Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro 27" LCD Monitor
by Chris Heinonen on October 22, 2013 2:40 AM ESTAll calibration measurements are done using SpectraCal’s CalMAN 5.1.2 software with a custom workflow. Measurements are done using a C6 colorimeter that is first profiled against an i1Pro spectrometer to ensure accurate results. There are two sets of targets we use. Pre-Calibration and our first calibration aim for 200 cd/m^2 with an sRGB gamut and a gamma of 2.2. This is a common real-world setting for a display. The final target changes the light level target to 80 cd/m^2 and the gamma curve to the tougher sRGB standard.
|
Pre-Calibration |
Post-Calibration, 200 cd/m^2 |
Post-Calibration, 80 cd/m^2 |
|
| White Level (cd/m^2) | 200.35 | 199.3 | 80.05 |
| Black Level (cd/m^2) | 0.2025 | 0.22 | 0.1669 |
| Contrast Ratio | 989:1 | 906:1 | 480:1 |
| Gamma (Average) | 2.1753 | 2.1818 | 2.41 |
| Color Temperature | 6401K | 6495K | 6551K |
| Grayscale dE2000 | 4.1762 | 0.5602 | 0.9245 |
| Color Checker dE2000 | 3.2142 | 0.99 | 0.9496 |
| Saturations dE2000 | 2.5515 | 0.8227 | 0.8172 |
There are a few preset modes in the Monoprice Glass-IPS Panel Pro display but the Standard mode is the most accurate one. Using Standard and the Normal color temperature setting produces the most accurate results. However the display still has a serious lack of blue in the grayscale and the gamma curve is well off the target. Colors also show large errors, especially in skin tones, and they are exacerbated at lower levels due to the poor gamma. The overall errors levels are OK but not wonderful.
With our 200 cd/m^2 calibration target the Monoprice improves immensely. The contrast ratio has a slight drop to 906:1 but the grayscale, RGB balance, and gamma are now virtually perfect. More impressive is the improvement in the color gamut, with an average dE2000 for the color checker chart of only 0.99. A few samples creep above dE2000 levels of 2.0 with a little over-saturation in the red gamut, but otherwise this performance is phenomenal.
The 80 cd/m^2 results are not quite as good. Due to the high minimum brightness setting the contrast has to drop all the way down to 480:1 to make our light output target. The grayscale and gamma are still virtually perfect, but you won’t have the same pop that you do with a target of 160 cd/m^2 or higher. What you will see are colors that are still as accurate as the prior calibration and virtually perfect.
Considering the color accuracy of this display after calibration, it seems like a cheap option for an image professional that wants color accuracy. Fortunately for them contrast ratio usually isn’t as important as overall accuracy so that lower contrast level may still work fine. That small change could produce a display with one of the overall best set of post-calibration benchmarks that I’ve yet to test if it were made.
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jbm - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
ASUS PB278Q is $553 on amazon.com right now. I'd buy that for sure over the Monoprice (in fact I have bought it and I am very happy with it). The PB278Q has a matte screen, is calibrated well, has all the inputs you will ever need AND comes with all the cables in the box (VGA, HDMI, DVI, Displayport) - which also needs to be figured into the price difference.Nfarce - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Nice monitor. If you are lucky enough to get one with no dead pixels or massive light bleeding problems. I tried three of them and returned them all. Two had dead pixels that were towards the middle of the screen and noticeable, and the third a massive light bleed problem in the lower right and left, probably an assembly defect with the bezel not fitting correctly. I gave up and am now spending time researching other 1440p options.jabber - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Buy some carbon fibre vinyl sheeting (or whatever) and cover the bezel in that.l_d_allan - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
> Considering the color accuracy of this display after calibration, it seems like a cheap option for an image professional that wants color accuracy.I infer by "image professional" that you would include a serious Photoshop'er. At that level, I think they would expect closer to 100% coverage of the Adobe-98 gamut, rather than sRGB.
Or not?
foxalopex - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Last I recall Adobe-RGB is a wider colour space than standard sRGB which is closer to what most consumer monitors are tuned to. To display it usually requires a wide-spectrum backlight system which you are not going to find in a cheap monitor.From what I recall it depends on the application. Image Professionals who publish primarily to the Internet or to a consumer's computer will never need more than sRGB because that's what your customer's only capable of. Using Adobe-RGB would likely throw off the picture quite a bit because it won't look remotely correct in sRGB colorspace. I believe the Adobe-RGB users are probably printing images where there's a very wide colorspace or just archiving the pictures and trying to see as much as possible.
piroroadkill - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
I think he's inferring that someone who wants colour accuracy probably wouldn't be looking at a cheap ass monitor.JDG1980 - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
I'm hoping that Monoprice or one of the Korean vendors will soon release a 4K monitor that uses the inexpensive panel used on Seiki 4K TVs, but supports 60 Hz via DisplayPort. (The panel on the Seiki TVs can do that, it's just that they are limited to HDMI input, which only supports 30 Hz.)2560x1440 is OK, but surely we can do better now.
Nfarce - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Have you even looked at the performance hit on modern high end graphics cards that 4K monitors do? See Tom's review on Sept. 18 about it. At high graphics quality settings in games, a 4K monitor (2160p) brings a Titan GPU to its knees, barely making 30fps in games like BF3, and with Crysis 3, forget about it unless you go with two Titans. At some point, the law of diminishing returns steps in to what the eye can appreciate as resolutions move up anyway. But if you've got the money, sure, you *can* do better than 1440p - you just need to pony up for the GPU power to run it.iamlilysdad - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Not everybody is in it just for gaming.DanNeely - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
The few games they benched with no AA gave good results on the single titan. I'd like to see more tests like that with a single 780. While 140DPI isn't enough to not benefit from AA; it's enough of an improvement over 100 that it's not as important.That said; my budgeting is assuming that when I jump on the 4k bandwagon that I'll need to add a second GPU to feed it at native resolution.