White still looks white at brightness 18.7%, contrast 15.0% (Advanced DVM off). Anything lower isn't quite white IMO. It's OK for text but not that contrasted.
What I prefer for text is:
Brightness: 60.9%
Sharpness: 20.8%
DV Mode: Gaming (changes contrast and color temp for you)
Advanced DVM: On
I love advanced DVM. It's awesome for most things. Maybe for web browsing I'd turn it off. But for plain old text, games, HD video it'll be left on.
I'm typing over a cyan background right now (AnandTech theme), and this looks contrasted at the above settings.
Text is very high contrast here and it doesn't feel too hard on the eyes. I changed my mind about advanced DVM. I actually like it for text work. Whenever you turn it on it seems to darken everything (reduce blinding brightness) but it maps the colors correctly.
Granted it's not all the monitor's fault the text isn't perfectly contrasted. I'm sure if I told it to display pure black text it would look decent on almost any setting. Unfortunately I can't do that. I definitely need my text anti-aliased.
I still don't quite understand how these DV modes work. Some change the brightness/contrast, some don't.
My gamma on the OS/video card side has been 1.0,1.0,1.0 all throughout, and I intend to keep it that way. Otherwise I'd be clipping the gamut.
The biggest challenge is getting text to look as good in contrast as HD content does. If you raise the contrast too high, the white/light background of your text editor will be blinding. On the other hand, I want the text to be sharply contrasted, just at a lower brightness. What is clear is that I should probably get some more ambient lighting (it's pretty dark in here thanks to the light that burned out). That helps things a lot.
The best scene yet I've seen this monitor produce is this one:
http://xtknight.atothosting.com/hd/bbcjapan1.png
On this one, I wouldn't be able to tell if the inferno was inside my monitor or in a video:
http://xtknight.atothosting.com/hd/bbcjapan2.png
This is from the Quicktime HD gallery (BBC Japan H.264 1080p). It produces picture elements in one screen in a way three other monitors couldn't if they were to attempt each element individually. The gamut and contrast is incredible. The AS-IPS panel looks its most amazing at a low brightness. Everything is extremely saturated and deep but does not look oversaturated at all.
Other LCDs just can't produce these deep colors in an effective way (too much backlight is let through). Only S-IPS monitors truly can. Basically it's the quality of a high-end rear-projection CRT with a flat profile and a crystal clear image and small dot pitch. As for the granite object at the right of that pic, you might as well be looking through a window. The violet on the parasol is perfect. The depth of field down the path is reproduced brilliantly. Vegetation on the left is a very deep/intense lush green, but without being oversaturated in the least.