NEC CRT Monitors

[Rhin0]

Originally posted by: robarrieta
RhinO:

I may be having the same issues as you. I am super sensitive to changes in my display. And I am also conditioned to looking at text on an LCD which is super bright and super crisp. The text on my CRT isn't horrible, it just isn't great. However, the text on my CRT at work looks better. The work CRT uses shadow mask technology, not aperture grill. I read somewhere that aperture grill monitors are just not very good at displaying text, which if true, sucks since I plowed down $500 bucks on my NEC monitor. That said, it seems that others on this board don't have any issues.

Rob,

I'm in line to talk to a tech person on Mitsu live chat right now. The only LCD I ever used it my g/f laptop and it is really clear on text. Looks like crap on games compared to two monitors but is "okay" I guess.
My IBM P72 17" is an aperature grill also and I'd say it looks about the same. Like I said when I get home tonight from class i'll compare them again on text and see what is going on.

For example, right now i'm looking at the reply box and the text is really clear in the middle the screen but the tet up where it says "Reply to Topic: NEC CRT Monitors" is blurry and hard to focus on. If I drag the box down about 6" it becomes crisp. Please, give that a try and see if it does it to you too. I will also compare with my friends 930sb

I paid 199.00 for mine it was refurb but still, i'd like it to look the way it is supposed to!

 

[slash196]

In my experience, CRTs are pretty ornery about being turned off and on again. After being turned off for a while, CRTs get really blurry and painful to look at, but if you leave the monitor on, it tends to work itself out. Not really a solution, just my two cents.

 

[Rhin0]

rob,

I've been talking to the tech here. He asked me what res I said 1280x960, he said no go on that move to 1280x1024 @ 85 hz. I left it at 100HZ and moved to 1280x1024... My blurriness went away mostly. Then he told me to check my font smoothing settings which I am playing with now. There are three settings: Off, standard, clear type. I am trying off right now.

Also I moved my contrast to 80% from 100% and my brightness to 50% from 40%. It made a big difference. For some reason I thought it only looked right at %100 contrast with 40% bright but this actually looks ok, just takes a while to get used to seeing it.

I will report back to you...


EDIT:

Ok I am back on 1280x960 again since 1280x1240 is supposedly the incorrect aspect ration. The guy at NEC told me it was the recommended setting for this monitor. I can't tell for sure if the blurrieness is back or not. It appears it may be... I am going to restart and see if that font change takes effect

 

[n19htmare]

I have a NEC AccuSync 95f 19", i get blurry text too

 

[Patrick Wolf]

I've got an NEC FE991SB and have NO blurriness anywhere. My resolution is 800x600 at 85hz. Contrast is at 100%, and brightness at 55.8%.

 

[robarrieta]

Wolfman:

I'll modify my settings to replicate yours just for giggles...let's see what happens. How crisp and bright is your text compared to an LCD?


By the way, I just purchased the Klipsch speakers you have and they rock!

Rhino:

Any progress?

 

[scooter1]

Originally posted by: alexandernevsky
rhino give that focus control a twirl - why not.

Hope its got nothing to do with reports that Nec - Mitsu have halted all crt production in 2005.....

Where did you hear NEC is halting CRT production?

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: Rhin0
I've been talking to the tech here. He asked me what res I said 1280x960, he said no go on that move to 1280x1024 @ 85 hz.

thats when i woulda ended the chat. you should be able to run in 800x600 or all the way up above 1600x1200 with that crt. they can give a recommended res all they want, but with the right settings, that nec should work perfectly at any res.

 

[Excelsior]

Originally posted by: wolfman579
I've got an NEC FE991SB and have NO blurriness anywhere. My resolution is 800x600 at 85hz. Contrast is at 100%, and brightness at 55.8%.

It is worse or actually visible at higher resolutions, not 800x600.

 

[Rhin0]

Originally posted by: deadseasquirrel

Originally posted by: Rhin0
I've been talking to the tech here. He asked me what res I said 1280x960, he said no go on that move to 1280x1024 @ 85 hz.

thats when i woulda ended the chat. you should be able to run in 800x600 or all the way up above 1600x1200 with that crt. they can give a recommended res all they want, but with the right settings, that nec should work perfectly at any res.

by "No go" I meant he said the 1280x1024 was the recommended resolution not 1280x960... Funny enough it seemed to immediately solve the problem. I made some adjustments to contrast and brightness. I was actually able to lower then quite a bit (remember we had talked about how high I had to have them) and after my eyes adjusted it worked great at the lower settings.

I am still doing some testing but for a while there it looks as though I had all but eliminated the blurriness

I will let you know

 

[robarrieta]

NEC is definitely ending CRT production. I heard from the NEC tech support guy.

 

[BenSkywalker]

One other thing. The monitor comes with an analog VGA cord. Yet the eVGA 6800 GT only has DVI connectors. Therefore, I am using an analog to DVI adapter. Could this be the culprit?

Absolutely. Running a 2141 here and there is a clearly noticeable decline in 2D IQ when a DVI-VGA adapter is used(tried this using multiple boards from nV and ATi). I'm mulling over going with an SLI setup and I will not buy a board that lacks VGA out- they compromise IQ too much.

 

[robarrieta]

Skywalker:

Great...So what is the soultion is I only have a video card with a DVI input?

 

[alexandernevsky]

Well, I would not put too much importance on what a live chat tech support or just general tech support from nec mitsubishi has to say - from my experience it's just someone sitting infront of a spec sheet with no added knoledge whatsoever - just mouthing away things like "recommended resolutions".

Robarieta - You wrote earlier about having difficulty in aquiring true blacks with your monitor - which should really be this models bread and butter - hows that coming?

 

[robarrieta]

alexandernevsky:

Still tweaking it, getting a little better but still no comparison to my LCD. BenSkywalker mentioned that it may be an issue with my VGA to DVI adapter. I hope this is not the case since my 6800 GT card only has DVI inputs.

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: BenSkywalker

One other thing. The monitor comes with an analog VGA cord. Yet the eVGA 6800 GT only has DVI connectors. Therefore, I am using an analog to DVI adapter. Could this be the culprit?

Absolutely. Running a 2141 here and there is a clearly noticeable decline in 2D IQ when a DVI-VGA adapter is used(tried this using multiple boards from nV and ATi). I'm mulling over going with an SLI setup and I will not buy a board that lacks VGA out- they compromise IQ too much.

You can just buy a DVI-A to VGA cable. Those came with my IBM monitor, and worked perfectly.

 

[Zebo]

I get crystal clear even at 20x15 on 2070. course it's way too small for me too see anything..

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: robarrieta
Skywalker:

Great...So what is the soultion is I only have a video card with a DVI input?

They are forceing us to LCD's.. go with the flow or get a GT which still comes w/ 15pin

 

[robarrieta]

Is there a difference between a DVI-A to VGA adapter and a DVI to VGA adapter?

 

[robarrieta]

Wow. After all this headache with the blurriness, all I had to do was tweak the screws on the side of the monitor for a much better (although not perfect) picture. Two questions:

1. Why in the hell doesn't NEC support tell people about this?

2. Why do they make these srews so friggin hard to reach?

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: robarrieta
Wow. After all this headache with the blurriness, all I had to do was tweak the screws on the side of the monitor for a much better (although not perfect) picture.

Like I said above, I have no bluriness at all and seem to have perfect settings for my viewing (2070SB)... BUT, I haven't installed my DVI-only 6800GT yet. In case the bluriness arrives with the use of the VGA adapter, I want to make sure I understand this correctly:

The focus is the screw on the rear left (looking at the monitor from the front)? There's also one on the right... what does it do? How much turning of the screw was needed to affect the display? Naturally, I don't wanna mess with it atm since it's working perfect, but would like to know just in case it gets worse with the adapter.

 

[Patrick Wolf]

Originally posted by: Excelsior

Originally posted by: wolfman579
I've got an NEC FE991SB and have NO blurriness anywhere. My resolution is 800x600 at 85hz. Contrast is at 100%, and brightness at 55.8%.

It is worse or actually visible at higher resolutions, not 800x600.

It gets worse, 1024x768 isn't too bad, any higher is..not good. I keep my desktop resolution at 800x600, but for games I turn it way up, and the text is perfect on games.

 

[Patrick Wolf]

Originally posted by: robarrieta
Wolfman:

I'll modify my settings to replicate yours just for giggles...let's see what happens. How crisp and bright is your text compared to an LCD?


By the way, I just purchased the Klipsch speakers you have and they rock!

Rhino:

Any progress?

I won't lie, I had a Dell Ultrasharp 2005FPW, I ran it 800x600 also, the text was awesome, it was basically bolder, and was much better than my CRT's text. But my CRT is a 18", and the 2005FPW is a 20.1", so there is size a difference, which makes a little difference. The 2005FPW's text would still be quite a bit better than a 20" CRT, or any LCD's text would be much better than any CRT's.

The text on my CRT is easily acceptable, and games don't look any better than on a CRT.

 

[alexandernevsky]

Originally posted by: robarrieta
Wow. After all this headache with the blurriness, all I had to do was tweak the screws on the side of the monitor for a much better (although not perfect) picture. Two questions:

1. Why in the hell doesn't NEC support tell people about this?

2. Why do they make these srews so friggin hard to reach?

Well. at least you got over your fear of "screwing it up".

The sad thing is that it's not even a secret - it's just not mentioned on the official spec sheet. Since when you call tech support all you get is someone putting you on hold while they go and fetch this very same sheet of paper - you're not likely to hear it (or any other useful info) from them.

These monitors for some reason often arrive at the customer out of whack and need to be adjusted - thankfully they included these screws which can be accessed.
These are intended for use by "skilled service personnel" - and should help you to lengthen the useful life of your monitor whitout having to open the cover. In a stupid way they're hard to reach so that you the customer are not tempted to "play" with them.
I'm not sure but I think that they are mentioned somewhere in the accompanying literature which is somewhat redeeming and allows yu to blame yourself a little for not having carefully read through the booklet.

At least in my experience the lab people would have you bring the monitor all the way down to the lab because they "know how to tune it for you" (which raises the question "why didn't you do it to begin with")
rather than just tell you to do it yourself and have it done with in 30 seconds. The reason for this is either they assume you're a complete idiot or they just want to feel important and clever with their "insider trade secret".

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: alexandernevsky
Hope its got nothing to do with reports that Nec - Mitsu have halted all crt production in 2005.....

*sniff*