HP LP2475w, IPS 24" Official Thread! (Now Available from OcUK)

HiggsBoson · 23 Sep 2008 at 01:52

Hi. I was looking for info on this monitor and I found your great forum.

The only thing holding me back from purchasing it is the text problems that some people mention in this thread. For what I've read it looks like it's related to the subpixel layout of H-IPS screens. In fact, in the KDE linux desktop you can specify various font anti alias sub-pixel hinting modes (RGB, BRG, Vertical RGB and Vertical BGR). It looks like for H-IPS one has to choose Vertical RGB. Don't know if Windows have some equivalent (hidden?) setting.

It would be great if someone owning the monitor could test RGB and vertical RGB sub-pixel hinting modes to see if that sheds some light on the issue. If there are no penguin lovers here, any Gnu/Linux distribution live CD with KDE would allow to test it without installing (launch 'Control Center' and find the preference in Appearance and themes | Fonts | Use anti aliasing = Enabled | press confiure button)

martian_aphid · 23 Sep 2008 at 07:29

Yea I would say you are right Higgs, however from what I have read M$ currently do not cater for these anomolies like it appears KDE does. It's been a while since I used linux, does Kubuntu have a live cd I can dl and test for you or is there a better option?

HiggsBoson · 23 Sep 2008 at 09:40

martian_aphid said:
Yea I would say you are right Higgs, however from what I have read M$ currently do not cater for these anomolies like it appears KDE does. It's been a while since I used linux, does Kubuntu have a live cd I can dl and test for you or is there a better option?

You can get Kubuntu from the official site. Although they announce it as an install CD, it's a live CD. Note that antialias settings on the KDE ControlCenter only affect KDE applications (kdelibrary based) and not apps based on other toolkits (like OpenOffice, for example). I think there is a similar preference for GTK based applications, but that will require editing some configuration file.

Thanks.

martian_aphid · 23 Sep 2008 at 09:45

Ok I will try that, I did check the kubuntu site but noticed it said install cd and didn't want to install at this time so I searched for a live cd and started to dl from here: http://releases.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/hardy/
Only 10% done so I've cancelled it ; )

Do I need the release with KDE4 to take advantage of the antialias settings?

HiggsBoson · 23 Sep 2008 at 11:47

martian_aphid said:
Ok I will try that, I did check the kubuntu site but noticed it said install cd and didn't want to install at this time so I searched for a live cd and started to dl from here: http://releases.ubuntu.com/kubuntu/hardy/
Only 10% done so I've cancelled it ; )

Do I need the release with KDE4 to take advantage of the antialias settings?

No need for KDE4, the antialias settings are present in 3.5.

And many thanks for your testing!

eddablin · 23 Sep 2008 at 12:40

Can I just check that I have set up my monitor correctly. I downloaded that profile you posted philjohn. I changed the monitor settings through the front panel by using the settings it recommended. I then did the LUT manager thing.

I didn't do Spyder is that something I should do?

Will this be correct for PS3 to?

What is Calibrize? shall I do that too?

Thanks!

philjohn · 23 Sep 2008 at 13:00

eddablin said:
Can I just check that I have set up my monitor correctly. I downloaded that profile you posted philjohn. I changed the monitor settings through the front panel by using the settings it recommended. I then did the LUT manager thing.

I didn't do Spyder is that something I should do?

Will this be correct for PS3 to?

What is Calibrize? shall I do that too?

Thanks!

Calibrize is a "by eye" calibration utility that creates an ICC profile. Try both, but you're probably better off with the proper ICC profile.

ecat · 23 Sep 2008 at 13:21

The weekend was quite a strain, the best part of two days looking at the monitor for blinks or flickers or shadows or shades. Last night I arrived home, switched on the PC, forgot all about analysing every pixel and simply got on with a fairly normal web/pc session. It was an absolute joy, no ill effects, no eye strain, I'm very pleased. Highlights if you wish would be a HiDef promo video of Gwen Stefani - 'What You Waiting For?' and just about any picture on the bbc website featuring the background of the main Labour Conference stage, this monitor is capable of stunning imagery. On the other side of the coin I was vividly reminded just how bad wide gamut can be without proper support :

http://www.channelflip.com/2008/09/22/viva-pinata-2-trouble-in-paradise/
http://www.channelflip.com/2008/09/15/location-based-gaming/

look out for the oranges on the grass in that last one. :eek:

I still don't see text as wrong <shrug>

martian_aphid · 23 Sep 2008 at 13:35

Yea ecat I know what you mean, I think reading and making ones self more informed can actually have negative effects. When I got my first TFT monitor I had no idea about anything regarding response time, input lag, gradients, etc, etc. All I checked was that I had no dead pixels once I was happy with that I pretty much just got used to the monitor straight away. Probably checking it now with a calibration device it would fail poorly but without knowing that it made no difference to me. Now being more into researching stuff I find myself checking obsessively all the issues people have pinpointed, which can kind of ruin the experience :S

I do agree the wide gamut is the main issue with this monitor for me but I do feel that Badass' comments about increasing support for wide gamut monitors will become a reality in the near future since that is the way that many new monitors seem to be heading and it makes sense that the software is there with it. For that reason I feel that I have kind of invested in the future although I will have to deal with a bit of CCC tweaking for the time being to keep those colours in check.

CaptainCrash · 23 Sep 2008 at 14:22

ecat said:
The weekend was quite a strain, the best part of two days looking at the monitor for blinks or flickers or shadows or shades. Last night I arrived home, switched on the PC, forgot all about analysing every pixel and simply got on with a fairly normal web/pc session. It was an absolute joy, no ill effects, no eye strain, I'm very pleased.

You make a very good point, and I'm a little reluctant to report my own negative experiences, as I really don't like to think I might be raining on other people's parades and preventing them from enjoying their monitors.

Unfortunately though, with the colour/brightness shift I honestly *couldn't* just "get on" with a PC session (believe me, I tried), as it seemed like the problem was in my face all the time. I couldn't with hand on heart even say it was a serious problem by any objective measure, just one of those things I found impossible to tune out and put to the back of my mind.

As you say, the monitor's image quality is generally stunning, so I'm going to order another one anyway and hope for the best - the fact that other people are obviously happy does at least give me some reason for optimism.

kmetek · 23 Sep 2008 at 16:31

omg i got it in my countray, can't believe it !!!!!!!!

nightrhyme · 23 Sep 2008 at 17:19

kmetek said:
omg i got it in my countray, can't believe it !!!!!!!!

Congrats kmetek Did you buy ?

builder22 · 23 Sep 2008 at 18:55

really the best idea is once you get a monitor is to never read a monitors forum again lol

kmetek · 23 Sep 2008 at 19:30

nightrhyme said:
Congrats kmetek Did you buy ?

yes ordered it, distributor has it for appx 495€

495.00 EUR=391.918 GBP

martian_aphid · 23 Sep 2008 at 19:59

thats a good price

kmetek · 23 Sep 2008 at 20:16

directly my price, without margain......at store i'll sell it appx 15% expensier.

smogsy · 23 Sep 2008 at 21:38

im Buying a 3rd HP LP2475W in Jan decided to get it with my Mac Pro Purchase & Ram

nightrhyme · 23 Sep 2008 at 21:40

lol I paid 468£

But mainly because I know myself and need the safty of 14 days money back guarantee :rolleyes:

smogsy · 23 Sep 2008 at 21:44

i got mine about a month ago now for £422

wm51 · 23 Sep 2008 at 21:46

Mine arrived today, it's enourmous!

Very impressive build quality & stand adjustments, I think I spotted 2 lazy subpixels earlier but I can't seem to see them now so I'm very happy with it.

I'm still unsure about the colours but I've only had a very quick play with settings so I could do better and think i could live with the wide gamut, skin tones seem to be the worst victims.

I'm not happy with text though. Some of the time it seems fine, but it's not what I'd call sharp, and sometimes I can clearly see colours around it, almost like the DLP rainbow effect. Bit of a bugger for me as I'm I spend a lot of time looking at code.

I'm also getting a bit of eye strain with it, I'm not sure if this is just the sheer size of it or something else, I've got brightness down to 10 and i sit about 60-70cm away.

It almost appears to be flickering very slightly, I'm not sure if this is the refresh rate? I've always seen flicker on crt's below 85hz, but I didn't think LCD's had the same problems, I've never seen lcd flicker before.