A great widescreen for a great price. (Acer AL1916ws)

Member Name: codiak

Product:	Acer AL1916ws
Date:	10/07/07 (110 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Great value for money, and widescreen.

Disadvantages: No height adjustment.

Here is my review of the Acer AL1916WS, where to start well maybe a bit of background and why I bought it.

6 months before I bought this screen id bought myself a 19" TFT screen to replace my old CRT monitor and realised it didn't quite fit my requirement but that's my own fault as it was bought in a hurry.

So with my mind made up on the fact that the old screen just wasn't right for me I decided to be a bit more careful and do a little research. With a little flick over the likes of www.overclockers.co.uk and www.dabs.co.uk I was seeing the Acer standing out from all the rest of the 19" screens on 2 major points (1) its widescreen and (2) the excellent price.
Even though I trust both overclockers and dabs they couldn't touch the price I got from www.ebuyer.com of £179.76 and that was with VAT and delivery. Id just sold my old TFT screen second hand and as you can imagine this didn't cost me very much on top of that

So I placed my order and a couple of days pass before I had my screen, so I opened the box to see a very well packed screen waiting to be setup. In the box you get the screen wrapped in a padded bag and polystyrene holders on both sides, along with an inner box containing manual, cd-rom, power cable and vga cable.

The build quality was fantastic and it came from a good brand name Acer so no needs to worry about the disappearing over night. Besides the look of the screen is nice, black base and rear of screen with a silver front and buttons.

Putting the screen together was a doddle just pop the screen in to the base and plug the cables in and your up and running. First thing to noticed when you switch the screen on is the Acer logo every time, maybe I can turn it off but im not really into reading manuals so maybe I will look into it one day if it annoys me. To auto adjust the screen image at anytime just press the auto button, the menu can be accessed by the menu button at any time and the navigation is clearly explained on screen, here you adjust contrast, colour temperature, brightness etc.

Ok before I go into my thoughts on the screen I'll bore you all with the technical jargon etc.

Pixel Pitch - 0.284mm x 0.284mm (image sharpness)
Brightness (typ.) - 350 cd/m2
Contrast Ratio (typ.) - 500:1 (difference in light intensity between the brightest white and the darkest black)
Max. Refresh Rate - 1440 X 900@60Hz
Viewing Angle (typ.) - 170°(H), 170°(V)
Response Time (typ.) - 8ms
Input Signal - VGA (Analog D-sub)
VGA cable removability - Yes
Width 462mm
Height 385mm
Depth 180mm

One thing to note here is that it doesn't support the DVI interface but for the price that's understandable.

After plugging in and turning this screen on I was pleased to see the return of my POST (Power On Self Test) screen from my motherboard, my old screen was to slow in responding to display it, so thumbs up to Acer here.

Ok down to the detailed thoughts, since I bought this to use for gaming I looked into what was going to be new this year and found that widescreen is being supported by more games, the benefit of widescreen can be seen in the television market since your eyes are more better suited to widescreen images, your programs and movies are easier to watch the same a applies to games as the games really do become more immersive when put into widescreen.

The 8ms response time is hard to see, and that's even in some of the most action packed games I have played and the most action packed DVD's I have run on it. It really did prove to be a vast improvement over my previous 19" TFT with a sluggish 16ms response. Another plus point is that any widescreen DVD or TV show you play back on your PC will fill the screen if you use the right media player, gone are the days of viewing a little letter box on your PC. Only bad point which there is but I find pointless to mention is that there is no height adjustment on this screen, however I have noted this as this may be an issue for some, if you require a height adjustment id suggest one of the dell wide TFT's.

So this is good for gamers but what about the home / office user what does the widescreen do for you that a conventional screen cant? Well think about when your screen gets cluttered with windows that are open, or you want to run 2 windows side by side, you will find that 2 programs fit well into the wide aspect on the screen side by side unlike the old square screens used today.

One thing to make a note of though, the true widescreen resolutions can only be supported under Windows XP so be warned users of windows 98 or 2000.

Ok to tie things up and make a conclusion this screen suits games on a budget perfectly, it ticks all the boxes for wide aspect, response time, colour vibrance and contrast ratio.
The only draw back being the lack of height adjustment.
The DVD and TV playback will support full widescreen mode if used under the right media player.

For the home / office user its like any screen you use right now but you will find benefits that wide aspect screens provide and that media playback can be full screen without the old letterbox view.

For the price I have hard time being picky over things like the lack of DVI input, speakers and height adjustment.

Since I have a 5.1 speaker setup I don't need the speakers and am glad that cost of something I don't need is not being passed on to me.

From me it gets a nice 9.5 out of 10

As a note, the latest verion of this screen has a quicker response time of just 5ms response.

Summary: Hard to fault for the price.

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