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High-quality 19" CRT's???
OK, my old 17" CRT is dying and while I was planning on going dual-display this year by adding a 21" CRT and moving the 17" CRT to the side for a palettes screen, I was forced to order a 19" CRT quickly to replace the 17" CRT. This display system is used for color-critical photo & graphics editing, so the current crop of <$1000 LCD panels is out of the question.
In the course of researching the current 19" CRT market, I discovered that very few high quality 19" CRT's are stilll available. For me, high quality in a 19" CRT means: daily working res of 1280x960x32 @85Hz, max res of 1600x1200x32 @80Hz, dual inputs (1 D-sub, 1 BNC), adjustable RGB guns for color calibration, good geometry & convergence, comprehensive geometry controls, and good max/min brightness & color purity across the screen. The Samsung 900IFT and Cornerstone 1460 would’ve fit the bill quite well, but I can't find any at monitorsdirect.com, newegg.com, or buy.com.
Plus, since I'll be getting an aperture grille 21" CRT, I want the 19" CRT to be shadow mask - there are very few shadow mask 19" CRT's availlable, and none with the great Hitachi Ergo Flat tubes. I ended up looking at: Cornerstone p2450 (ap grille), Hitachi CM721F (1 input), Mitsubishi DP930SB (plan on getting the 21" version), NEC FE990 (1 input), and Samsung 957MB (can't adjust RGB guns). Eizo’s and Sony’s high-quality 19” CRT’s were too expensive.
I did find a 17” CRT (Samsung 700IFT) that has dual inputs, but I decided not to trade off screen space for input flexibility – finally settled on the Hitachi CM721F, swayed mostly for the 5-year warranty and monitorsdirect.com had a 1¢ sale on upgrading to the fast-replacement warranty. Very sorry I missed out on the Hitachi shadow mask tubes, but it looks like LCD panels have started to really push CRT’s out of the computer display market.
In the course of researching the current 19" CRT market, I discovered that very few high quality 19" CRT's are stilll available. For me, high quality in a 19" CRT means: daily working res of 1280x960x32 @85Hz, max res of 1600x1200x32 @80Hz, dual inputs (1 D-sub, 1 BNC), adjustable RGB guns for color calibration, good geometry & convergence, comprehensive geometry controls, and good max/min brightness & color purity across the screen. The Samsung 900IFT and Cornerstone 1460 would’ve fit the bill quite well, but I can't find any at monitorsdirect.com, newegg.com, or buy.com.
Plus, since I'll be getting an aperture grille 21" CRT, I want the 19" CRT to be shadow mask - there are very few shadow mask 19" CRT's availlable, and none with the great Hitachi Ergo Flat tubes. I ended up looking at: Cornerstone p2450 (ap grille), Hitachi CM721F (1 input), Mitsubishi DP930SB (plan on getting the 21" version), NEC FE990 (1 input), and Samsung 957MB (can't adjust RGB guns). Eizo’s and Sony’s high-quality 19” CRT’s were too expensive.
I did find a 17” CRT (Samsung 700IFT) that has dual inputs, but I decided not to trade off screen space for input flexibility – finally settled on the Hitachi CM721F, swayed mostly for the 5-year warranty and monitorsdirect.com had a 1¢ sale on upgrading to the fast-replacement warranty. Very sorry I missed out on the Hitachi shadow mask tubes, but it looks like LCD panels have started to really push CRT’s out of the computer display market.
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