CyberVision: Japanese monitors for the cost-conscious

By Zatni Arbi

JAKARTA (JP): A friend, Mr. Mohan, one day asked me whether I really believed it was worth it to spend an extra Rp 500,000 (US$209) to Rp 700.000 just to gain an additional inch of viewing space on my PC monitor.

These figures were, and still are, roughly the price difference between a good 14" GTC Digital monitor and a Samsung or Sony 15".

The question he asked was indeed a tough one, given the fact that, in general, the monitor prices double as you go from one size to the next. The typical 15" monitor, for instance, comes at about half the price of the 17", and the 20" or 21" ones cost more than twice the 17" ones.

Because of my poor vision, my answer was: "We should buy the largest monitor we can afford." For average people, however, the answer is not that straightforward. Large monitors are unfortunately still very expensive.

Monitor manufacturers like to say that, in order to increase the size of the viewing area, they have to put in a lot of additional microelectronics. This, they would say, is the reason for such an exorbitant price difference. Can we believe it?

I think a more sensible reason is that the larger monitors have not reached the popularity of the standard 14" ones. The result is that they still don't enjoy the scale of economy that their production of 14" monitors enjoy. If more people were buying the larger monitors, the monitor-makers would be able to gradually cut their prices to make them more affordable.

Luckily there are more and more new monitors that have slowly lowered the prices without sacrificing display quality. As far as display quality is concerned, because of the availability of so much information for the savvy consumers today, it would be hard to sell bad monitors anyway.

One of these promising monitors come from CyberVision, a Japanese monitor-maker that we haven't heard very much about. By courtesy of PT Ark MediaTech, I was able to test two models of their 17" lines, CyberVision ds69T and ds86. Of the two monitors, the latter is the higher-end model.

Features

The lower-end model, ds69T, has a maximum display resolution of 1280 by 1024 pixels at 60 Hz refresh rate. At 1024 by 768, which I think is the ideal resolution for a 17" monitor, it can handle the flicker-free 85 Hz vertical refresh rate. The higher- end one, ds86, can display a screen of 1600 by 1200 resolution at 65 Hz or 1280 by 1024 at 75 Hz. Of course, as you already know, the higher the vertical refresh rate, the softer the screen is on our eyes. Both these monitors have a maximum refresh rate of the stable 85 MHz.

Display setting can be controlled with the use of four buttons and an on-screen menu. Frankly speaking, the arrangement of the buttons would be simpler if the monitor-maker had placed these buttons in north-south-west-east format instead of in their current four-in-line style.

You can adjust a lot of display settings through the monitors' fairly complete on-screen menu, including pincushioning, trapezoidal, parallelogram, rotation and color temperature. The ds86 even lets you control horizontal and vertical moire pattern, if you happen to encounter this problem.

However, because of the not-so-intuitive button placement, it took me some time to really get accustomed to using the buttons. The good thing is, you don't have to fiddle with these settings very often. You can choose between five languages for the menu, including Italian and Spanish. Strangely, neither Japanese nor Chinese is available.

The more expensive ds86 model is price under Rp 2 million. If you wish, you can connect your PC or Mac to it with a 5-BNC connector. This cord is optional, though. The monitor comes only with a cord that has a 15-pin mini D-sub plug on both sides, which looks exactly the same as the one Samsung 15GLi has. I like it because it would be easy to replace if necessary.

The inexpensive model, which costs less than Rp 1.8 million, instead comes with a fixed signal cord. Except for the maximum display resolution, horizontal scanning frequencies, the moire control and the signal cable option, the two models do not differ very much in their other specifications.

Both models store the settings digitally in their memory, so there is no need to readjust the settings each time you change your resolution or use them with a different computer. Both boast a 27 mm dot pitch.

Their display quality is very good for midpriced monitors. Text is sharp and the colors are brilliant. You might jump every time you turn these monitors on, since there's always a slight exploding sound before the display starts to emerge.

Sound

It's nothing to get alarmed about though, as the sound is a little more audible than with other monitors. The power button is a little old-fashioned, too, and has to be pushed to turn the monitor on or off. Other new monitors on the market just require you to slightly touch the switch to power them up or down.

Of the two monitors I tested, the ds86 gives a perfect focus on all edges. The brightness is almost uniform all over the screen, making your WordPerfect page look like real paper. The cheaper ds69T has a slight misconvergence on the top, left-hand corner of the screen, perhaps just a quirk not typical of this monitor. As always, you should take your time testing a monitor before you buy. Imperfections in the display monitor will be noticeable right from the moment it is taken out of the box.

Both monitors are equipped with the latest standard features in display monitors, such as DPMS and DDC. Using the available VESA DMPS screen saver feature of Windows 95, I could throw the monitors into their standby mode automatically after one minute of idle time. During normal operation, these monitors consume about 110 watts to 120 watts of electricity. In the standby mode, they consume only 15 watts. Depending on your settings, they can turn themselves off and use up only eight watts.

As you can see in the accompanying picture, the beige cabinet is pretty stylish. Surprisingly these 17" monitors are not much bigger than a 14" TV monitor. Despite their 16" viewing area, they do not really take up a lot of space on your desk. Their antiglare and antireflection screen is almost flat.

PT Ark MediaTech informed me they provide service for these monitors, which carry a three-year warranty. If you happen to be on the market for a midrange monitor in the 17" class, you should take a look at these two. For public presentations in an exhibition booth or text page layout jobs, even the cheaper ds69T should be more than adequate. Their display quality may not be on par with the high-end ones from Japan, such as Panasonic or Eizzo Nanao -- both of which are truly a treat on the eyes -- but the new monitors are at least 30 percent cheaper.