Dell U2311H: E-IPS, Full Adjustments, and DisplayPort
by Chris Heinonen on September 27, 2011 12:20 AM ESTOSD Menus
Dell has had a nice OSD setup for a couple of generations now that uses four soft keys to control all the settings. Brightness and Contrast of course allows access to those controls, but the majority of the settings are located under the Color Settings menu. Input Color Format can switch between RGB and YCbCr when using the DVI input. Gamma allows a choice between PC gamma (typically 2.2) and Mac (1.8)—though note that since OSX 10.6 the Mac gamma standard has changed to the more common 2.2 gamma setting. Mode selection allows you to choose between Standard, Multimedia, Game, Warm, Cool, and Custom (RGB) modes. If you choose the Custom mode you get the option to calibrate the white balance at a single point using Red, Green and Blue gain controls. Here's a gallery of the various OSD settings.
If you are using any input other than the DSUB15, most of the choices under Display Settings are locked off since they aren’t needed with a digital video signal. Other settings simply allow you to customize the menu interface, including position, time out, transparency, and switching between landscape and portrait orientations. Finally the personalization menu will let you change the default behaviors of the soft buttons to whatever settings you need to frequently access, though Auto-Adjust and Input Source are the only two choices available beyond the defaults. A quick selection of Portrait/Landscape orientation for the menu would also be nice for people that often move the monitor position around.
For an in-monitor calibration, the Dell offers very little beyond the single RGB control if you are in custom mode. This does let you dial in a specific point (I chose pure white) to the D65 standard, or another color temperature if that is required. Beyond this, the gamma only offers two settings and there is no RGB Low option for calibrating another point, so this is as far as you can go without using software for the calibration.
Viewing Angles
One of the hallmarks for IPS displays has been wide viewing angles and the Dell 2311H keeps this up. Moving off to the sides, and from top to bottom, brightness and color stay at very good levels until you start to move to extreme angles where you wouldn’t be able to use the display for work anyway. This also allows you to easily use the monitor in the portrait orientation without having large color or brightness shifts while reading or editing a document. As panels gets larger, having these viewing angles becomes more and more important.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
65 Comments
View All Comments
pjfan75 - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
Can you post the calibration settings you used?Thanks!
cheinonen - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
I will grab the settings I used when I hook it up for the input lag test, but since the majority of the work is done with the LUTs in your graphics chip, and not in the display itself, it really won't get you that much of an improvement over the stock settings unfortunately.Zoomer - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
How about a review of HP's line, the ZR24w, etc, or maybe even a comparison?Makaveli - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
I own a ZR24w and I would love to see this. From what I have researched the HP screen uses a real 8 bit panel and would love to see this compared to the 6bit+AFC in this. I'm sure if the Dell 24 inch version is also a non 8 bit panel?TegiriNenashi - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
EOMthe_engineer - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
I Love these monitor reviews. Thanks for working hard on this! I would REALLY love to see a comparison of the current monitor technologies (H-IPS; E-IPS; Samsung's newest tech; TN Panels; Discussion of diffrent styles of LED backlights etc....) and which monitor lines we can find each tech in. This is a very complex issue and actually very pressing for those of us amateur turning-pro photographers and graphic designers on a budget. I've even seen some 40"+ LED backlit Televisions that claim to use IPS technology that i've considered for a display mostly for the price per inch ratio seems so good. Any thoughts on why that might be a bad idea if they are IPS panels?fausto412 - Wednesday, September 28, 2011 - link
yes, i would like to see comparison of technologies...TwinIon - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
I own three of these. Great monitors for the price, but wait for a Dell sale. I got mine for closer to $250 each.Displayport was a real benefit for me since I wanted to use the screens for eyefinity, which requires DP for at least one monitor. The ability to adjust the screens has also proved very important for eyefinity.
xi1inx - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
I remember in the last 12 mouth, another Dell IPS screen was reviewed here. I recall this monitor have also the same price and have a Genesys board inside to drive the lcd. It's perhaps the same monitor with the dvi port instead, So, I saw many reader comments say this ips lcd is bad. I prefer at this point to pursage a nice and bright used Apple Cinema Display HD 23" for the same price. I very happy with this screen and I'm not regrating to don't have buy the Dell one.I think the Apple Cinema Display HD 23" could be a good comparison monitor to compare with new incomers, if you could found one like new. It perhaps an old monitor but it certainly clash with the Dell offers.
Despoiler - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
Check out the NEC EA231WMi. It has since been discontinued for a newer model with a LED backlight, but I got it just south of $300. It suffers none of the issues Dell's E-IPS panels do. It can be calibrated to be quite accurate. In fact you can download a calibration file from TFT Central from their review. You can get .inf files for 75hz and 83hz over display port. There is no input lag or ghosting that I can detect and I play a lot of video games. The stand on it is epicly good. Simply put there are a lot better and cheaper E-IPS panels than what Dell offers. NEC is worth the look.