Baseline monitors

| SPECIAL TO GCNIt's natural to prefer a large monitor; the bigger the better. And LCD models would be high on anyone's wish list.But when the time comes for information technology departments to peel off megabucks to upgrade PC systems, 17-inch CRT screens priced at around $200 look pretty good.Most of us don't really need a large, top-of-the-line monitor for the work we do every day. For word processing, spreadsheet, office automation and Web viewing, any of the 17-inch models listed in this guide would do nicely.A 17-inch CRT monitor with 1,024- by 768-pixel resolution and a fast refresh rate will render crisp, flicker-free images that satisfy all but the most demanding graphics professionals.And it's not hard to see their cost-effectiveness. You can buy two Viewsonic 17-inch CRTs for the price of one of the company's economy 19- or 20-inch models.For $174 each, you can pick up a half-dozen Samsung SyncMaster 750S CRTs for less than you'd spend on only one of the company's $1,105 17-inch SyncMaster 170T LCDs.A cathode ray tube, or CRT, monitor uses an electron gun to shoot electron beams through a metal mask or grille onto the back of the monitor screen, which is coated with colored phosphor dots. The beams excite the phosphors, causing them to glow in various intensities to produce the images on your screen.CRT manufacturers use one of two types of masks or grilles in their products. The shadow mask is a metal plate perforated with tiny holes that help filter and focus the electron beam to produce the image. The aperture grille is a wire frame with vertical metal strings.The general opinion is that shadow mask technology is preferable for computer-aided design and manufacturing, precision graphics and heavy text, and that aperture grille technology works best for desktop publishing and graphic arts, where very bright, rich and saturated colors are necessary.But because the baseline monitors listed here aren't designed for high-end graphics work, the distinctions are moot. Both shadow mask and aperture grille technologies produce excellent image quality for typical office tasks.The shape of a monitor's tube is an important factor in determining its overall viewing quality. CRTs in older monitors were often noticeably spherical, which slightly distorted the image, particularly at the edges of the screen. Nearly all new monitors are flat-square, rendering precise and proportional images.All the monitors listed in this guide have flat-square tubes. This feature is almost always paired with an antiglare, antistatic and antireflection treatment to help improve image quality from virtually any angle.Monitor size is measured diagonally, and there's always an inch or two around the screen's perimeter covered by its case. The viewable area of 17-inch CRT monitors ranges between 15.7 to 16.1 inches, with 16 inches being average for the models listed here.Consider the following criteria for evaluating CRT monitors: Dot pitch is the distance measured in millimeters between two phosphor dots of the same color inside the display screen. In flat-square tubes, the measurement is diagonal, but the actual measurement can vary between screens with shadow mask and aperture grille technologies. For example, a 0.25-mm aperture grille pitch is roughly equivalent to a 0.27-mm shadow mask dot pitch.If you forget everything else, remember this one thing about dot pitch: The lower the better. Don't buy a 17-inch with higher than 0.28-mm dot pitch. A unit with 0.27- mm dot pitch or less will meet your viewing needs nicely. Resolution is measured by multiplying the number of horizontal pixels by the number of vertical ones. CRT monitors can generally handle multiple resolutions, from 1,600 by 1,200 down to 1,200 by 1,024, 1,024 by 768 and even lower.More important than a monitor's advertised maximum resolution is its optimum resolution. Many manufacturers claim maximum resolutions of 1,200 by 1,024 or higher; read the fine print to determine if this is matched with a refresh rate of at least 75 hertz.For example, an expensive 17-inch monitor running a resolution of 1,200 by 1,024 pixels at only 60 hertz will flicker noticeably. The same display set to 1,024 by 768 at 85 hertz will provide clear, flicker-free images. Also known as scan rate, refresh rate is the speed at which the screen can refresh, or repaint, its images. The horizontal scan rate is measured in kilohertz and represents the number of horizontal lines the display can repaint per second. The vertical scan rate is measured in hertz and indicates how many times the entire screen can repainted from the top line to the bottom line per second.Horizontal and vertical scan rates are important performance measurements. A higher horizontal refresh rate enables the display to run at higher resolutions. A higher vertical refresh rate reduces the amount of noticeable screen flicker and results in less eyestrain. Beware of dirt-cheap 15- or 17-inch monitors that come bundled with low-priced computer packages from unknown retail outlets. If they have two or three analog knobs under the monitor's bezel, they're obsolete.Your monitor should come with on-screen digital controls that let you adjust brightness, contrast, horizontal and vertical images from a menu. Digital controls also let you check for convergence; degauss or demagnetize the screen; and eliminate barreling, pincushioning, and trapezoid- or parallelogram-shaped distortions. The monitor you buy should comply with MPR II and the Swedish Confederation of Professional Employees' TCO99 standards for regulating electromagnetic, magnetic and electric field emissions. It also should meet power and energy conservation standards. Look for the Energy Star logo to be sure the monitor meets the latest power management standards. Don't worry about them. I wouldn't turn down a monitor because it came with speakers, but I would not go out of my way to find one with them either. A baseline monitor is going to have fairly flimsy speakers. For good audio quality, buy separate speakers and a good sound card. Check the fine print. Monitors are most likely to fail during their first few weeks, or even days, of use. Who pays for delivery and return of the product when your monitor screen goes blank? What happens if your monitor is dead on arrival? Will the manufacturer add warranty protection, even for a fee?The 17-inch CRT monitors that fit my baseline criteria are among the best buys in IT hardware, but there are some caveats.Be careful about buying sub-$200 units available through online stores and computer magazines, and in office supply stores. Many units sold this way are discontinued models.If you're buying a new monitor for a legacy PC, check whether the old graphics card can handle higher resolutions and refresh rates. If not, replace it.Remember, there's no really objective technique for determining which monitor appeals to you the most. In the final analysis, the eyes have it.XXXSPLITXXX-