Samsung SyncMaster 1100P

The Samsung 1100p Plus CRT monitor is an ENORMOUS 21 inch monitor with a 20 inch viewable area, with a .21 mm dot pitch, 1800 X 1400 resolution, with the choice of using the standard 15 pin video cable or BNC connectors. (BNC cables are generally used more in high end applications rather than in video gaming or daily work. Don't let this discourage you in buying the monitor since it is just as good for your normal everyday use also. Okay now back to the "ENORMOUS" word that was mentioned at the beginning of this paragraph. Enormous is not an understatement. With the flat screen models of today, this monitor looks like a T-Rex in comparison. It is 47 cm from front to back 51 cm from top to bottom (including stand) and 50 cm from side to side and also weighs about 26 kg. Now this might not be a space saving monitor, but if you are not worried about space this amazing monitor could be for you.

Now for the display control buttons. This monitor unlike most monitors has its display control buttons on a “hidden console”. To access this console all you have to do is tap the panel door lightly (as you would with some of your cd player slides) and POOF it slides out. On this slide you will find 7 buttons set up in 4 groups. (From left to right) The first button brings up information with one push, and user timing with the second push. The second button clears the menu off the screen. The third group of buttons include 4 buttons. One button on top, on on the bottom and one on each side. These buttons are used to scroll through the menu screens. The last button brings up the main menus that will adjust your display. By pressing this you will be able to access and or change the screens position, zoom, parallel, trapezoid, pinbalance, linearity, color, clear moire (moire is a pattern laying over another pattern [picture included at bottom]), focus, convergence, clarity, degauss, recall, input type, video input level, the video connection type (regular cable or BNC), menu position, menu duration and language. It is set up into 9 different languages. You will not find the brightness and contrast controls on this slide due to they are located underneath the monitor for ease of use. Since these two features seemed to be used more frequently they decided it would be best for them to be out in the open so not to be an annoyance when adjusting.

Okay I seen the results of the Nokia monitor test for this monitor, so I decided to use this test for myself. I will include the “experts” results along with my own opinion on this:

Geometry
E- Slight distortion of the test grid at the top of the screen, and along the outer edge row to the test grid squares. Central region of the screen is perfect.

ME- I did not notice any distortion. From center to the edges of the screen it all looks pretty much the same. If there is any distortion it is not noticed by the untrained eye.

Brightness/Contrast-
E- Excellent contrast and brightness/ Black is very dark and whites are vibrant.

ME- I agree totally with their results.

High Voltage-
E- vertical and horizontal trace lines remain absolutely steadfast.

ME- Again, I totally agree with this one.

Colors-
E- Excellent colors in whit, black, green, blue, and red test screens.

ME- Great color. Every color was very strong.

Convergence-
E- Loss of convergence in the upper right hand corner with the red color. On the pink test grid, blue is slight off at the outside edges and even partially in the center. The yellow and light blue test grids show excellent convergence.

ME- Now I guess I am blind, I ran this test three different times especially after reading there comments again. I found that all the tests seemed to come out basically the same. Everything seemed to be fine across the whole screen throughout all tests.

Focus
E- Very good focus in the center of the screen and good focus towards the outside edges of the screen. Noticed some faint shadowing on the right of the test patterns on the white screen.

ME- Agreed the focus is wonderful. Yes there is the slightest bit of distortion on the outside edges but no more than you could expect from all CRT monitors. Now about the shadowing on the white pattern. I did not see this. Again I ran the test 3 or 4 times to ensure I was not overlooking it, If it is there it is not noticeable again with the untrained eye.

Resolution
E- Excellent resolution at the center of the screen area and at the corners. As is the case with most displays, the 1 pixel separated vertical lines showed some blending effects.

ME- I agree. My testing concluded that the resolution was wonderful. Yes there is some blending on the 1 pixel test.

Moire-
E - Excellent, no visible image effects

ME- Agreed totally.

Readability
E- Excellent readability. Again some faint shadowing or streaking was noticeable on the white background to the right of the test pattern.

ME- Excellent test results. I did not notice any shadowing.

Jitter-
E- None visible at all.

ME- Test unavailable for me.
Jitter is the deviation in or displacement of some aspect of the pulses in high frequency digital signal.(shaky pulses) This definition is found at Search networking.com

Okay now that you have the test results time for some personal opinions on this monitor. This monitor was a major improvement over my 17 inch monitor that I had previously. I have noticed that everything is much clearer and that much easier to look at. It has a great resolution and rapid refresh rate. Whether playing video games via the internet or disc, or watching DVD's this monitor has proven its worth by providing a crystal clear image day in and day out.

The drawbacks to this monitor is that it does require a large amount of power and its size. It draws up to approximately 140 watts of power, which is relatively a lot. The size as discussed earlier is a big consideration for anyone with limited space either in your home/flat or the computer desk itself. Even with these two negative points I have not regretted buying this monitor for one second. Its positive points farly outweigh its negative ones and if I had it to do all over again I would buy it without question.

And now the best for last. The specs for this monitor are as follows:

Picture tube: 21” full square. 20” viewable. Horizontal dot pitch .21mm. Flatscreen 90 degree deflection, anti-reflective coating with anti-electrostatic properties.

Synchronization- Horizontal: 30-115kHz, Vertical: 50-160 Hz

Resolution-1800X1400

Signal Cable- D-Sub 15 pin analog or BNC (RGB, HV, V)

Video Clock- 280 Mhz

Color Temperature- 9300K, 6500K, 5000K, or user defined.

Warm up time 30 minutes

Power consumption- 140W running and 15 W standby

Power 100-240 VAC

Weight- 57.6 pounds/ 26 Kg

Nokia Monitor test results by the “experts” for this monitor were found at pcstats.com and the Nokia Monitor test can be found at: construnet.hu/nokia/monitors/test/monito​r_test.html

Price range: On the internet- 270 GBP- 355 GBP
Second hand computer stores- I found mine for 70 pounds at a second hand store in Cambridge. I have still seen other places that have sold it for upwards of 400 GBP but for the purposes of this review I just included the internet prices that were available.

Thank you for reading.
Cheers
Dave