Datacolor User to User Support Group.

THis may be OT here, but I suspect many here would have useful
feedback as a lot of monitor calibration issues are here, and I do use
the Colorvision software for this.
I've been eeking out every last minute of use I can from the CRTs
here, and prepping for the inevitable got an economy LCD to break my
teeth on, knowing I can move it to a less critical color computer here
if it falls far short.
But, for the money, it's supposed to be OK, just not a pro. Samsung 214T.

Anyway, the transition to this has not been good, and of course I read
elsewhere LCDs seem to be letting a lot of people down. I'm using
Spyder2Pro, and EyeOne photo and neither seem to really be able to get
this thing in line. I have to say the on screen controls make no sense
whatsoever, so that's a problem all it's own.

Anyway, the biggest problem for critical work is that neutrals
crossover all over the place, particularly in shadows. OF course the
usual, non color managed stuff is way over saturated, etc..
All three of the elderly CRTs here out perform this thing, unless I'm
doing something very wrong.

Can others here tell me- is this usual hard knocks for this
transition? Or is this monitor just not very good? I'm on a budget
like everyone else, and spending over $2k to get performance not quite
as good as my nice big old $900 Mitsubishi is a pretty bitter pill.
Thanks all. John, you can delete this if it's way OT.
Tyler

--- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com, "Tyler Boley" <trboley@...> wrote:
> 
> Anyway, the transition to this has not been good, and of course I read
> elsewhere LCDs seem to be letting a lot of people down. I'm using
> Spyder2Pro, and EyeOne photo and neither seem to really be able to get
> this thing in line. I have to say the on screen controls make no sense
> whatsoever, so that's a problem all it's own.
> 
> Anyway, the biggest problem for critical work is that neutrals
> crossover all over the place, particularly in shadows......

No it's not OT at all...

Funny I had some odd behaviors with my Samsung 213T (not 214T) - like saturated colored 
shadows. The 213T died a while ago, cat clawed it, and at that time I used the EyeOne, only had 
the Spyder CRT at the time, the EyeOne helped for the most part...but wasn't too impressed 
with the EyeOne performance. My memory is foggy but I remember I always shook my head at 
the screwy Samsung monitor interface...that could be where it's messing up.

If I remember correctly Steve M. has the 213T...has he been able to give you any insight with the 
Samsung interface?

You could just have a bad monitor. How does the default Samsung monitor profile look?

What are your settings for gamma, brightness and color temp?

If you spent $2000.US for the Samsung...I probably would have purchased an Apple monitor or 
NEC instead.

Best,

John

Hi John, well, I did not explain myself well. I certainly did not pay
$2k for this monitor, I think only around $350 on sale. I meant it was
hard to swallow the idea of spending that much on a really good one,
which seems to be the prices, on something not quite as good as my old
CRTs.
I'm having trouble with the evolution in general, from CRTs, and was
wondering if my experiences were unique.

The settings on this thing right now are-
Contrast- 71
Brightness- 100
Color tone- Warm1
gamma- -0.1
color weakness custom2

lord knows what much of that means or how I even arrived at it. There
must be some kind of law that new products must not adhere to excepted
industry wide and well known settings nomenclature. Color temp? Why
have that?
It's probably just not a very good monitor, and will get relegated to
a lesser box.
Still, it doesn't make me feel real comfortable about the move to LCDs
in general...
Tyler


--- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com, "John Vitollo" <jvlist@...>
wrote:
>
> --- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com, "Tyler Boley" <trboley@>
wrote:
> > 
> > Anyway, the transition to this has not been good, and of course I read
> > elsewhere LCDs seem to be letting a lot of people down. I'm using
> > Spyder2Pro, and EyeOne photo and neither seem to really be able to get
> > this thing in line. I have to say the on screen controls make no sense
> > whatsoever, so that's a problem all it's own.
> > 
> > Anyway, the biggest problem for critical work is that neutrals
> > crossover all over the place, particularly in shadows......
> 
> No it's not OT at all...
> 
> Funny I had some odd behaviors with my Samsung 213T (not 214T) -
like saturated colored 
> shadows. The 213T died a while ago, cat clawed it, and at that time
I used the EyeOne, only had 
> the Spyder CRT at the time, the EyeOne helped for the most
part...but wasn't too impressed 
> with the EyeOne performance. My memory is foggy but I remember I
always shook my head at 
> the screwy Samsung monitor interface...that could be where it's
messing up.
> 
> If I remember correctly Steve M. has the 213T...has he been able to
give you any insight with the 
> Samsung interface?
> 
> You could just have a bad monitor. How does the default Samsung
monitor profile look?
> 
> What are your settings for gamma, brightness and color temp?
> 
> If you spent $2000.US for the Samsung...I probably would have
purchased an Apple monitor or 

> NEC instead.
> 
> Best,
> 
> John
>

Color temp is important because that is what regulates how warm or cool the
image color is.  I am not sure what the range of options are under "Color
Tone," which is as far as I know the color temp setting, to be able to
decipher what "Warm 1"  indicates; but typical settings allow for one of
three options - 9600K which is cool bluish, 6500K which many select as their
standards and is on the cooler side of daylight, and 5500K which is daylight
but to my tastes is slightly too warm. I suspect that the "warm 1" setting
stands for 5500K.

 

 LCDs tend to be more contrasty and brighter than CRTs so the settings on
LCDs might need to be lowered to obtain a comparable level to a CRT's; but
that will depend to some degree on t he ambient light in the room as well as
what your calibration and profiling software requires or suggests.

 

I do not have the slightest idea what the "color weakness" setting stands
for or what range of settings it allows.  Play with it to determine what
looks and feels good to you as well as to see what it does.  As for the
gamma, it defines the luminescence value.  I will assume that 0.0 defines
the lower extreme of the gamma scale and 1.0 is the upper end of the scale
with the higher the gamma resulting in an overall shift of the gray standard
to the lighter side and a lower gamma producing a darker image.  CRTs
typically used the equivalent of a 1.9 gamma for Macs and 2.2 gamma for PCs
.  I am not sure how these standards translate for LCD displays or into the
scale used by your monitor.

 

Hope this helps; I will leave it to others to give more detailed and
accurate descriptions with respect to your scales and what they should be
set at.

 

From: colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com
[mailto:colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Tyler Boley
Sent: Monday, April 21, 2008 11:15 PM
To: colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [colorvision_group] Re: possible OT: LCD advice

 

Hi John, well, I did not explain myself well. I certainly did not pay
$2k for this monitor, I think only around $350 on sale. I meant it was
hard to swallow the idea of spending that much on a really good one,
which seems to be the prices, on something not quite as good as my old
CRTs.
I'm having trouble with the evolution in general, from CRTs, and was
wondering if my experiences were unique.

The settings on this thing right now are-
Contrast- 71
Brightness- 100
Color tone- Warm1
gamma- -0.1
color weakness custom2

lord knows what much of that means or how I even arrived at it. There
must be some kind of law that new products must not adhere to excepted
industry wide and well known settings nomenclature. Color temp? Why
have that?
It's probably just not a very good monitor, and will get relegated to
a lesser box.
Still, it doesn't make me feel real comfortable about the move to LCDs
in general...
Tyler

--- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com
<mailto:colorvision_group%40yahoogroups.com> , "John Vitollo" <jvlist@...>
wrote:
>
> --- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com
<mailto:colorvision_group%40yahoogroups.com> , "Tyler Boley" <trboley@>
wrote:
> > 
> > Anyway, the transition to this has not been good, and of course I read
> > elsewhere LCDs seem to be letting a lot of people down. I'm using
> > Spyder2Pro, and EyeOne photo and neither seem to really be able to get
> > this thing in line. I have to say the on screen controls make no sense
> > whatsoever, so that's a problem all it's own.
> > 
> > Anyway, the biggest problem for critical work is that neutrals
> > crossover all over the place, particularly in shadows......
> 
> No it's not OT at all...
> 
> Funny I had some odd behaviors with my Samsung 213T (not 214T) -
like saturated colored 
> shadows. The 213T died a while ago, cat clawed it, and at that time
I used the EyeOne, only had 
> the Spyder CRT at the time, the EyeOne helped for the most
part...but wasn't too impressed 
> with the EyeOne performance. My memory is foggy but I remember I
always shook my head at 
> the screwy Samsung monitor interface...that could be where it's
messing up.
> 
> If I remember correctly Steve M. has the 213T...has he been able to
give you any insight with the 
> Samsung interface?
> 
> You could just have a bad monitor. How does the default Samsung
monitor profile look?
> 
> What are your settings for gamma, brightness and color temp?
> 
> If you spent $2000.US for the Samsung...I probably would have
purchased an Apple monitor or 

> NEC instead.
> 
> Best,
> 
> John
>

--- In colorvision_group@yahoogroups.com, "Tyler Boley" <trboley@...> wrote:
>
> Hi John, well, I did not explain myself well. I certainly did not pay
> $2k for this monitor, I think only around $350 on sale. I meant it was
> hard to swallow the idea of spending that much on a really good one,
> which seems to be the prices, on something not quite as good as my old
> CRTs.
> I'm having trouble with the evolution in general, from CRTs, and was
> wondering if my experiences were unique.


Oh sorry...misunderstood you regarding the price. Good you only paid $350.00.


> The settings on this thing right now are-
> Contrast- 71
> Brightness- 100
> Color tone- Warm1
> gamma- -0.1
> color weakness custom2

Holy Moly that's some messed up info! Warm1? Color Weakness? Crud!

Have you tried setting the Contrast to 100% and just use the Brightness setting to lower the luminous? Is there a way to 
reset to default setttings or zero out the settings?
 
> lord knows what much of that means or how I even arrived at it. There
> must be some kind of law that new products must not adhere to excepted
> industry wide and well known settings nomenclature. Color temp? Why
> have that?
> It's probably just not a very good monitor, and will get relegated to
> a lesser box.
> Still, it doesn't make me feel real comfortable about the move to LCDs
> in general...

Yeah the Apple LCD seems very good to me. I've heard some good things about NECs. I have used Eizo ColorEdge 
LCDs...really nice just too dang pricey.

I have a cheap 19" Dell that does OK...the shadows block up from 91% to 100%...only notice when doing low-key B&W. 
Also if I change my viewing angle (45 degrees sideways) I can see to about 97%. I'm sure that doesn't instill confidence 
in LCDs!

I just picked up a used Xerox Phaser 8400 solid ink printer, I presume 
my PrintFIX pro / Spyder3 will not be of much use with this CMYK 
printer -- any recommendations on where to send out for a CMYK profile 
for a solid ink printer? (Also any sources of information, 
recommendations, or caveats regarding non OEM ink appreciated.)

Mark Godfrey

I am using the Xerox ppd for the Phaser 8400DX with Adobe PostScript3 
-- printing an RGB vs CMYK test file (100%K vs 100%CMY) confirms this 
is a CMYK printer.
Mark Godfrey
- - -
On May 30, 2008, at 6:23 AM, CDTobie@... wrote:
> I wouldn't make that assumption too hastily. Most printers use CMYK as 
> the basis of their print colors, but they usually run from an RGB 
> driver. I've profiled a number of the Phaser "crayon printers" as well 
> as the Phasers that are actually toner devices (Lasers) with our 
> products. Unless you are sending CMKY files to a special PostScript 
> driver, you can probably profile this device with PrintFIX PRO; though 
> you should certainly download Spyder3Print v3.5 software, if you are 
> actually still using the PrintFIX PRO software.
- - -
. . . any recommendations on where to send out for a CMYK profile
for a solid ink printer? (Also any sources of information,
recommendations, or caveats regarding non OEM ink appreciated.)