bmw
February 6th, 2005, 20:19
Just a heads-up to anyone looking for a good quality LCD display for not a huge amount of cash. I got one of these at work and I liked it so much I bought one for home. I needed an LCD to dock my PowerBook to so I wouldn't strain my eyes so much trying to use the 12" screen all day.

The Dell 1704FPV is 1280x1024, has both DVI and VGA (front-panel switchable), impressive contrast of 1000:1, good brightness (280 nits) and respectably fast pixel response. Mechanically, it has nicely balanced height adjustment and the entire screen rotates 90 degrees for accessing cables and connectors. I imagine you could also switch the video mode from landscape to portrait (1024x1280), but I can't seem to do that with my PB (no Mac OS X driver provided).

The black front bezel is quite slim and not dominated with a big round Dell logo like their earlier models. Four small recessed silver buttons control on-screen-display, VGA/DVI, "auto-adjust" (figures out the best image placement and size for the provided signal), and power.

But the thing that blew me away was that by ordering this at www.dell.ca, with a 15% discount (first online order), I paid $381 Can (under $300 US). There's nothing else in that LCD product range comparable to it. All other DVI-equipped LCDs start around $600 Can. and go up from there.

In use, the video is super bright and sharp. Movies play back on it just fine, and it has a bunch of extra USB plugs (4) so you can attach a keyboard and mouse and your camera to it (very handy).

I've used both of my monitors (home and work) for over a week now and about the only complaint I have is that when you pull out the DVI connector, it neither switches to the VGA input nor goes into sleep mode (it stays in test mode with a coloured menu floating around forever). But you can switch it over manually to the other input with a single button-push, so that's not a big deal.

It comes with drivers for Windows, and colour profile config files for Windows and Mac OS X. I think this would be an ideal monitor for a Mac Mini; it's certainly perfect for my software developing and web surfing needs.

Highly recommended!

intx
March 5th, 2005, 04:56
How did you get a 1704FPV from Dell.ca? I don't see it on the site.

bmw
March 5th, 2005, 15:02
You're right, the 1704FPV has disappeared from the product list. I wonder if the FPV is obsolete already? :-) The 1704FPT appears to be a very similar model for the same price, but it has 500:1 contrast and 12mS response. It's a little brighter at 300 nits. Still has DVI and VGA connectors. Other specs the same.

Beats me why they do these things! The FPV is still in the USA catalog. Oh well ...

intx
March 5th, 2005, 15:54
I want the 1704FPV!!

Why is it only available on the US Site? Damn Dell!:2gunsfiri