Philips 190B4CS

Of the screens in our comparo, Philips' 190B4CS is definitely the simplest, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I'm a big fan of extra features like picture-in-picture, rotation to portrait, and oodles of video inputs, but I suspect few users actually need all that extra functionality. Extras are cool, but paying for them isn't if you never plan on using them.

So the 190B4CS isn't exactly brimming with fancy extra features, but that doesn't mean the screen is completely boring. Let's have a look.

Philips' 190B4CS has a better contrast ratio than many of our contenders, but its brightness rating of only 250 cd/m² is one of the worst. Honestly, I'd rather see an LCD screen biased towards a better contrast ratio since just about every LCD I've laid my eyes on has been more than bright enough.

As for responsiveness, the 190B4CS's 25 millisecond pixel response time is par for the course. Since six of the seven displays we're looking at claim pixel response times of 25 milliseconds, so it should be easy to see if any of the manufacturers are being overly optimistic with their screen specifications.

Only handful of these LCD screens can bend over backwards, and the 190B4CS is one of them. Honestly, I'm not aware of any real-world applications that require this level of flexibility. It would certainly be easier to hang the 190B4CS on a wall with the screen folded flat, but its mounting holes are located on the back of the panel, so this display can be hung without the base. In addition to flopping onto its back, the 190B4CS can swivel from left to right, though that should be less necessary given the screen's generous 170 degree viewing angle. The 190B4CS's monitor arm also gives the screen a couple of inches of height adjustment, but screen tilt must be re-adjusted every time the arm height is changed.

The 190B4CS's front panel is lined with a collection of six buttons and a blue power LED. For my tastes, the button feel is a little too mushy, but I'll forgive Philips since they throw the blue LED into the mix. Eizo's L795 also has a blue power LED, but the 190B4CS's is brighter so, uh, Philips wins.

With only DVI and VGA inputs, one button would suffice

It strikes me as a little odd that the 190B4CS dedicates two front panel buttons to input switching because the screen has only two input ports. I'm not sure why Philips thinks users need to switch between only two inputs in two different directions. Perhaps the button layout was carried over from a monitor with additional input ports.

Fortunately, the multiple input buttons are actually useful for manipulating the 190B4CS's on-screen display. The OSD lets users control everything from brightness and contrast levels to color temperatures and RGB levels. When using the screen's analog VGA input, the OSD lets one tweak the screen's vertical and horizontal position, phase, and clock.

Philips covers the 190B4CS with a three-year warranty. Unfortunately, Philips' dead pixel policy is a little less defined. Screens are covered when five or more pixels die, but there's apparently a little wiggle room since the policy "depends on each specific case." Philips wasn't able to provide me with more detail on whether it's case-by-case analysis takes into account dead pixel proximity, or whether it depends more on how much you yell at them over the phone.