Dell UltraSharp U2312HM for $229+tax

[JustAnEngineer]

The Dell UltraSharp U2312HM is currently on-sale for $229+tax with free shipping.
http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/68447/d ... 80-monitor

Here's a review:
http://www.tftcentral.co.uk/reviews/dell_u2312hm.htm

[Hoser]

Moved to the Hot Deals forum.

[BlackStar]

I've seen this monitor in person and own the previous model U2311h. It's a pretty sweet deal, pretty much the best monitor in its class, at this price range (easily better than the LG 231 eIPS we bought at work).

Pros
+ Great for gaming (0.6ms input lag, whereas most monitors have >10ms). No ghosting.
+ Great color reproduction for video and photos.
+ Pretty good out-of-the-box calibration, can become even better with a proper calibrator.
+ Uniform colors and blacks.
+ Very stable picture (no visible dithering).
+ Anti-glare coating.
+ Can be rotated to portait mode (two of those side-by-side would be perfect!)
+ DVI, VGA and DisplayPost connectivity.
+ 4 USB connectors.

Cons
- Anti-glare coating is very aggressive, leading to visible 'sparkling' on bright colors.
- Text contrast could be better.
- Viewing angles are good but not perfect (white 'clouding' on steep angles, due to lack of polarization filter).
- No HDMI input (need a DVI adapter).
- 6bit eIPS panel + dithering, instead of true 8bit H-IPS. Not noticeable unless you are *actively* looking for it (I don't know how they managed, but its dithering implementation is very very good, without visible artifacts).

All in all:
Gaming: 5/5
Text: 4/5
Video: 5/5

I'm very happy with this monitor. I'm a die-hard CRT fan, and only gave up my Trinitron once I came across this monitor. I've played Mass Effect 2, Skyrim, BF3, SC2 and watched an untold number of movies and it looks positively gorgeous - even compared to my CRT on the side!