MaximumPC 2008 10

the new wave of LCDs

Taking a cue from ViewSonic’s playbook,

Westinghouse’s L2610NM produces a crappy

image out of the box. We haven’t seen a

display ship with such a whited-out picture

in a long time. And unlike ViewSonic’s

VX2240w, adjusting the L2610NM’s bright-

ness and contrast settings does little to help

matters. Switching through the display’s

color temperatures requires a large contrast

adjustment, as moving from one mode to

another tends to wash out a huge section of

the display’s lighter grayscales.

The color saturation on the 1920x1200

display suff ers from its overly bright settings.

It trades richness and vibrancy for a brightness

that can overpower the natural look you’d

expect images, and even your desktop, to

have. Colors look white, blacks look gray—

everything looks far more washed out than

we’d ever want. Depending on which color

temperature we picked, the monitor’s gray-

scales were imbued with various tints of color.

We were unable to fi nd a true black-to-white

gradient even once.

We’d normally list the connections this

display carries right here, but it’s irrelevant;

we don’t want you connecting anything to this

26-inch spotlight.

Westinghouse

L2610NM

No adjustments could

save this display

Word to the wise: A monitor’s brightness isn’t

like whipped cream. Overloading the display’s

luminosity won’t make the picture any sweeter.

SPECIFICATIONS

VIEWABLE AREA 26”

NATIVE RESOLUTION 1920x1200

INPUTS VGA, HDMI

PANEL TYPE TN

VERDICT

$500, http://www.westinghousedigital.com^4

WESTINGHOUSE L2610NM

Size is important, but so is quality.

Hannspree’s 27.5-inch HF289HJB fits the

former just fine, but its average perfor-

mance makes us yearn for a better-quality

picture to fill the massive screen.

We had to crank the brightness on this

1920x1200 display to the maximum level

to achieve the best results in DisplayMate’s

series of grayscale tests. Even aft er this ad-

justment, the display reproduced less detail

in its darker values than any other monitor in

this feature. The HF289HJB isn’t as bad on the

lighter side of the spectrum, but it’s not good

enough to compensate for the limited range

of dark values.

The HF289HJB had more trouble produc-

ing lighter colors against a white background

than other monitors we’ve tested. This re-

sulted in skin tones that looked washed out in

our real-world testing situations. On the gam-

ing front, our Call of Duty 4 run-through lost a

bit of its visual fl air. The shades of green in the

image suff ered the most, and black scenes as a

whole appeared slightly tinted with blue.

If we had our way, we would have made

a few changes to this monitor. For starters,

the display doesn’t come with any pre-

sets. None. We tweak our displays, but not

everyone enjoys fi ddling with the nuances

of brightness, contrast, and color. We’d also

fi x the HF289HJB’s strange audio setup. The

single included speaker sends out its mono

sound from the back of the display. This

creates a strange auditory eff ect that could

easily be improved by replacing it with two

front-facing speakers.

You can adjust the height and angle of

this mammoth monitor, but not pivot it or

change it to portrait mode. But that’s OK:

There are far more changes this panel needs

than increased ergonomic options for it to

be a king of the huge displays. We’d rather

spend the cash on a better-performing,

smaller panel.

Hannspree HF289HJB

Acceptable performance for a beastly large display

VERDICT

$580, http://www.hannspree.com^6

HANNSPREE HF289HJB

SPECIFICATIONS

VIEWABLE AREA 27.5”

NATIVE RESOLUTION 1920 x 1200

INPUTS VGA, DVI, HDMI, Component

PANEL TYPE TN

No banding? No color-tracking issues? The HF289HJB avoids

these problematic picture issues entirely.

52 | MAXIMUMPC | OCT 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com