Customer Reviews

ViewSonic VX922 19-inch LCD Monitor

5 star:		(22)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

This monitor does have a tremendous refresh rate which makes for almost zero ghosting, but it also comes with the downside of bad viewing angles and uniformity.

The good attributes of the monitor are it's sharp picture and great refresh rate. The picture is one of the sharpest you will see in value priced monitors. The refresh rate is the best you will see among monitors with almost zero ghosting when scrolling down a website with a detailed alternating texture background and no noticable ghosting while gaming.

The bad attributes are it's viewing angles and uniformity. I purchased this monitor online thinking I could deal with the bad viewing angles I heard about. But unfortunately this affects the look of the monitor even when you are viewing straight on. You will notice the top of the screen is much darker than the bottom of the screen due to the aweful viewing angles. Plus the uniformity of the screen is pretty bad. The corners, especially the top right one, are much brighter than the middle.

When I received this monitor I thought the bad uniformity was a defect. I made the mistake of sending it to Viewsonic to get repaired. After over a month of flaking me off they sent me a replacement that had a bad pixel. If you send for a replacement from this company I think it's pretty surefire they will send you one back with a bad pixel. The replacement had the same bad attributes.

Anyways, I got rid of this monitor and instead went for a VX2025WM - it's probably about the best value monitor on the market and I very much recommend it. One tip I have is buying monitors from local stores. Most of them will allow you to return it within 14 days for whatever reason. Online stores are not so forgiving about monitors. You'll be better off working to find the monitor you want from local stores.

I purchased this monitor for home because I wanted to use it for gaming and it works well for that purpose. I do think that there are some terrible trade offs here, in that the monitor has horrible viewing angles. If your eyes stray away from looking head in into the monitor then you are going to see a lot of white fading into brightness. If that doesn't bother you, then this is a good monitor with nice color and fair contrast. I work in IT and have purchased hundreds of Viewsonics, Dells, and HP's. In the early days when LCD came out, the common complaint we had from users was the horrible viewing angles. The Dell ultrasharp came up with a solution that solved 75-80% of this problem. The viewsonic VG series we use at work also came up with good solutions to this viewing angle isue. My theory is that in order to provide the fast 2 ms response time on the VX922 there was some sort of engineering compromise that took place. The VX922 really sets back the viewing angle issue to where we were 4 years ago. In order to prove this, I took my new VX 922 and boxed to work to do a comparison with the Dell ultrasharp 1905. To my surprise and shock, the Dell blew away the Viewsonic in terms of color contrast, viewing angle and all. The Dell wins hands down, and I feel like a fool for having purchased this Viewsonic VX922 for home use. I called Viewsonic, and I have an RMA to return the VX922 directly to their Walnut California facility. I was given the name of their customer service-quality control manager. I really don't have the time to make my case with Viewsonic, and I don't expect them to do anything for me. In the interest of all of those who are going to purchase these models, I think somebody has to speak up. Hopefully CNET and Tom's hardware will come to the rescue with a review soon.

Switching from CRT to LCD: this is enough

This is a great monitor to switch from CRT to LCD. I've long held on to my crt because of "blurry" or slow-resposiveness on LCD's. I play fast paced first person shooters and this monitor definately performs much better than any other LCD I've ever tried to use before. If you are happy with your current CRT I would recommending keeping and waiting for an even better LCD, but if you're looking to buy a new monitor because your current CRT is failing I would certainly recommend transitioning to LCD through this product and not buying a CRT now. Current CRT's being produced have low supply amounts and limited options (not many high-end options). Quality crt's that could be found around the $300 range are no longer produced or are sold for $450 plus prices. This LCD has enough advantages (color, sharpness, reduced eye stress) to make up for the higher refresh rate of your CRT.

The previous reviewers state bad viewing angles and bad color reproduction. The viewing angles are enough if you are using this monitor for a single person to look at it straight on or from a slight angle. It is not for several people to watch a movie on. You will not see a darker side than the other or darker top than the bottom if you place the tilt of the monitor correctly, between an 85 and 95 degree angle, depending on seating height.

The reviewer complaining on bad color must have received a bad unit because the unit I'm using produces impressive, popping colors (Much better than my Samsung 21" crt, 19" crt, and 19" Dell Trinitron)

The reason the viewing angle is not as wide as other monitors is because of the type of panel this LCD uses. ALL sub 8ms panels use TN+Film panels to be able to reach the 4ms-2ms mark. Other kinds of panels for LCDs have better viewing angles but can not rid themselves from ghosting like this panel can because they cannot reach such low response times. This monitor is inteded to be used by a single user, not as a tv for an audience of more than 1.

Pros:

+ The sharpness and color reproduction is better than any of the 3 crt's ive owned (Samsung 1100 df 21" inch/ Dell Trinitron). Games look much more impressive on the native res of this monitor than on any other monitor I've ever owned.
+ There is no ghosting (trails on fast movement)
+ There are no artifacts on fast movement from overshoot (plagues other fast response time lcd's)
+ Feels smooth and is not hard to get used to after using 100hz and 100fps on the 21" crt.
+ Eye stress from looking at a monitor is reduced immensely using this monitor instead of a CRT.

Cons:
- Refresh Rate does not go up to 85hz like the older vx924 model does on 1024x768. (However, the vx924 model has overshoot artifacts from a more poorly controled overdrive engine)
- If you try you can still perceive a blur on far distance objects in games when moving your mouse quickly from one side to the other in First person shooters. It is so hard to percieve you will percieve it if you truly stop and look for it. I could only tell it was happening by having the game display on both my CRT and the LCD.
- Using games on a different resolution from the native resolution will decrease the sharpness of the image, so make sure you can run your games smoothly at the native res (read: good video card and processor) before you buy this monitor.
- No height adjustment, only tilt adjusment.

Conclusion:

If you are looking for If you're looking for great gaming performance and more impressive color and sharpness than your old CRT this can provide it all. I really wanted to give the review 4.5 stars, but I will give it 5 to offset the unreasonable reviews that give it one star and skew the overall star rating.

I bought this item on December 18th 2005. About one week ago (1/13/07) the monitor simply blacked out. It ran for one day of flickering madness and finally made a sound that only a welding torch should before expiring completely. While it worked the monitor was amazing. 2ms response time in video games eliminated all ghosting in even the most graphic and motion intensive First Person Shooters like Half-Life 2 and FarCry- it even ran Elder Scrolls: Oblivion like a charm. Sadly, $500 (In 2005) was much too expensive a price for a product that was fated to last only a year and then self-destruct. Although a downgrade from 19" to 17" I replaced the VX922 with the Samsung 731BF- 2ms response time and it costs less than $200. I also noticed that the Samsung 731BF gives off much less heat- it's only moderatley warm to the touch even after hours of use.

Normally I do not comment on computer tech. because I find that many electronic gizmos have love/hate ratings. But this time I have to seriously warn anyone looking at this monitor- DO NOT BUY- perhaps I had a bad expirience of a monitor breaking before its time, but there is no need to throw money away- do some research and find another model. Good luck in all of your future monitor hunting!

*Updated 1/24/07*
Ok, there is a 3 year Limited (Very limited) warranty for this LCD screen. On the phone with the Viewsonic warranty department the rep. that I spoke with said they will only replace your broken unit with a new one for 90 days. After this period you can return the item for repair and if they can repair it they will. However, if the item cannot be repaired you are at the mercy of what they send you to replace it. I was told that replacements are usually other refurbished units and sometimes they aren't even the same model that you initially purchased. Needless to say I'm as dissatisfied as ever especially because I had to pay the $20 shipping fee as well. I will be getting some type of LCD back in the mail- in the meantime I stand by my previous post ---DO NOT BUY!

This monitor is fantastic! Out of the box, it was easy to set up and, once the brightness was set, has worked flawlessly. Others have complained about the little "analog signal" box that pops up when the screen lights up, but on my monitor, it's down in the lower right corner and doesn't bother me. Overall, I have had no trouble with the monitor, it provides a great picture, and works well. I am completely satisfied with it.

This is a great monitor at the two-fifty i paid. It is very very fast. I play counterstrike:source, FEAR, and other fps's without any ghosting. The 2ms spec is right on. Tom's hardware states "if what you want is sheer performance, this is the monitor of choice", and i concur. Colors are rich, contrast is ample, text looks sharp. I find the uniformity very good. Solidly built. Stand and panel are one piece design so the box is a little bigger. No speakers and no USB ports, and that's fine with me. To be up front about it, the vertical viewing angle is even more narrow than the lateral viewing angle. So in my opinion it is not an all-purpose monitor which some criticize it for. So don't get for a dorm room if you're going to invite your friends over to watch DVDs. But for an individual gamer or for document or graphics work it is simply outstanding. Especially for gamers. The stand does not adjust up and down, only tilts a little. I've always thought viewsonic was a good company but pricey and out of reach, but i finally got a job and this is a good value at even 3 hundred.

I bought this LCD almost 3 months ago, and have been very pleased. I use it almost solely for gaming, and have found it to be bright, crisp, clear. It handles quick motion beautifully. After replacing an aging CRT, everything looked noticably better. It's a joy to look at. =)

I bought this monitor after my Viewsonic PF790 began to give out after 6 years of heavy use. I read the reviews and decided to go for a LCD display for the first time in my life. My old PF790 was one of Viewsonic's professional series CRTs, and I must say that the higher-end CRT monitors still give a much better picture than a LCD display. Many have commented on how this display was as good as their previous experience with CRT monitors, or professional publications claim that LCD have narrowed the gap to the point that most cannot tell the difference. I can only conclude that they must not have had beyond average or entry level CRTs. The richness and boldness of the colors cannot compare to a quality CRT. Yes, the LCD saves on space, an important factor for many, but not me. I have a large desk that accommodated my 19" CRT without problem. Unfortunately, one is almost forced to buy a LCD today as quality CRTs are no longer available. The entire market for monitors have switched to LCDs.

I am keeping this monitor, but those of you who have used high-end CRTs should not hold out high hopes for this (or most any other LCD) display to match their CRT's performance.

well, I received the monitor in a timely fashion and plugged it in and it did not work..... forcing me to return the product, so I guess I have no idea how well the monitor performs. ViewSonic VX922 19" LCD Monitor

I do online gaming, mostly COD2. This is the fastest LCD monitor I have seen and is very clear and bright. It has increased my ability to see my oponent first, and that's what counts in this type of game!

My only negative comment is that near the top there is one pixel that is not functioning and leaves a small black dash. This is of so little consequence that it is not worth my time and effort to have it replaced under warranty.

I strongly reccomend this monitor!