I have been looking at getting some real estate in the monitor front for a while now and looked at various models. My Current biggest monitor is the 21″ which comes in at 1680×1050 and remember the issue her is resolution not how big the monitor is because after all if that was the case I might as well stick a 42″ TV on the wall and run it at 1920×1080 – yes it will be big but silly when you can get the same resolution from a cheap 22″.

The first choice

There is a LOT of cheap 20-24″ TFT out there that only do 1920×1080 – this is not a great big jump to be honest from 1680×1050, we are talking an extra 240 pixels across. These are termed 16:9 and are more suited to watching a movie. I looked at some cheap models and they looked and felt cheap, I even looked at TV’s in the local supermarket – do I splash out £250 and be happy with 24″ TV that does 1920×1080 along with a DVD drive, TV and loads of other stuff?

True 24 inch

If we move up the price scale, you can get a true 24″ screen running at 1920×1200 – this is the same resolution as the iMac I used to own ran at and this is termed 16:10. With this at least you gain more resolution as it now spans both down and across compared to what I had.

Step into the arena the big boys

Short of buying an 27″ iMac (2560×1440) or a 30 display (2560×1600) then you are stuck as there is not much choice left. There was a Samsung 24″ model (2048×1152) and the Dell (2048×1152) and checking the price shows they came in the same but with the current special offers on Dell Site – this brought the monitor down to £180 including delivery.

What does the Monitor offer?

First and foremost it runs at 2048×1152 – this offers a LOT of screen real estate for running various programs at the same time. 80,000:1 Contrast ratio – this is in-line with top notch TV’s from Samsung.  A Built in 2 megapixel webcam and combined with this is 2 microphones – this makes it ideal does it not for broadcasting? The last thing to make note of is USB Hub built right in – this means I can scrap the thing I have stuck to my desk.

When does it arrive?

This is the downer – if I had ordered it at full price (£220) from an on-line retailer, it would be sitting here in a day or so but dell (who make the thing) seem to want to take the entire on January to get this thing to me, maybe they really do make it?