Widescreen Gaming Forum

Hi,

I just bought a U2410, but I have one little problem. Since I know it's a popular monitor 'round these forums, I was hoping someone could provide some advice or a brief test of their own monitor.

I will only be using this monitor for basic computer stuff, no important or professional image editing, so I don't really need a wide gamut. So based on what I've read so far, I should be using the monitor in sRGB mode. The problem is in sRGB mode, everything seems to have a blue tinge. Also, colors seem washed out.

In Adobe RGB mode, I don't notice these problems. Colors look warmer. If I open up a Word 2007 document and switch back and forth between sRGB and Adobe RGB, I can see the blue background become more vivid in Adobe RGB, as well as see more of a contrast between the white page and the background. Another thing I find weird is although everything has a blue tinge in sRGB, even blues look more vivid in Adobe sRGB.

Adobe RGB looks much closer to what I think is normal, which is weird considering my last monitor was a Dell 2005FPW which directly specified it was sRGB in its settings panel. This happens both with my PC over DVI, and my MacBook over VGA.

I tried restoring the default factory settings, but that didn't help. Not sure what other options I have...

Is this normal, or is it a problem with the monitor? I thought that sRGB mode should allow me to not use any color management profiles and have this display act as a "normal" screen. If something's wrong with this monitor, I'd like to get a replacement asap while it's still easy to do so.

Thanks.

This is after it has warmed up for a while, right? It's too bad, really. Though if you're not using it for gaming and don't need super-accurate colors, why not just use the custom color mode? It has many settings. Or simple change the 'temperature' settings on the monitor or the video drivers to get rid of the blue hue.

This is after it has warmed up for a while, right? It's too bad, really. Though if you're not using it for gaming and don't need super-accurate colors, why not just use the custom color mode? It has many settings. Or simple change the 'temperature' settings on the monitor or the video drivers to get rid of the blue hue.

There aren't actually any settings for each mode. You can either pick a preset like Adobe RGB or sRGB, or do custom everything. The custom color profile looks even weirder than sRGB by default, and I'm not really up to tweaking everything myself. Plus I'd have to worry about color profiles and the wide gamut. While I don't need perfect accuracy, I do want things to look the way they should.

Here's why this blue thing is a problem for me:
The monitor is supposed to handle color conversion from its internal 12 bit down to 8 bit (or something like that). Given that there is no temperature/color setting for sRGB, it's not a simple bar I can slide to fix this. It makes me think that this blue hue is a result of a defective internal component. If that's true, with this monitor costing as much as it does, and given that I have the option of easily getting a replacement unit, I'll exchange it for another. But at the same time, if this issue is all in my head, I don't want to be wasteful and spend the time replacing it if the replacement exhibits the same problem (and possibly even other problems).

EDIT: And yep, it's been running for hours and still exhibiting the same issue.

Colors are different between sRGB and aRGB gamut. They are supposed to be.

However, if you have a blue tint, color temperature might not be the same between the settings. Try to change the color temperature through the GFX card and see if you can normalize this. What .icc profile do you use and what GFX card?

The backlight of the U2410 is wide gamut and the sRGB preset is an emulation of sRGB which is pretty complex through a 3D LUT. Custom profile won't give you sRGB, since it won't use the emulation, so there is no need to bother. :)

Colors are different between sRGB and aRGB gamut. They are supposed to be.

However, if you have a blue tint, color temperature might not be the same between the settings. Try to change the color temperature through the GFX card and see if you can normalize this. What .icc profile do you use and what GFX card?

The backlight of the U2410 is wide gamut and the sRGB preset is an emulation of sRGB which is pretty complex through a 3D LUT. Custom profile won't give you sRGB, since it won't use the emulation, so there is no need to bother. :)

I know that sRGB and aRGB should be different, just as going from aRGB to the full wide gamut would look different. But it's worse than just different... sRGB looks wrong (blue). I think the washing out of colors and the blue tinge are related; it looks almost as if the added blue is dumbing-down other colors.

I'm using the default Windows color profile. I tried the Dell-provided one, but it didn't do anything for me so I disabled it. My card is an NVIDIA 8800GTS.

I understand that I can normalize the colors using the graphics card, but I'm a bit too picky for that. I can't help but feel that there's something wrong with this monitor; things aren't supposed to be tinted blue in sRGB mode, should they? If most U2410's don't have this issue, then rather than trying to compensate for its defect with the GFX card settings, I'd rather just get a new U2410 shipped to me. Besides, this one was only delivered yesterday... I'm well within the simple exchange process stage of the purchase. :)

Compensating with my GFX card means that I'd have to also do color tweaks on my laptop so things look normal when I plug it into the U2410. And this too is just a workaround to mitigate the effects of a defective screen.

If, on the other hand, this blue problem exists with all U2410's, then I have no choice but to do GFX setting modifications. So my primary goal here is to determine if this blue tint is abnormal, not necessarily to fix it. If it's a defect, then hopefully the replacement I get won't have the problem at all. This is my first time dabbling with a wide gamut monitor, so I'm just not sure what I should be expecting in sRGB emulation. But based on what I read before buying this screen, sRGB mode should make it look exactly like any other run-of-the-mill LCD screen color-wise... which is evidently not exactly true with this particular monitor.

Thanks for the input so far! :)

Ah, so you just want to check the emulation of sRGB up against "how it should look in sRGB"? :)

Then do this:
Use aRGB preset and load dells .icc color profile.
Download newest Apple Safari browser (because it is color managed).
Open a picture that has sRGB as colorspace with blue in it in both Apple Safari and Internet explorer (not color managed).

Apple Safari should then read the sRGB designation from the picture and use sRGB as workspace for this image. This is how sRGB emulation with same picture should look like.
Internet explorer will show this image as aRGB, and since its sRGB, the blues are wrong. In sRGB emulation mode however, internet explorer will/should if working show this as sRGB with correct blue.

Here you can see an example on how color blue can change by just using another color space:
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/web-browser-color-management.html

Note:
Dells .icc profile is best to use with aRGB mode,
sRGB .icc profile is best to use with sRGB mode.

Ah, so you just want to check the emulation of sRGB up against "how it should look in sRGB"? :)

Then do this:
Use aRGB preset and load dells .icc color profile.
Download newest Apple Safari browser (because it is color managed).
Open a picture that has sRGB as colorspace with blue in it in both Apple Safari and Internet explorer (not color managed).

Apple Safari should then read the sRGB designation from the picture and use sRGB as workspace for this image. This is how sRGB emulation with same picture should look like.
Internet explorer will show this image as aRGB, and since its sRGB, the blues are wrong. In sRGB emulation mode however, internet explorer will/should if working show this as sRGB with correct blue.

Here you can see an example on how color blue can change by just using another color space:
http://www.northlight-images.co.uk/article_pages/web-browser-color-management.html

Note:
Dells .icc profile is best to use with aRGB mode,
sRGB .icc profile is best to use with sRGB mode.

Yep, that's exactly what I want to check. Thanks for parsing through my horribly ignorant sounding descriptions. :)

Alrighty, so I did exactly that. With the same picture loaded in Safari and IE and using the Dell icc, they always look different from each other. Even in sRGB mode. Also in aRGB and Standard mode.

If I only look at the Safari window (still with the Dell icc loaded) and rotate between sRGB and aRGB, they look different. If my understanding is correct, the color-managed image should look identical in both sRGB and aRGB as long as I have the icc loaded, correct?

So if I'm following along correctly, this indicates a problem with the sRGB emulation built into the monitor. Which is a hardware issue.

Yep, that's exactly what I want to check. Thanks for parsing through my horribly ignorant sounding descriptions. :)

Alrighty, so I did exactly that. With the same picture loaded in Safari and IE and using the Dell icc, they always look different from each other. Even in sRGB mode. Also in aRGB and Standard mode.

If I only look at the Safari window (still with the Dell icc loaded) and rotate between sRGB and aRGB, they look different. If my understanding is correct, the color-managed image should look identical in both sRGB and aRGB as long as I have the icc loaded, correct?

So if I'm following along correctly, this indicates a problem with the sRGB emulation built into the monitor. Which is a hardware issue.

No problem. Color management is something most doesn't read up on, since its not necessary in most cases. :)

Consider the .icc profile as a profile describing the abilities of the monitor. When you use Dell's profile, its described in its native state, which is closer to aRGB. If you use the same profile on sRGB preset, you get a mismatch in color managed programs and therefore you need an .icc profile that describes the monitor as sRGB in sRGB preset. So optimally, you use Dells .icc profile for aRGB preset (or use generic Adobe RGB profile), while in sRGB preset, you use sRGB .icc profile.

If you are going to make a comparison while switching between windows, you need open the same picture in Safari and IE as you did, and then compare the Safari picture in aRGB preset to the IE in sRGB preset.

The reason for this, is that Safari will use a virtual colorspace (virtual sRGB in this case) to present the picture within the abilities it reads from the .icc file. Internet explorer won't do this, since it makes no use of any color management. Since sRGB preset is supposed to be sRGB and the image is sRGB, no virtual color space is needed in this case.

It wouldn't be a 100% colormetric match, but should be close enough to determine if the sRGB preset is broken or not. :)

[quote]
Yep, that's exactly what I want to check. Thanks for parsing through my horribly ignorant sounding descriptions. :)

Alrighty, so I did exactly that. With the same picture loaded in Safari and IE and using the Dell icc, they always look different from each other. Even in sRGB mode. Also in aRGB and Standard mode.

If I only look at the Safari window (still with the Dell icc loaded) and rotate between sRGB and aRGB, they look different. If my understanding is correct, the color-managed image should look identical in both sRGB and aRGB as long as I have the icc loaded, correct?

So if I'm following along correctly, this indicates a problem with the sRGB emulation built into the monitor. Which is a hardware issue.

No problem. Color management is something most doesn't read up on, since its not necessary in most cases. :)

Consider the .icc profile as a profile describing the abilities of the monitor. When you use Dell's profile, its described in its native state, which is closer to aRGB. If you use the same profile on sRGB preset, you get a mismatch in color managed programs and therefore you need an .icc profile that describes the monitor as sRGB in sRGB preset. So optimally, you use Dells .icc profile for aRGB preset (or use generic Adobe RGB profile), while in sRGB preset, you use sRGB .icc profile.

If you are going to make a comparison while switching between windows, you need open the same picture in Safari and IE as you did, and then compare the Safari picture in aRGB preset to the IE in sRGB preset.

The reason for this, is that Safari will use a virtual colorspace (virtual sRGB in this case) to present the picture within the abilities it reads from the .icc file. Internet explorer won't do this, since it makes no use of any color management. Since sRGB preset is supposed to be sRGB and the image is sRGB, no virtual color space is needed in this case.

It wouldn't be a 100% colormetric match, but should be close enough to determine if the sRGB preset is broken or not. :)

Makes sense.

aRGB in Safari and sRGB in IE do look similar, but not quite exact. Then again, it's hard to tell without being able to see both image modes side-by-side at the same time.

I found instructions on another forum about entering the factory menu where you can manually adjust the RGB values for all of the preset modes. I think I'll try playing around with those values and see if I can get things looking right just by eye. If not, I'll have to start the never-ending replacement game with Dell until I get one that doesn't have an obvious problem.

Thanks for all the help. :)

No problem. :) Let me know if you need some pointers with the RGB adjustments.