Samsung SyncMaster 971p

The Samsung SyncMaster 971P ($350 street) is a versatile 19-inch LCD monitor with classy looks, good performance, and a handful of nice, office-friendly features. But if you're looking for a multimedia display with lots of connections, you're better off looking elsewhere.

The 971P is one sweet-looking display. Framed by a glossy charcoal-black bezel and shrouded in a shiny piano-black case, the 1,280-by-1,024 panel sits atop a unique matching stand composed of a U-shaped base and a mounting arm with three hinges. This design provides height and tilt flexibility, and it also lets you fold the panel at a variety of angles and lower it so the lower bezel rests on your desktop. The screen is mounted on a circular pivot hinge and can be rotated for portrait-mode viewing. I was pleased that Samsung included its Magic Rotation utility. This automatically flips the image when you change the panel's orientation, so you don't have to do it manually via the graphics card control panel.

Function buttons are limited to a customizable button on the left side of the base and a power switch on the right. All other settings, such as color temperature and calibration, brightness and contrast, gamma, sharpness, and screen position, are handled through the included Magic Tune software via your computer's keyboard and mouse.

The custom button can be programmed to invoke one of the Magic Tune utilities such as Magic Bright, which lets you select one of five preset viewing modes with differing contrast and brightness settings for text, movie, sports, Internet, and gaming. You can also create your own custom setting that works best with your lighting environment, or program the button to access the auto-adjust function or to change the input source. Tucked away on the bottom of the stand is a single DVI input. Two USB ports are positioned along the left edge, making it easy to connect thumb drives and other peripherals. A small power plug for the brick-type adapter and an upstream USB port are located at the rear of the stand.

Unlike the NEC MultiSync LCD195WVXM, you won't find analog or audio jacks on this display. Nor are there any multimedia A/V ports such as those found on the Gateway FPD1975W. Still, the 971P delivers better performance than both.

Using images from the DisplayMate (www.displaymate.com) testing suite, the 971P did a fine job of displaying all levels of light-gray shades on the 64-step grayscale performance tests, unlike the Gateway FPD1975W, which had trouble with grayscale reproduction. Dark-gray performance was mediocre, though, resulting in a slight loss of shadow detail on our test photos. Color quality was not affected by that flaw, though; colors were uniform and scaled evenly, and there were no color-tracking errors. Text reproduction was good but not great. Though I was able to read most Arial fonts at the smallest setting (5.3 points), some characters appeared jumbled and were difficult to decipher. Still, the 971P's text performance was better than that of the NEC MultiSync LCD195WVXM.

Like many of today's fast LCDs, the 971P handled video and gaming with aplomb. (Its pixel-response time was 6 milliseconds, gray to gray.) I played a few rounds of F.E.A.R. and was impressed with the smooth game play; ghosting and smearing were nonexistent. Likewise, a showing of my new favorite DVD, The Departed, was also enjoyable, although I prefer to watch movies on a widescreen display. Samsung's claim of a 178-degree viewing angle was pretty much on the money, although I did notice a very slight color shift at the extreme end of the arc.

The SyncMaster 971P comes with DVD-DVI and DVI-analog cables, a quick setup guide, and a CD containing drivers, the MagicTune software, and an electronic user guide. The monitor is covered by a generous three-year parts, labor, and backlight warranty, which includes 24/7 toll-free telephone support.

If you're in the market for a 19-inch LCD monitor to handle your everyday home or small office workload and want to spruce up your desktop at the same time, Samsung's SyncMaster 971P is definitely worth a look. For those looking for a monitor with more multimedia features, the NEC MultiSync LCD195WVXM and Gateway FPD1975W would be better alternatives.