Conclusion

The AL1916WB from Acer offers a relatively decent value. This monitor represents the first widescreen monitor aimed directly at the masses, and its general performance will match what a majority of that market will expect.

There are still a very large number of CRT users who have been ardently avoiding the switch to LCD screens, simply because of the ghosting issue. We can confirm that there is virutally no image streaking while playing games with this monitor, and in that regard, this monitor won't suprise or disappoint.

The main issue we had, with our sample anyways, was poor color consistency. There have been reports of other people experiencing similar results, while some have said it's not an issue in the least. Whether the leaking backlight is par for all of these monitors or not, it will definitely deter some people from buying it. Performance in dark games such as any of the Splinter Cell games or F.E.A.R. is not fantastic, and will make some of these games unplayable for many. Again this is subjective, and some will be more annoyed by the slighter lighter edges than others.

Color rendition with this monitor was not fantastic either, compared to a CRT or even other, more expensive LCD's, this monitor comes out with slightly flat, washed out colors. This is not a problem for gaming, as it was very difficult to percieve in Call of Duty 2 even with a cloned image on a 2005FPW right next to it. However, on a plain desktop, or for general web browsing, the slightly anemic coloration will stand out.

Acer could definitely work on a number of these things for a future revision, currently, we would recommend this monitor to those who don't need color accuracy, don't mind a few issues with the backlight, (again, it's looking like some samples are worse than others, ours being on the lower end of that scale) but want widescreen and great general gaming performance. The lack of a DVI input is disappointing, but for those wanting that option, Viewsonic have this monitor which appears to use an identical panel to the Acer. It would be interesting to see if it suffers the same issues with backlighting as the AL1916W does.

As much as a 19 inch widescreen monitor for roughly $300 is a great deal, we can't give this monitor an award simply for the fact that it falls short in too many areas. With this in mind, we hope Acer work at improving this model, as widescreen is where everything is heading, so we can only imagine that their line of widescreen models is only going to get better.