Samsung Natural Flat 900 NF
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| Samsung 900NF |
The 900NF 19inch monitor uses Samsungs Natural Flat Aperture Grille technology with uniform 0.25mm AG pitch to produce what the company terms as the ultimate monitor for business or graphics applications. The 900NF has a recommended resolution of 1600x1220 with 85Hz refresh, and features the highest maximum resolution in this roundup in fact, at 2048x1536 with 69Hz refresh, this is the highest maximum resolution weve seen to date on a 19 monitor. The monitor also features an 1800x1440 resolution with a 72Hz refresh rate which some people may find acceptable.
As with all flat CRT displays, the 900NF has an anti reflective treatment to further reduce glare. Samsungs ARAS screen treatment was actually the most inobtrusive in my opinion, though the Philips antiglare, antireflective treatment was the most effective out of the three monitors.
The 900NF, as with many of Samsungs other monitors, has a hidden control panel that pops out with a simple touch. The small rubber buttons were harder to use then the Philips buttons, but controls wise, the 900NF was the most user-friendly monitor I have ever encountered thanks to its diamond d-pad like navigation and its ultra convenient exit button. Controls were also very complete, with advanced settings like purity, convergence, focus and linearity. Theres no per channel RGB temperature custom setting, but the monitor comes with Colorific software to fine tune your colors.
Because the price of this monitor (around $430 street price) is nearly identical to that of the Philips 109P20, comparisons between the two are bound to be the most relevant. Interestingly, the two perform in nearly the same capacity on many of our tests. Overall color quality in gradient and bar tests was excellent, with richer and crisper colors than even the 109P. We found some very slight fuzziness on the lower portion of the screen in our focus and convergence tests, but the bigger problem were the medium to medium-large sized ripples on pattern tests, and slightly worse streaking than what we found on the Philips monitor. Black/white contrast was average, but grey tones were more distinguished than on the other monitors, which later contributed to some great results in our subjective tests.
Our subjective tests gave results fairly consistent with our objective tests. The same pictures that were best produced by the 109P were also excellently reproduced by the 900NF. In the game still captures, the Samsung edged out with a small advantage, thanks to superior color gradients and better dark color separation, but we found the graphics to be quite hazy compared to what the Viewsonic offered.
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