Dell U2713HM - Unbeatable performance out of the box
by Chris Heinonen on October 4, 2012 12:00 AM ESTDell U2713HM Input Lag and Power Use
As I stated on the Nixeus review, since I don’t have a CRT that can do 1440p resolution I’m stuck testing these higher resolution displays at 1080p. Because of that the scaler gets involved, and that can lead to extra delays that you might not see if you run at 1440p. The pixel response should be the same, but the lag could vary from being the same to perhaps the low 1-2ms we see from some displays like the HP ZR2740w.
Here the Dell performs almost identically to the Nixeus that we recently reviewed, which means bad things for gamers. We have over a full frame of input lag, and then 11ms of pixel response time to bring our total lag up to 29.5ms, which is nearly two full frames on a 60 fps game. While the U2713HM is fine for everything else, for games that require fast reflexes and can’t deal with two frames of lag you’ll probably need to look elsewhere. I know some consider two frames to be acceptable and some consider anything over one frame to be unacceptable, so you will have to decide what you can live with.
On the power use side, I don’t know what Dell did to this display but it is stingy when it comes to energy use. Even with the backlight at maximum and the screen pure white, we see only 45 watts of power being used. With the backlight at minimum this drops down to 18 watts of power. No 27” display in here has come close to this yet, and there are 23” and 24” class displays that almost use as much power as the 27” Dell does. I guess the eco consciousness at Dell goes beyond just packaging to the actual power use of the monitor as well.
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cheinonen - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
The results are almost always the last 12 displays tested, as older ones rotate out of the spreadsheet and newer models rotate in. I'll try to grab the U2711 numbers for some of those, but the lag testing has totally changed since that was done, so the numbers might not be as accurate as they are now.JNo - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
I agree with EnzoFX. Because this is Dell who update their monitor lines every couple of years, a comparison with their previous models is important to see what improvements they've been able to make (if any) and also to see if it's worth aiming for the previous model if its still 'good enough' but cheaper.Comparison with the U2711 is also interesting because uses CCFL (usually wider gamut) as opposed to WLED and will continue to be sold alongside the U2713HM.
We compare the iphone 5 with the 4S and the galaxy S3 with the S2 and the 7970 with the 6970 so why not the same with the monitor lines?
ChuckDriver - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
While it's nice to see Dell dropping the price below the $1,000 mark, I lost interest in this article when I saw that the price was still over twice that of a Korean 27" IPS LCD monitor off of eBay. It is true that you are rolling the dice when you purchase one, are getting fewer features, and poorly translated documentation but at that large of a difference, I'll go for it. I've also heard that MicroCenter is offering these Korean 27" IPS monitors in their stores, with the return policy that you'd expect from a local store, so I may stop inside the next time I'm near one of their stores and pick one up.mevans336 - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Dell currently has this one sale for $559 USD.http://accessories.ap.dell.com/sna/productdetail.a...
Despoiler - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Ahh yah in Australia.peterfares - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Dell Monitors in Australia are super cheap. I don't expect this monitor to drop much below $700 in the United States from the Dell website. You can get a Korean Catleap or Yamakasi for $290 shipped using fedex express 2 day from Korea. Or if you go to Microcenter they have the $400 models with extra ports and a scalar for $400 + tax.10101010 - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
It'd be quite useful if there was a standardized test for optical distortion. The last Dell U2711 I tried had really bad distortion from the anti-glare coating. I ended up going with the Apple 27" display even though it is something of a pain to use with Windows 7. It is amazing to see the quality of ClearType without the distortion of today's low quality anti-glare coatings. I'd have to think there would be some tests that could be developed to test optical distortion that would give readers an objective measure of the quality of the anti-glare coatings in common use today.I've read that there are some Korean companies offering 27" displays that have no front glass and no AG coatings. That might be ideal for optical quality, but cleaning the screen would be perilous.
It'd be great if Dell, HP, or another company would offer a quality 27" display without an anti-glare coating. Anyone know of a non-Apple 27" 2560x1440 display that has a glass panel but no anti-glare coating and has a no bad pixel warranty?
ComputerGuy2006 - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
yeah I use the u2711, the antiglare coating is ridiculous. To this day I still see the 'sandy' look, its easily visible and obvious from the white textbox im typing this message from.Who knows what dell was thinking. Id prefer 0 anti glare over this any day of the week.
piroroadkill - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
It's actually on the LG panels, it's not Dell that applies it.Honestly, I think it's absolutely fine, and I prefer it to glossy by far.
Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
I've been keeping an eye on 27" monitors for a while. I want a wide-gamut one, but for a long time all the complaining about the anti-glare coating held me back from making a purchase because otherwise the U2711 was the obvious best choice for me.Then one day I had a flash and did a search on the U2410, which I've been using for years, and found that the same complaint was being leveled against it too. I was basically like, "WHAT!? THIS is what you people have been b------- about!?"
I mean, don't get me wrong, the coating is a little aggressive. Do I mind how it looks? Heck no. Have I started watching LogicBuy for U2711 sales? Yup, I sure have.