Introduction

Although we have 16ms panels from LG.Philips, AUOptronics and Samsung, we still lack a low response time 19" LCD. Today, we are happy to take a look at the first 16ms LCD from Sharp Systems - a milestone in 19" LCD technology.

Sharp is not a new player to the display sector. They were one of the pioneering LCD production houses in the world when LCD monitor technology began to take off. Even though their focus has oriented more towards LCD TV and 26" or larger LCDs, the Sharp Systems of America division continues to bring more and more LCDs into the consumer range.

We have high expectations for this LCD. From emails and forum posts, we constantly are asked when we will see an LCD that is quick enough for very fast-paced response times (specifically for first person shooter type games). Those not familiar with response time may want to catch up on our quick primer here. Will the Sharp LL-191A break into the 19" LCD market the same way the Hitachi CML174 entered the 17" LCD market one year ago? The answers may surprise you.

Construction

Our Sharp 191A looks very different from any other LCD that we have seen to date. It feels particularly refreshing, considering that the last several LCDs we have reviewed all have very similar designs. Off the bat, the first thing we noticed was a lack of DVI interface on this monitor. This is unfortunate, but perhaps Sharp can still provide good performance even with this obvious deficiency.

Click to enlarge.

Aside from the two included modest 1 watt speakers, there are not many frills on this LCD. In fact, we found the speakers for this LCD extremely poor. They are difficult to hear and do not provide any sort of DSP. Using the forward headphone jack is also not suggested; there was a severely noticeable loss in signal quality. However, we buy an LCD monitor from which to see things not to hear.

Click to enlarge.

Sharp LL-191A-B
LCD	19" SXGA LCD (Active Matrix) pixel pitch: 0.294mm Anti-glare coating
Scanning Frequency	Horizontal: 31-80kHz Vertical: 56-76Hz
Response Time	16ms (Typical)
Contrast Ratio	500:1 (Typical)
Compatibility	1280 x 1024 (Native)
Brightness	220 cd/m2
Power	Working: 33W Standby/Off: 5W
Warranty	3 years parts and labor

There are two items that catch our eye immediately: 16ms response time and 33W working power consumption. Power consumption is considerably lower than our Samsung 193P from last month. The 16ms response time will be the large determining factor in whether or not this LCD is game worthy. Since our sample did not have a DVI connection, the LL-191A already has one major strike against it (serious gamers need only be reminded that the majority of GeForce 6800 cards are showing up without analog 15 pin D-sub connectors, and for a reason). In previous reviews, we have shown that gray-to-gray response time is much more important for die hard gamers than TrTf response time, which is listed in the specification above.

The listed brightness of 220 nits seems low, considering most of the LCDs that we have reviewed in the last 18 months have been 250 nits (or higher). However, a quick visual inspection reveals that the brightness seems about on par with our Dell 2001FP. Our Dell 2001FP is capable of a UXGA signal, whereas the LL-191A is only capable of SXGA (1280x1024).

The quality of our 191A was very good. We found no imperfections in the panel; no dead pixels or subpixels. Again, much like our Samsung 193P, production techniques seems strong enough at this point to assure very high yield rates on a 1280x1024 panel.

Wallmont, Swivel, Pivot, Sound & Cable Management

The Sharp LL-191A-B is very modest in this category. The LCD is not capable of swiveling or pivoting. We can only adjust the tilt on the horizontal axis. Most importantly, there is no capability for height adjustment on the LCD. In a multi-monitor configuration, this could be a nuisance. The y-axis tilting is not particularly easy on the 191A, but it is not too complicated either. Our 191A can be adjusted constantly without much strain using two hands.

The entire base of the panel can be removed in one action to reveal a VESA wall mount. We need to remove four screws from the rear of the LCD in order to attach the mounting brackets.

Click to enlarge.

Above, you can see the analog, AC and speaker input.

LG Philips LCD LM190E03

To no surprise to us, the Sharp LL-191A uses an LG Philips LCD panel. We say "no surprise" because thusfar, they have dominated the low response time LCD market with the LM201U04 panel found in every 16ms 20" LCD to date. This newest LG Philips LCD panel is not shown to be in mass production yet (at least according to their website), so it is probably safe to say that the LL-191A is the first production unit available.

We have mentioned some other display modes in the past. AUO's modified TN mode powered the Hitachi CML174 LCD with a 16ms TrTf response time. This LCD had very similar polarization and viewing angles. Both the Hiatchi CML174 and the Sharp LL-191A use 6-bit LCD panels. This essentially means that each sub pixel can "twist" to 64 varying degrees, allowing 64 slightly different hues of that sub-pixel through. When you consider three subpixels capable of producing 64 hues each, we consider each pixel capable of producing 262,000 colors. Other displays, such as Samsung's 193P use 8-bit panels; they can produce 254 varying hues per subpixel (or 16.7M per pixel). We have more information about how an LCD substrate works here. The LM190E03 panel uses a dithering technique to simulate 16M colors, but it is not true 8-bit rendition.

Unusually, even though the LG Philips LCD website claims 250 cd/m² luminesence, Sharp labels the monitor as only 220. As we show later in this review, this seems to be correct; adjusting the brightness too high washes color vibrance out of the image.

Click to enlarge.

Unlike our last 6-bit LCD, the LL-191A does not use a Genesis controller (see also Dell 2001FP). Instead, Sharp uses a much different Myson chipset - the MTV312MV64. The Myson chip is fairly robust, since it can support four A/D channels (the LL-191A only uses 1 analog channel).

Click to enlarge.

From the looks of the controller circuit board, there is no room to expand a digital interface on future models. However, since the Myson controller does support digital and analog channels, we may see a digital version of this LCD yet.

On Screen Display

The 191A uses a very different on screen display than anything that we have seen from Dell or Samsung before. Recall that our last LCD did not even use an OSD in the traditional sense. This directly correlates with the fact that we do not typically see Myson display controllers as well.

LCDs typically disable certain functionality for DVI signals; supposedly, the digital interface has very little interference compared to an analog signal. Therefore, certain functions like color balance can be corrected on the computer rather than on the monitor. However, the 191A does not have DVI inputs, so the vast majority of calibration and correction settings that we have grown accustomed to ignoring become major issues again.

Click to enlarge.

The front panel input has five input buttons, plus the power button on the far right. From left to right, they are: Auto, Menu, Mode, and two volume controls. Since "Auto"" is typically disabled on DVI signals, its presence became immediately nostalgic. Unfortunately, the Auto sync takes a long time; as much as 5 seconds during our analysis. However, like the Viewsonic VG800 from last year, the sync was only hit or miss. Whenever we ran the Auto Sync function with a black background, the vertical crop would always crop the image to the point when a vertical line test detected something other than black. This is a major issue for users who run console modes or games with black borders. The improper sync issue is really two-fold with this LCD; first, we lose valuable screen space; and second, since the signal has improperly cropped the image vertically, there are more horizontal lines than horizontal pixel columns. The result is an image that looks stretched and pixilated. Our only solution to this problem is to sync the LCD while there is a non-black image occupying the entire screen space.

Click to enlarge.

Other menu functionality was fairly rudimentary. Depressing the "Menu" button brings up a six-menu display. Each menu can be activated by hitting the menu button again. The "Mode" button adjusts the pointer on which item to modify, and the Volume left and right controls fine-tune the selected item. Cycling through the menu options closes the menu, but you can also wait for it to time-out after 30 seconds. The menu pointer only operates in one direction, which takes a little getting used to compared to our Samsung LCDs, but mastering the overall process only takes a few tries.

Interestingly enough, there is a phase control in our menu. We did not have the same problems with phase on the 191A that we had with our Albatron LWX-30AMS, so it is probably a very rarely used function.

Click to enlarge.

Depressing the "Mode" button during normal full screen application adjusted contrast and color mode on the fly. There were four modes:

• STD: Standard mode, brightness and contrast are adjusted to 50%
• Office: The same as STD, but with a lower brightness for document work
• sRGB: Similar to STD, but there appears to be an adjustment on the red level
• VIVID: Contrast and brightness levels are increased a little too high, darks fade off very quickly (too quickly).

During our analysis of the LCD, we left the monitor on STD.

Click to enlarge.

On a separate note, notice the unusual polarization on the close up images above. This is not apparent during normal viewing, but we do eventually notice this polarization later when observing the viewing angle later in the benchmark process.

ColorVision Spyder

Before running DisplayMate and our subjective analysis of the LCD, we ran ColorVision's Spyder and OptiCal software. Not only does this accurately calibrate the monitor on the DVI and analog interface, but it also gives us specific luminescence information not obtainable though subjective analysis. Special thanks to our friends at ColorVision for providing us with both a ColorVision Spyder and their OptiCal software.

Our test bed uses a Radeon 9800 XT video card. We use the factory-included analog cable for this portion of the benchmark. Resolutions are on the native 1280x1024.

Just like our last ColorVision benchmark, we have one expectation:

1. There is a severe bluish tint on this monitor.

And here is what our Spyder and OptiCal software have to say:

Not much to our surprise, the OptiCal software reports show a severe blue shift. Keep in mind that since this LCD uses a 6-bit panel and dithering techniques to achieve 16.2M colors, we are not seeing truly native 16.7M colors as we would with an 8-bit panel. Side by side with the Dell 2001FP, we see a large difference in color vibrance.

However, since the monitor is using an analog connection, we have extra room to play around with the calibration (granted, using a DVI connection, we could only adjust the color calibration on the computer). We were able to fine-tune the LCD into normal curve bounds, but none of the standard presets would set our color range at the optimal setting. We used these settings in the next portions of this benchmark.

Full Screen Application

Here are a few quick looks at some demanding full screen applications. All of these screenshots are taken with the Analog input on the LCDs.

The Matrix Reload, The Matrix - We use the Matrix series to test full motion video on our 191A. Since the Matrix isn't the best movie to test color reproduction, we typically only look for motion blur or other imperfections. For our purposes, the image quality looked very good, but slightly darker than on the Dell 2001FP. Increasing the brightness too much resulted in a washed out picture.

Click to enlarge.

Morrowind - Although the colors in Morrowind look right on, the image is fairly dark. Adjusting the brightness on this LCD too much results in a washed out image; likely attributed to the 6-bit panel.

Click to enlarge.

Max Payne 2 - We have said before that we get completely different results for each LCD we test with Max Payne, and the LL-191A is no exception. In fact, we found brilliant light and dark transition; perhaps even better than the Dell 2001FP. It is very apparent that the lower response time has edged out other monitors like the Samsung 213T.

Click to enlarge.

Halo - Similar to Max Payne, again, we saw great FPS performance. Unlike Max Payne, however, there are more colors to observe and after a few minutes of game play, we could tell there were differences between the LL-191A and other LCDs. The game feels a little too dark, particularly in hallway scenes where there is not much light. On the other hand, outdoor scenes look perfect, increasing or decreasing the brightness does not do the image any justice. Motion was very fluid and the lower response time can be felt immediately.

Click to enlarge.

Unreal Tournament 2004 - Halo and UT2K4 have very similar results. There are not as many dark corridors, so we did not experience any particular point in the game where the image was too dark, but attempting to increase brightness overall gave us a washed out image (similar to our analysis of The Matrix earlier).

Click to enlarge.

Subjective Analysis

DisplayMate/CheckScreen/VESA FPDM 2.0
Test	Monitor	Observations
Intensity range check	191A (analog)	5
	2001FP (digital)	5
	2001FP (analog)	5, Good
Black level adjustment	191A (analog)	4.5
	2001FP (digital)	4.5
	2001FP (analog)	4.5, Acceptable
Defocusing, blooming and halos check	191A (analog)	5, None
	2001FP (digital)	5, None
	2001FP (analog)	5, None
Screen uniformity and color purity	191A (analog)	5, Very Good
	2001FP (digital)	4.5+
	2001FP (analog)	4.5+, better than 192T, but still small imperfection on upper right
Dark screen (Glare Test)	191A (analog)	4, Good, Blue tint?
	2001FP (digital)	4.5
	2001FP (analog)	4.5, Improvement over 1702FP and 192T
Primary colors	191A (analog)	4, fixed with OptiCal
	2001FP (digital)	4
	2001FP (analog)	4, attempted to fix curves with OptiCal
Color Scales	191A (analog)	4.5, Good
	2001FP (digital)	4, red errors
	2001FP (analog)	4, red errors
16 intensity levels	191A (analog)	4.5
	2001FP (digital)	4.5+
	2001FP (analog)	4.5+, Improvement over the 192T 5, Level (for LCD)
Screen regulation	191A (analog)	5, Good
	2001FP (digital)	5
	2001FP (analog)	4.5
Streaking and ghosting	191A (analog)	4, Surprisingly clean, but present
	2001FP (digital)	5, None
	2001FP (analog)	3.5, Extremely present at 1600x1200. Analog signal is not capable.

Overall, the DisplayMate portion of this review rated the LCD very highly. This is fairly unexpected because we saw a slight blue hue when operating the monitor under normal usage. The only real test where we saw issues with the blue tint was on the dark screen test (where we power on the monitor, but keep a completely black image on the screen). The Dell 2001FP scored better, but that is because it has a slightly duller display.

Perhaps the most shocking surprise was the interference test (Streaking and Ghosting). Although we could clearly spot interference due to the sole analog connector, it was considerably less compared to our Dell 2001FP or Samsung 193P. We still do not recommend a D-sub solution over a DVI one, but Sharp does hold the honor of displaying the cleanest analog signal of any LCD monitor that we have seen to date.

One test that we do not list up on the screen is viewing angle. The specifications for the monitor claim a 160 degree viewing angle, but from our tests, we concluded it was much less than that, at least vertically. Side-to-side experienced the full 160 degree viewing angle benefit. Most users will not experience a difference in the vertical angle, but the shallow angle becomes very apparent when you stand up and look down at the LCD.

Below are two MPEGs showing the changing viewing angle. You will notice the colors on the 191A begin to get inverted before we are viewing them at a 45 degree angle. The same shot is taken with the Dell 2001FP for comparison. The colors on the Dell stay fairly consistant.

Sharp LL-191A	Dell 2001FP
Click to play video.

Final Thoughts

Although the monitor performed great in the DisplayMate portion of this review, there were two nagging facts. The first being the D-Sub (Analog) only input; the second, the $699 price tag. We are exceptionally pleased at the quicker response time; there just are not any other LCDs on the market with 16ms response times yet. The high response time proved itself in our performance benchmark. The Sharp LL-191A was able to keep pace with our reigning champion, the Dell 2001FP.

There are other factors to consider, though. The higher price tag, 6-bit color LCD panel and lack of a DVI input all weigh negatively on the monitor.

This monitor excels in our gaming tests and deserves recognition as one of the better 19" LCDs for gaming; particularly concerning response time. Once we corrected the colors with our OptiCal software, colors were accurate enough for gaming purposes. However, the trade-off for lower response time is the less accurate color replication. You won't find a better 19" analog LCD for the money right now, but if accurate color is important to you, definitely consider a DVI capable LCD.