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Cottonsworth · Jun 18, 2009, 12:25 PM

I picked up a 21" Apple Studio Display Graphite CRT display the other day and hooked it up to my iMac as a second monitor. I'm a bit surprised at the lack of quality or are my expectations too high? The text is nowhere near as sharp on my iMac, it almost seems a bit fuzzy and the edges are not completely straight. Did I just get a poorly made one or was this how monitors were like back in the days?

Cottonsworth · Jun 18, 2009, 12:40 PM

The screen gets curved when I run it at max resolution, 1600x1200. It looks a bit better and straight at 1600x1024 but I lose a lot of real estate. Can anyone fill me in on this monitor? Thanks.

OreoCookie · Jun 18, 2009, 12:57 PM

Yes, your expectations are too high for a multitude of reasons:
(1) Sharpness: any cheap $180 lcd is 100 % sharp if you run it at native resolution. There is no need to focus the electron beam and 1 pixel is exactly 1 pixel on a lcd.
(2) The thing is old. Which means the screen is much darker, the beam tends to defocus and the picture quality has deteriorated compared significantly.
(3) LCDs are perfectly flat. Most CRTs are not.

Cottonsworth · Jun 18, 2009, 01:09 PM

Ah, I guess age is probably explaining why the edges are curving so much at max resolution. I guess it'll make an interesting relic piece for me for how people computed "back in the days." This thing is massive, I don't know how people use to put this on their desks. :/

anthology123 · Jun 22, 2009, 03:41 PM

This monitor was made when most resolutions were 1024x768, so if you are trying to push it to 1600x1200, prepared to be disappointed. Those monitors were standard CRTs, which were only 480i or P in some cases.

Big Mac · 06:33 AM

They weren't 480. That's standard definition TV resolution, which they certainly exceeded (we're not talking about the computing dark ages here). OreoCookie explains the problems with that class of monitor.

anthology123 · Jun 22, 2009, 03:55 PM

Sorry, I stand corrected. My apology for that erroneous statement.

Big Mac · Jun 23, 2009, 06:32 AM

No need to apologize.

GORDYmac · Jun 24, 2009, 09:06 AM

The only CRT to exceed my expectations was the clear 17" Studio Display. The earlier ones were disappointing.

Cottonsworth · Jun 24, 2009, 12:02 PM

Originally Posted by GORDYmac

The only CRT to exceed my expectations was the clear 17" Studio Display. The earlier ones were disappointing.

Maybe you got one that hasn't been used that much.

GORDYmac · Jun 24, 2009, 01:55 PM

I just couldn't calibrate the older 21 and 17 versions accurately at high resolutions.

tooki · Jul 4, 2009, 06:00 AM

Originally Posted by anthology123

This monitor was made when most resolutions were 1024x768, so if you are trying to push it to 1600x1200, prepared to be disappointed. Those monitors were standard CRTs, which were only 480i or P in some cases.

They only did interlaced computer displays for a little while in the early 90s. (Well, CRTs support it, but graphics cards don't bother any more.)

But yeah, VGA (hot technology in 1987) was 640x480 ( = 480p), but the Apple standard resolution for 21" CRTs was 1152x870. 1024x768 (XGA) was the later PC world standard for 17" CRTs and 15" LCDs.

Apple's traditional resolutions:

9" B&W CRT: 512x342
10" and 12" color CRT: 512x384
13/14" CRT: 640x480
16/17" CRT: 832x624
20/21" CRT: 1152x870

All of those were intended to keep the on-screen resolution at close to 72 ppi.

Veltliner · Jul 5, 2009, 11:29 PM

When I bought a VCR recorder some years back for viewing a view tapes I needed to watch, I thought it was broken.

The picture quality was so awful: lack of sharpness, bad colors.

But the replacement unit had the same flaws.

I had been used to DVD quality so much I had completely forgotten how crappy a VCR images was.

Same for cathode ray monitors. Not only can they not match the quality of good LCD displays, the survivors of a period passed are also at their end of life and this increases our impression of a poor performance.

tooki · Jul 6, 2009, 01:56 PM

Well, high-end CRTs, like the Mitsubishi Diamondtrons I used to swear by, looked great, and only the latest generation of extremely high-end LCDs can match or exceed the color quality of a midrange or high-end CRT from the late 90s or early 2000s. (Good CRT monitors have so many adjustments that you can still make one look great if it's not worn out.)

LCDs decidedly are superior in sharpness, but fundamentally fall short in color fidelity and viewing angle compared to CRTs. (That's why I got a plasma TV, since they basically combine the color and viewing angle benefits of CRT phosphors with the flatness and sharpness of LCDs.)