Pros: Matte screen/bezel finish, proximiy sensitive buttons, 120hz/ 3d,
Cons: The proximity sensitive buttons might act strangely when putting 3 of these together, potentially. For those of us that hate OEM..the "alienware" logo
So I had shopped all over the place and the only 120hz 23 inch monitor I could find that got good consistent reviews was this Alienware. I got it with discount from Dell for 419.99 including shipping. Ordered on a thursday, came by UPS the following Monday. I believe they ship from Knoxville, TN.
Anyways, heres a few pictures, and details will follow.
The box/contents.
It came with a dvi-d cable (essential to output 120hz/3d signal, in case you didn not know), a gold-tipped hdmi cable (not pictured), a usb cable, power cable, and a 1/4'' audio cable. There are internal speakers, although I have no intention of using them so I cant vouch for their quality. The documentation it comes with is pretty vague, and the "driver" cd isnt really a driver cd but rather a digital version of pretty much everything in the box. Dell support on their website has a much better guide of what each menu does.
As you can see here, the mount is a sliding mount and it easily slides up or down to these minimum or maximum heights. I tend to keep my monitors on the lower-end so it works just fine for me.
The mounting post itself has a nice cable management feature big enough to slide that large dvi-d cable and power cable through it and out the back side of your desk. You should be able to see from these pics, sorry, didn't want to dismount everything again but you get the gist.
The fit and finish of everything is top notch and it definitely met my expectations. The proximity sensing buttons are pretty cool. You can tell from the distance my finger is, thats when the first menu button starts to light up.
The menus are pretty easy to navigate and are self explanitory. I had to get used to the picture quality at first because the "quality" of the brightness was different from my old leg l.e.d. Not lower quality, just less "saturated" than I had that one configured. Took all of about 15 minutes to find something I liked and it was all good. You can notice the quality of 120hz right away on the desktop moving windows around and such, but enough of that, I bought this for gaming.
Let me say, its instantly noticeable. I was totally shortchanging my lightning xtremes on that little 60-hertzer. No tearing whatsoever. I even have vsync enabled and there is not one ounce of input lag to be felt. That way, when my screen is transition b/w BF3 rounds, it doesn't shoot up to 200fps and heat my cards up unnecessarily, which is a plus.
One little quirk I noticed, and maybe this could just be the nature of the way dvi-d transmits, is that when booting up the computer, the monitor turns on relatively quickly and shows the POST screen promptly, but the starting windows screen for some reason no longer displays for that 2 or 3 seconds, instead it transitions from post screen, straight to desktop. Again, not a big deal, could just be a quirk of dvi-d.
When you shut the computer off the power button mildly pulses red until you turn the computer on again.
All in all, worth every penny. I opted not to get the 3d vision attachments at the current time, but will definitely in the future. I got a 50 dollar discount from dell so couldn't pass it up, compared to what you will pay for many other monitors of this caliber.
Some of the negatives: some OEM haters (myself included) might not like the alienware logo on the front of the monitor, but I dont really notice anymore. I also wish the button led's could've been blue to match my theme, but hey, what can you do?
If any of you have any more questions or pic requests etc...just shoot me a PM.
Anyways, heres a few pictures, and details will follow.
The box/contents.
It came with a dvi-d cable (essential to output 120hz/3d signal, in case you didn not know), a gold-tipped hdmi cable (not pictured), a usb cable, power cable, and a 1/4'' audio cable. There are internal speakers, although I have no intention of using them so I cant vouch for their quality. The documentation it comes with is pretty vague, and the "driver" cd isnt really a driver cd but rather a digital version of pretty much everything in the box. Dell support on their website has a much better guide of what each menu does.
As you can see here, the mount is a sliding mount and it easily slides up or down to these minimum or maximum heights. I tend to keep my monitors on the lower-end so it works just fine for me.
The mounting post itself has a nice cable management feature big enough to slide that large dvi-d cable and power cable through it and out the back side of your desk. You should be able to see from these pics, sorry, didn't want to dismount everything again but you get the gist.
The fit and finish of everything is top notch and it definitely met my expectations. The proximity sensing buttons are pretty cool. You can tell from the distance my finger is, thats when the first menu button starts to light up.
The menus are pretty easy to navigate and are self explanitory. I had to get used to the picture quality at first because the "quality" of the brightness was different from my old leg l.e.d. Not lower quality, just less "saturated" than I had that one configured. Took all of about 15 minutes to find something I liked and it was all good. You can notice the quality of 120hz right away on the desktop moving windows around and such, but enough of that, I bought this for gaming.
Let me say, its instantly noticeable. I was totally shortchanging my lightning xtremes on that little 60-hertzer. No tearing whatsoever. I even have vsync enabled and there is not one ounce of input lag to be felt. That way, when my screen is transition b/w BF3 rounds, it doesn't shoot up to 200fps and heat my cards up unnecessarily, which is a plus.
One little quirk I noticed, and maybe this could just be the nature of the way dvi-d transmits, is that when booting up the computer, the monitor turns on relatively quickly and shows the POST screen promptly, but the starting windows screen for some reason no longer displays for that 2 or 3 seconds, instead it transitions from post screen, straight to desktop. Again, not a big deal, could just be a quirk of dvi-d.
When you shut the computer off the power button mildly pulses red until you turn the computer on again.
All in all, worth every penny. I opted not to get the 3d vision attachments at the current time, but will definitely in the future. I got a 50 dollar discount from dell so couldn't pass it up, compared to what you will pay for many other monitors of this caliber.
Some of the negatives: some OEM haters (myself included) might not like the alienware logo on the front of the monitor, but I dont really notice anymore. I also wish the button led's could've been blue to match my theme, but hey, what can you do?
If any of you have any more questions or pic requests etc...just shoot me a PM.
Have 3 of those in surround for over 1,5 years and still love them.
Nothing beats 120hz and 3d is great too.
There are no functional issues with proximity sensors except that 2nd "button" from the bottom is lit on the screens near each other.
Enjoy!
Also, how is the color accuracy on the AW2310?