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Apple Cinema HD Display 23" LCD Monitor

Apple Cinema HD Display 23" LCD Monitor

List Price: $2,000.00
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Product Info Reviews

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Rating: 5 stars
Summary: fantastic monitor, and it works with xp!
Review: an absolutely amazing display, worth every penny!

works with my Sapphire Atlantis ATI RADEON 9600 Pro like a charm. setup was easy.

previously, i couldn't get my nvidia FX 5600 geforce to work with it, try as i might. i've always preferred the ATI cards, anyway. (don't play games, just photoshop and such, so i'm not an expert at this!)

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Beautiful hardware, but beware of compatibility with Windows
Review: As a software developer with broadband internet and a TV tuner in my PC, I usually have a ridiculous number of things on screen at the same time. It's not uncommon to catch me writing code in one window, reading documentation in another, and watching TV in a third. Attaching two side-by-side LCD displays to my PC would manage this just fine, and probably more cheaply to boot.

But I also like to play games and watch movies, and for that, I wanted a single large panel. The only thing that fit the bill was the Apple display.

I purchased it after much ogling of showroom displays, and attached it to my PC's DVI port (with the help of Apple's DVI-to-ADC adapter). Windows XP detected the new monitor, my video card (ATI 9700 Pro AIW) recognized the higher resolutions, and I was instantly using Windows in crystal-clear 1920x1200 resolution, with no dead pixels.

There are a few negatives:

- The brightness does drop a bit at about 45 degrees, so the sides of the screen may appear darker than the center, but only if you sit really close to it, and are really paying attention.
- On a PC, the Power and Brightness buttons do nothing (except glow in a really cool way when touched). You'll have to use whatever display settings your video card driver provides for color, brightness, contrast, etc. As for turning it off, you'll have to either use Windows' screen-saver option for powering the display down after a few minutes, or unplug it.
- The two built-in USB ports don't suport USB 2.0.
- The ADC connector is proprietary to Apple computers (and only a few models - go figure), so you'll have to buy an adapter (either VGA-ADC or DVI-ADC) to hook it up to your PC.
- Even with my Apple-manufactured DVI-ADC adapter, I get a small amount of "static", especially on black backgrounds. My eyes are trained not to notice it anymore, but considering how pricey these are, it's annoying. UPDATE: I have since found a setting in the ATI configuration that fixes this ('Alternate DVI operational mode'). So this is no longer an issue.
- On my PC, the display doesn't show anything until Windows XP has started up. This means you can't see the BIOS diagnostics or boot menu. On forums, some people have reported this as a problem, and some say it works fine for them. If anything ever goes wrong with the boot process, I'm not sure what I'll do.

Rating: 4 stars
Summary: Beautiful hardware, but beware of compatibility with Windows
Review: As a software developer with broadband internet and a TV tuner in my PC, I usually have a ridiculous number of things on screen at the same time. It's not uncommon to catch me writing code in one window, reading documentation in another, and watching TV in a third. Attaching two side-by-side LCD displays to my PC would manage this just fine, and probably more cheaply to boot.

But I also like to play games and watch movies, and for that, I wanted a single large panel. The only thing that fit the bill was the Apple display.

I purchased it after much ogling of showroom displays, and attached it to my PC's DVI port (with the help of Apple's DVI-to-ADC adapter). Windows XP detected the new monitor, my video card (ATI 9700 Pro AIW) recognized the higher resolutions, and I was instantly using Windows in crystal-clear 1920x1200 resolution, with no dead pixels.

There are a few negatives:

- The brightness does drop a bit at about 45 degrees, so the sides of the screen may appear darker than the center, but only if you sit really close to it, and are really paying attention.
- On a PC, the Power and Brightness buttons do nothing (except glow in a really cool way when touched). You'll have to use whatever display settings your video card driver provides for color, brightness, contrast, etc. As for turning it off, you'll have to either use Windows' screen-saver option for powering the display down after a few minutes, or unplug it.
- The two built-in USB ports don't suport USB 2.0.
- The ADC connector is proprietary to Apple computers (and only a few models - go figure), so you'll have to buy an adapter (either VGA-ADC or DVI-ADC) to hook it up to your PC.
- Even with my Apple-manufactured DVI-ADC adapter, I get a small amount of "static", especially on black backgrounds. My eyes are trained not to notice it anymore, but considering how pricey these are, it's annoying. This seems to be a common problem among users.
- On my PC, the display doesn't show anything until Windows XP has started up. This means you can't see the BIOS diagnostics or boot menu. On forums, some people have reported this as a problem, and some say it works fine for them. If anything ever goes wrong with the boot process, I'm not sure what I'll do.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: works with pc
Review: Don't let anyone tell you that this display is incompatible with PCs. I'm running it on a system with Gainward GF4 4200 video card and Windows XP. I use the Dr. Bott DVIator ($...) to convert from DVI to ADC.

When I bought the display and adapter I had a moment of panic because after the orders were placed, the DVIator compatibility page was changed to read "DVIator is also currently incompatible with the new 23" Cinema Display HD". Their site still says this. I was very relieved when I hooked everything up and it worked without a glitch.

There are 2 issues. Since Windows does not have a driver for the display, I can only run the display at 60Hz. This is disappointing because DVDs and games with fast motion appear blurry. There may be a way to force the refresh rate to something higher, I haven't experimented much with it. The second issue is that there's no apparent way to power off the display. When used with a Mac the power "button" on the display will power the entire system on and off. With my current PC setup it does nothing.

With the exception of the refresh rate problem above, the quality is excellent. Since my video card has VGA out in addition to the DVI out, I run a dual display setup with my Sony 19" Trinitron monitor. The clarity of the Apple display is noticably better.

If you have the bucks, buy this display. I haven't heard of a single user that was disappointed.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Phenomenal product - my best purchase in 2003
Review: I bought this monitor from Amazon almost a year ago. I am still amazed at how big it is - and I mean big in terms of usable screen space. I have it hooked up to my Intel based PC using a DVI video card. It is aesthetically beautiful as well which was a nice change of pace from my previous large screen monitors which were not much to look at. Everything looks good on this screen. High res digital photos, computer games, the 2+ full size Internet browsers that I can place side to side and still have room left on the screen. In short I am really glad I spent the money on it.

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Fretted needlessly about whether it would be worth the cost
Review: I briefly considered buying this...but just couldn't justify the purchase...it seemed pricy, especially when you could get a CRT monitor with as much screen real estate for a fraction of the cost.

But the huge price drop and an unexpected financial windfall conspired to make me buy one despite the aching suspicion that I would regret spending that much just for a little (well, a lot) more screen space. Now, several weeks later, I'm wondering why I was ever worried. This thing rocks.

For starters, the display looks great, even when it's off. It takes up very little space on my desk compared to my old CRT and generates almost no appreciable heat. (My old monitor could turn my office into a sweatbox in summer).

I won't get into the technical specs--other folks have covered that well enough--but I will offer my subjective opinion that the colors are vibrant, the images decidedly crisp and the amount of screen space it provides is almost breathtaking. (When I create a new Word document, it appears at the far left side of the screen and I catch myself moving it to the center so that it is not *so far* away from me (!). That's a big screen.)

I use this display on a new Mac system for which it was designed, so there is no trouble with adapters or hardware conflicts. No dead pixels. Plug it in, it works, end of story.

To be fair and balanced, I've tried to think of something bad to say about it...

I think it's telling that this is all I could come up with: There's no easy way to anchor it for protection against a moderate-to-severe earthquake (a concern here in Southern California).

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: I LOVE THIS THING!!!
Review: I can't say it enough!
I'm a desktop publisher/graphics artist and was using 3 monitors on my G4 just for the realestate for all the palletes and artboards, but they're all gone now and were replaced by this 23" beauty!
It's crisp, clear, no flicker, and my setup doubles at night to play DVDs!

Very happy camper!

BUY IT!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: WOW!!! BEST PURCHASE I HAVE EVER MADE!!!!
Review: I just bought this thing from Amazon and all I can say

is WOW!!!!

This is probably the best purchase I have ever made.

This thing is everything I ever expected and more!! It's

very easy to use as well!

I have bought other brands before, and this one just

blows everything else out of the water! I have to say,

everyone out there who is thinking of buying this, stop

thinking. I bought it and I am extremely happy with it

the moment I powered this thing on. YOU ABSOLUTELY

POSITIVELY CANNOT GO WRONG WITH THIS PURCHASE! I

GUARANTEE IT!!!

Rating: 5 stars
Summary: Best of the best.
Review: I know many PC (Windows and some *NIX) users hate Mac computers and equipment with a passion. But as a PC and Mac user I have to say this is the best LCD/TFT display I have seen as of yet. Too bad about the price but if I had the money it would be worth the money.

PROS
) Crystal Clear and Sharp
) Very bright
) Thin profile
} Rather light

CONS
) PC Users have problems with anything with a Mac or Apple name.
) No actual true cons besides the one above, and the price as of yet.

Rating: 3 stars
Summary: Underwhelmed - View Your Applications before Buying
Review: I recently bought the 23" Apple HD display along with a new PowerMac G5 1.8Ghz. I am probably going to return it.

I had not initially planned to buy the display, but after seeing it at a local computer store, I was so impressed at the beautiful photograph it was displaying, not to mention the spacious "real estate" the large screen provided, I decided to go for it and plunk down the two grand.

Since hooking it up - which could not be easier - I have been more than a little frustrated with the appearance of various fonts, be they in word processing documents or in emails, or on
the internet.

Part of the problem lies in the fact that the LCD display offers its sharpest and most crisp images in its "native" resolution, which is 1920 x 1200 dpi. Of course, at this resolution, icons and typefaces are quite small and hard to read. As I prefer larger size font and images, I am presently using a slightly lower resolution, 1344 x 840. While this seems to be a reasonable and tolerable compromise of size for image quality, it is nonetheless, not stellar.

I am used to a very sharp screen. I have owned a 21" Hitachi Rasterops CRT monitor since 1997, and its images are razor sharp. In contrast, I find the Apple displays' handling of fonts to be inferior. Edges are fuzzy and slightly out of focus, even with smoothing turned on (or off).

If you are a web designer, desktop publisher, video producer, etc., I would have no hesitation in recommending this display, in that it handles images quite well. The large screen affords the user ample room to have two large pages open side by side and with Mac's OSX 10.3 Panther, the Expose feature will allow the user to have several window panes open and on the large desktop.

If you make a living writing, or need to write documents and e-mails frequently, and are used to a very sharp image, you might want to carefully check out this display's ability to provide that sharpness with that kind of application.

One more thought: The display has an inflexible plastic easel stand. As another reviewer has pointed out, there is no provision for the adjustment of the slant of the screen, which, in my view, is a real weakness. Putting a videotape or small book under the rear leg may help, but Apple should have done better, especially at this very expensive price point. I don't like a sceen that tilts back -- and if you wear glasses you may find the bottom of the screen more in focus than the top.

My advice: try it before you buy it!


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