ViewSonic: New LCDs On Fast Track

The new products, the 17-inch Xtreme VX724 and the 19-inch Xtreme VX924, feature an eight to 10 times improvement in the average gray-to-gray response time to 4 milliseconds, the company said.

Gray-to-gray response time is a measure of how fast a pixel changes from one shade of color to another shade of the same color, which is important for video applications, in which pixels change shades more frequently than colors.

"This is a very big breakthrough," said Eric Willey, senior product manager at ViewSonic, Walnut, Calif. "We have been working on this for the past six months." The newest generation of flat panels from various manufacturers is moving to 8ms black-to-white response times. Willey said the new ViewSonic displays have an even faster 5ms black-to-white response time, but ViewSonic is emphasizing its technology for accelerating the gray-to-gray response time as more significant. "We're applying acceleration across the board," he said.

The increase is the result of what he called View- Sonic's proprietary dynamic structure and amplified impulse video response acceleration technologies.

The new displays, which are slated to ship before the end of the second quarter, have an MSRP of only $30 more than the existing comparable LCD ViewSonic products, according to Willey. The VX724 has an MSRP of $359 and the VX924 has an MSRP of $505, said Willey.

John Marks, CEO of JDM Infrastructure, a Rosemont, Ill.-based solution provider, said he is more impressed by display asset management offerings such as those offered by Philips than by faster monitor response times.

"Response time is not a big factor for horizontal business applications. It might have some small benefit, but the manufacturers addressing larger issues like asset management and return on investment are making bigger strides."