Acer T231Hbmid 23" wide TFT screen (2ms)

The cleaning of the screen isn’t often needed as I thought it would, maybe because of the glass used & is very accurate even before calibration, works well with windows 7 64bit & vista 64bit. The only fault or drawn back is: the base has 3 legs (not rounded base), in my case near to the edge of the table top, hence could fall backwards off, or you can be safe use a wall mount, but very happy with product & price.

Good features:

1. This screen has a formidable amount of screen area. You can easily set up 2 full size A4 sheets across the face. But at the same time it does not look enormous on the desk.

2. It is extremely bright, and I have had to set it to the Eco setting or wear sunglasses. I am sure it would work well in an office with full sunlight streaming through the window. The brightness of the back light is even.
3. Installation is simple. Connect it up with all the cables supplied, and switch on. I am using Windows 7 and the touch screen facility worked immediately. The only adjustment necessary is to go to Control Panel, Display, Settings, Appearance and ask windows to detect the screen and identify. That was all. (No instructions in the manual)
4. Screen quality is excellent. I have not seen any stuck or dead pixels.¬¬ Horizontal and vertical viewing angles are excellent. The front glass of the screen is tough, and when pressed does not distort the display.

Poor features:
1. As always with an piece of electronic equipment these days, the accompanying documentation is poor. It comes with a CD with ‘Acer touchport’ included. I was hoping there would be more user information than is included in the documentation. There isn’t. I cannot see the object of this software. It was only curiosity that made me take it out of its wrapper.
2. The most important feature of this monitor is the touch screen capability. At first sight this is quite impressive, but there are severe limitations which leave one frustrated. If you are simply selecting icons on the desktop, excellent. Once you get beyond that you are soon reaching for the mouse. The first frustration I found was trying to close an application which is positioned at the top right of the screen. It is virtually impossible to action the ‘close’ button (or indeed any of the buttons on the top). Fingers are just too big. I have resorted to the use of a stylus which is better, but even so, when the software tells you your selector is on an active area. It still may not work. Trying to select a file from a file explorer list is very tedious. Even with a mouse, it is not easy to expand the size of a window. With the touch screen it is almost impossible. The screen is quite low to the desk, and touching the icons at the bottom of the screen is not easy. I would like to be able to raise the screen off the desk rather more than the built in stand allows.
3. The front panel is totally devoid of any buttons or switches, which gives very clean lines. It took me a while to find the ON/OFF button. It took me even longer to discover the set up buttons along the bottom right hand edge of the screen. When you press the right hand one, a soft menu appears on the screen.
4. The literature boasts an on screen touch keyboard. There are no instructions on how to find this keyboard. At one time I discovered a white mark at the top right hand edge of the screen, and when I stretched it out, an on screen keyboard appeared. It appears to be normally parked off screen. It includes hand writing recognition. It has now disappeared again off my screen and I cannot now find it. When it was operational, I found one finger typing a laborious affair.

My main use of the monitor is for photo editing using Photoshop. For this purpose I need to calibrate the screen. I use a Color Munki. My first difficulty was that when placing the Colorimeter on the screen, it assumed I was using the touch screen and upset the measuring software. I simply pulled out the USB connector for the touch screen, and I was off. Acer claim a contrast ratio of 80,000:1 Using the standard 0-256 grey scale, I am unable to see any grey scale above about 245 and nothing below 20. This is typical for most modest cost LCD Monitors, and to achieve better than this would require the purchase of specialised photo monitors costing several times the price. Colour quality using my test image is excellent and the gamut display shows no hard edges to the colours.

Conclusion:
Whilst I may have been rather critical of some features of this screen, the overall impression is very good. It gives lots of screen area without appearing enormous on the desk.
I am happy with the cost/performance.
Touch screen performance is adequate if you are simply selecting large icons, or use a stylus, but the result of using a finger is variable. Long term use of the touch screen is tiring.