If you're willing to put in some time and effort adjusting a plethora of settings, this is a wonderful piece of hardware. It does both the big and important things and the little details well:

- Image quality: Outstanding
- Mechanical design: Outstanding

Installation of the hardware was easy: Just connect the power cord (no power "brick" required) and the video cable supported by your video card (old-style VGA or LCD-specific DVI--both are included with the display). Turn the power on. Be sure to turn on the "hard" power switch adjacent to the power cord connection on the back panel as well as the front-panel power button (the right-most of the five front-panel buttons).

Upon initial connection, I was prepared to be greeted with blank or otherwise non-functioning display requiring troubleshooting to rectify, but the VP201b adapted instantly to the 1280x1024 / 60Hz setting that was in force on my video card. I saw a perfectly legible, if non-ideal display (see below for the details of perfecting the display). There were no "dead" pixels in evidence, the monitor displayed a momentary note of the fact that I was not using it in its optimal mode and indicated which input is active (VGA, in my case) and the precise resolution and timing settings in effect.

New owners might experience an initial period of buyers remorse, especially if they're switching from a lower-resolution setup. When first powered on in such a situation, the display will adapt to such settings, but this produces distinctly sub-optimal results.

The first thing the new owner must do is set their video card parameters to the display's native resolution of 1600x1200.

Following this comes the possibly more arduous task of finding appropriate font settings both system-wide and application-specific. It's likely that font selection and sizes and other text-related settings that worked well for a CRT will produce poor results with the VP201b. Do not despair! Good font display quality is eminently possible, it just takes some experimentation.

Be sure to enable any available LCD-specific font display technology. There are at least two places for many users to do this:

- ClearType (Windows). Search the Windows on-line help for this phrase and you'll find straightforward and easy-to-follow instructions for enabling and fine-tuning this feature.

- CoolType (Adobe products). Adobe software performs its font rendering internally, and thus does not automatically benefit from ClearType being enabled in the operating system. For the current (version 7.0) Adobe Reader, use the Preferences command in the Edit menu, select the "Page Display" settings and check the "Use CoolType" box.

- Users of some Linux systems may have the counterpart to ClearType, too (Adobe Reader 7.0 for Linux includes CoolType, too), under the generic and descriptive, if cryptic, title of "sub-pixel hinting." In SuSE Linux, the KDE Control Center's Font configuration panel (under Appearance and Themes) includes an anti-aliasing enable check-box and a "Configure..." button that brings up the dialog in which you can enable the sub-pixel hinting function. Choose the "RGB" option and "Full" hinting.


Exploring the display's own configurations through its on-screen display is also recommended. At a minimum, users should be familiar with adjusting the brightness and contrast controls, since the VP201b can produce such a bright display that it can be uncomfortable to use in low-light settings.

The "Fine tuning" setting also has a dramatic effect on display quality. Using the on-screen display, enter the "Manual Image Adjust" section and select "Fine Tune." In the default configuration, the setting "thermometer" will be at the left-most position. Place one figer on the up-arrow button and another on the down-arrow button and with fine detail displayed (text works well), watch the screen closely as you hold down the up and down buttons. I won't try to describe the visual effect, but it is plainly visible. Choose a setting that you find optimal.

Users with demanding imaging needs will probably want to know that the displays color temperature can be adjusted, either by selecting one of the built-in values (9300, 6500, 5400, 6000 and sRGB) or in a free-form mode where each of the red, green and blue relative kevels can be adjusted.


Summary
This spacious and elegantly designed flat-panel display produces outstanding results, provided you're willing to exercise control over the various options and parameters that bear on display quality. The investment in time spent doing this fine-tuning is well worth it to get the most from the display.

As a software engineer, I hold to the ideal that the kind of painstaking exploration of options I went through to get the most from this hardware should not be necessary, so while intrinsically I'd give the product five stars, I'm only awarding four, in the hopes that all the relevant parties will take the next step and obviate all the manual adjustments, at least for most users.

I recently purchased this monitor and it was everything I hoped it would be. No stuck pixels or other problems. Looks better than my friend's 20" UltraSharp Dell. Can't wait to buy another one. Little pricey though.

Having used nothing but CRT's in the past (my previous monitor being a sweet NEC 22") I was a little nervous about taking the LCD plunge at this point. Mostly because I do a lot of gaming (Trying to finish up Doom 3 presently) I was always afraid of the "ghosting" effect not seen with CRT's. Earlier and some of the newer (cheaper) LCD's just didn't refresh the screen fast enough for fast paced gaming so I always shied away from them.

But after seeing some other users opinions of this product on gaming boards and, having a friend who was interested in purchasing by NEC, I bit the bullet and ordered this Viewsonic. The main selling point being its 16ms response time (should have minimal to no ghosting hopefully) and a 1600x1200 native resolution. Waiting for the unit to be delivered I was a little nervous that I might have made the wrong decision and would have to go back to a CRT....

Well upon setting things up and firing up XP on this screen for the first time ... I was BLOWN AWAY. Screen shots don't do it justice. Everything is bright and text is razor sharp right out to the corners. Kudo's to Viewsonics quality control. NO dead or stuck pixels that I can see. Unfortunately another reviewer I saw on here had them, maybe just bad luck or Viewsonic improved quality since this products rollout. Colors looked awesome. And NO ghosting playing Doom 3 that I have seen so far, or maybe I just don't notice it. Anyway at this point, using this monitor for a few days now, I am MORE than happy with my purchase.

However I must point out that it does have a different "look" coming from a CRT. It will make bad images stand out more. The screen has a bit of the "looking thru a screendoor" effect I have seen posted in other reviews. Maybe some people can't get used to this over a CRT or it is more pronounced on a bigger screen such as this but I've had absolutely no problem with it bothering me thus far. I was ALWAYS bothered by a CRT's lack of focusing towards the corners, and the lack of brightness being even across the screen, even on my NEC somewhat. Nothing of that I see now.

It is always best to try and see a monitor on display in a store being that it is a subjective purchase (although I didn't find any close by selling this model). Anyway if you can't, are finally in the market for an LCD, are willing to order blind online like me, and can shell out a little extra $$$$ for a quality product, I HIGHLY recommend the VP201B or S (the silver color model).

I'm a gamer and always thought that CRT was the way to go for gaming, but after taking the jump up to the VP201b, it changed my way of thinking. The colors are bright and really stand out, there's no ghosting at all in gaming, and there's no dead pixels.

I highly recommend this monitor. The only problem that I have is the fact that I didn't realize that with it's aspect ratio, the monitor recommends that you use a 1600X1200 resolution and if you use anything else, the picture quality isn't as good while web browsing, however it's great for gaming. I'm getting used to browsing with it though.

I bought this monitor because reviews I had read said it was the first flat panel that could display FPS games without ghosting or blurring. But it does both. Simply moving the cursor slowly across the screen will blur it, not to mention the background in games blurs badly during movement. As a text and static graphic-only monitor it is beautiful, but don't expect it to display games anywhere near as well as a CRT costing half as much.