New HP monitors look – well, practical


A new lineup of basic consumer LCD monitors has been announced by HP, and they look fine. Juuuuust fine. Nothing flashy here, but the specs look solid (except for the cheapest one) and the styling is very “Apple Cinema Display” – but less chromey. That’s a good thing, in my opinion.

Basically you’ve got four models, at 20″, 21.5″, 23″, and 27″. The 2010i is kind of low resolution, and has a slow response time and (relatively) low contrast as well, so we’ll just strike that one from the running.

The 2210m and 2310m (pictured above) are nearly the same, except of course for the slight size difference and a ever-so-slightly slower grey-to-grey time on the 2310m. 1000:1 contrast ratio (and the usual vastly exaggerated 40,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio), 2.5ms response time, 1920×1080 resolution, and a couple integrated 2W speakers. The 2210m costs $220 and the 2310m costs $260.

The 2710m (above; also, that link is kind of janky) has virtually the same specs (and, disappointingly, the same resolution) as its smaller brethren, but costs significantly more at $456 (or at least, that’s what is listed at Amazon (you can get it for $366 though)). With a rather larger pixel pitch, this one won’t give you as crisp an image as the others. My pick for value out of this bunch is the 2210m; it could make an excellent second monitor if you already have a large, high-quality one for your primary.