Samsung 226BW

The Samsung 226BW is a value-priced 22" widescreen LCD monitor with a 16:10 aspect ratio. This monitor has a native resolution of 1680 x 1050 with its 0.282 mm pixel pitch, and boasts an incredibly fast 2ms grey-to-grey response time.

It is also a very bright screen with deep blacks, coming from its 1000:1 contrast ratio and 300 cd/m² brightness rating.

The 226BW also includes a "dynamic contrast" settings that boosts the contrast ratio to 3000:1 by dynamically brightening and dimming the screen based on the content. Reviews have suggest that this featured is useful for gaming, but perhaps not in the typical Windows environment because of overblown colors.

This 226BW comes in a sleek black, glossy finish. The only adjustments that you can make are by tilting the monitor front-to-back or to swivel the entire screen. This monitor includes a single VGA and a single DVI-D input. The DVI input supports HDCP (not common among its class) making it compatible with Blu-Ray DVD players with an HDMI-to-DVI adapter (purchased separately).

There has been some controversy concerning the various "versions" of this model that have been available on the market. The LCD panel included in the display has been provided by three different manufacturers, Samsung, AU Optronics, and CMO, that have been dubbed the "S-Panel", "A-Panel", and "C-Panel" respectively. The issue is that the quality varies across the three panel types. More information about this and for instructions on determining which type of panel you have, take a look at BeHardware's analysis of the Samsung 226BW.