SCREEN TIME WITH DELL

It’s shocking how little thought we put into our choice and maintenance of computer displays, considering the sheer number of hours we spend looking at them. We picked the brains of Vincent Wong, product manager at Dell Consumer Monitors, and Michael Peh, product consultant at Dell Commercial Monitors, on what to consider.

Setting a price:

Perfectly usable monitors can be had for cheap, but spending more gets you discernible improvements in design and picture quality. Unless you need them, professional grade monitors are probably unnecessarily expensive.

Features and needs:

Gamers who play fast-paced shooters should look for quick refresh rates and short response times, while those who like racing simulators will prefer curved ultra-wide monitors instead. Photographers and designers, on the other hand, require accurate colours and high resolution.

There is no perfect monitor, though there’s probably a best fit for each user. Undecided? Get a do-it-all like Dell’s UltraSharp U2719D.

Glossy vs matte:

Glossy displays tend to have more vibrant colours, but also reflect ambient light sources. Consider the usage environment.

Out of the box:

Setting up a display is fairly straightforward, but remember to do so under the lighting conditions it’ll be used in. Next, do a quick online test for hot/dead pixels and other possible issues. You’re now good to go.

Regular maintenance:

Like cars, displays require regular tune ups to perform at their best, with the service interval dependent on usage patterns. As a rule of thumb, it’s good for casual users to check their monitors every six months for colour drift, and make the necessary adjustments for colour, brightness and contrast settings.