Gadgetory

so today we're going to be having a look at the Acer s 2 3 1 HL bi d LED backlit LCD monitor this is part of their Olympic edition monitor so while the Olympics are over it is still an Olympian of sorts and that it is a unique well not completely unique these days but it is a very very unique product offering in that it has an LED backlight and there are maybe other monitors with LED backlights but I haven't seen one yet so it's unique to me see how I covered that up either way let's have a look at what's included with this particular monitor and talk a little bit about the benefits of an led-backlit LCD versus a conventional fluorescent backlit LCD so actually I want the cameraman to look up a miniaturised version of that is exactly what is behind most LCD panels so what happens is that you actually have you tend to get what's called hot spots so those lights are actual tubes behind your panel and so it has to be diffused properly to get a nice even backlight so you get some hot spots where it's more washed out in some dark spots where it's a little bit darker with an LED backlit LCD the whole thing is completely backlit with little points of light so you get a nice even backlight one of the other advantages is it's a pure white backlight so you don't have any of the disadvantages of an off-colored cathode light behind the panel so you actually get better more accurate colors you get more consistent backlighting and you also get better power consumption because LEDs are much more efficient than those fluorescent tube blades so I've got all the accessories on pack let's have a quick look at them here oh cameraman is probably looking at this what is this okay oh yeah and they're thinner so because you have to have that tube light you have to have some way in front of it to diffuse it so that it is evenly distributed you end up with a thicker panel if you have a CCFL backlit LCD so e color they're probably talking about more color oh yeah better contrast ratio yet another advantage this is a twelve million to one active contrast management contrast ratio led maybe it's not quite bad hi in some respects poor contrast ratios have gotten a little bit ludicrous over the last few years but I can assure you that it's going to be better than a cathode backlight LCD so we have a VGA cable just in case you're still using one of those with your fancy new monitor we have a DVI cable that is also included I highly recommend using this one because that's how you're going to get the best image quality out of it you've got a power cable take that out which plugs into a power brick see there that really speaks to the power efficiency of an LED backlit LCD that's the power of brick you're using it's like there's like nothing to it then we have the little stand that we're going to use to attach the monitor to presumably some kind of a base so let's pull the monitor itself out okay there's a piece of foam that is not the monitor now I'm gonna pull monitor up no this is the limited warranty agreement as well as a QuickStart guide on a CD or monitor next we're gonna pull out the monitor and not drop the monitor it's okay it comes on the phone so I'll get the phone then well there we go we finally got the monitor as well as the base so here is uh oh yeah get another cable includes the way they pack this is just ingenious I'm not even gonna try and get that out there ah it's an HDMI cable there you go so I'm guessing that this monitor supports VGA DVI and HDMI based on the accessories that we've seen here next we've got the base so here is the one where we are so a nice shiny plastic base and then there's a screw on the bottom here for attaching that little arm piece I'm gonna get this mom I'm gonna get through this plate assembled as quickly as I can here so that we can have a look at the overall aesthetic because that's something that you know while you might have specs on your side and there might be all of these sort of Marketing bullet points one of the most important things about a monitor is gonna be how it looks to you on your desk because you have to stare at it an awful lot and if it doesn't look nice then you're not gonna like it no matter how good the image quality is for a lot of people anyway I mean not everybody's like that but for me certainly I wouldn't want to monitor that I found ugly sitting on my desk for I mean I don't know how long most of our viewers will keep a monitor but I usually keep monitor for at least 3 to 5 years I typically don't replace them unless I absolutely have to so here we go we've got all this was full of marketing stuff okay so it's ultra-thin there you can look at that while I'm taking off this glass cover on the monitor unless that's boring oh yeah this is the same stuff that was on the front of the box so it's mercury free you know so not manufactured using mercury that's good alright making my way around here with these tape which is quite difficult to remove cleanly sorry about this everyone wow they are really serious about protecting the front of this panel it's like you got your page you got your plastic yeah more tape and more plastic there we go mmm that's nice okay so for here for thinness you're looking at about the width of oh yeah sure cameraman wants me to use his iPhone for comparison so it's actually only about twice the thickness of an iPhone at the top of the monitor so that's very very cool and that's just the bezel so when you actually look at the screen itself it's even quite a bit thinner than that because you've got a fair bound to the bezel up here in front of the monitor so if we just kind of hold the iPhone there for thickness comparison you can sort of see how thick the the bezel here is and how thick an iPhone is so it's incredibly slim now it's a little bit thicker down at the bottom because that's where you have all of the electronics for your inputs as well as oh here here's how we attach the base so there's little bits of spot right here or we can put this in so it just slides in presumably like this yeah just like that and then if I had a screwdriver I'd be able to put this in more quickly but I don't so I'm going to have to drive the screw with my hand there we go hey in a patient and that's in there pretty good all right and then let's go ahead and stand it on the base so this particular model doesn't include any real tilt options or any of that kind of stuff but if you're looking for something that's just really power efficient and offers good color all that good LED backlit goodness good contrast ratio then this is probably the one for you now we're going to actually be testing this monitor a little bit better when we do a full NCIX tech tips episode comparing it against a conventional cathode backlit LCD and that's really the whole reason that I'm unboxing this thing but just for the sake of having a look at it but why don't we get the cameraman to do some close-ups and you die check out this particular LCD I you know what I don't think I even mentioned the resolution and the size of it this is a 23 inch model and it is a 1920 by 1080 resolution so that means you can watch Full HD video on here it's not going to be scaled in any way it has a 16 by 9 aspect ratio so that means that you're not going to see the black bars on your content that you would on a 16 by 10 and that's a 1920 by 1200 panel so let's have a look around in the back where we have our vase amounts so you got one two three four those so you can mount this on a wall mount and it wouldn't even have to be a very strong one because this LCD monitor is incredibly light so that's one of the really cool things about it then we've also got our inputs here which as I guessed before our HDMI DVI and VGA in here is the DCN so as I showed you before it does have an external power brick although it is quite small so you just plug that in like that it does have a Kensington lock here as well if you need any anti-theft security so thank you for checking out my unboxing the s23 1hl be ID LED backlit LCD monitor from Acer