Samsung Syncmaster 205BW Review

Since it seems that no one has yet reviewed this little baby I thought it was my duty to put my $0.02 in. Here goes.

The Samsung 205BW 20" widescreen LCD monitor is quite nice, offering a clean design, with simple, intelligent controls, nice thin 3/4" bezel surrounding a gorgeous 1680x1050 resolution LCD panel. Take a look:

Here's a look at the monitor full-view, showing the pedestal stand:




What's included in the box: Monitor, AC line cable, 15-pin analog video cable, and (a very nice touch) a nice DVI cable. Also included is a software disc that includes the driver and some accessory software, and a printed manual.

Connections: In the picture below, you can see the connections available on the back of the monitor:




As you can see, they are all located nicely in a recessed area at the bottom of the back of the monitor.

Operation: Operating this monitor is a breeze. Simply plug it all in, and boot your computer. If there is no driver present, the in-box VGA driver will work enough to allow you to see the video. Then either the plug-n-play system will ask for a driver, or you can simply slam in the CD and load it yourself. After loading the driver, reboot the computer and you will be in business.

Quality: This monitor rocks. At 20" diagonal, 16:10 aspect ratio, and 1680x1050 pixels, the display is crisp and clear. This choice of form-factor, diagonal size, and spatial resolution is simply optimum for today's technology and general digital imaging work. 19-inch monitors have lower resolution, typically 1400x900, yet are not much smaller, so the result is the pixels are larger and the image less sharp. Larger monitors, be them 21 or 22-inch types, almost all have the exact same resolution as the 20" (1680x1050), again making the resultant pixels larger and the image less sharp. You need to go up to 24" diagonal measure to get more pixels (1900x1000, or full 1080p resolution), but yet again the pixels will not be that much smaller, the image will not be that much sharper, and your pocketbook will be much, much lighter. So, for today's technology at least, this monitor is exactly at the sweet-spot. When you consider it is available for around $300, and the 24" models are sitting at $500 today, this deal is really sweet.

What's cool: Besides the simple, clean design, and fantastic image quality, one of the coolest things about this monitor is the neat articulating stand. The stand, a simple pedestal mount, is attached to the monitor via a standard VESA-compliant mount. You can see how the monitor attaches to the stand here:



If you want, you can remove this mount and attach an after-market type, perhaps for mounting the unit to a wall. But believe me, for general tabletop use, this stand is great.

Once you have released the monitor stand from its shipping condition by pulling the cotter pin from the base, you can easily raise the monitor with a finger. It can be easily lowered to nearly 2" from the surface, and raised to approx. 5 inches off the surface. Moreover the monitor can be rotated by approx 180 degrees around the base by simple finger pressure!

After seeing how many manufacturers mess up a simple thing like articulation, it is truly a joy to see Samsung do such a marvelous job. Why can't everyone do that?

Obviously I think this monitor offers a great combination of features, quality, and price. You could wait for the new 22-inch Samsung widescreen, but honestly I don't think it's worth it. If you are interested in more in-depth monitor reviews, along with reviews of other computer-related equipment, I suggest you check out Tom's Hardware Guide's (no relation) review pages, or epinions.com. Here is the link to the latest LCD monitor review at Tom's Hardware. At the time of this post, the 205bw was not reviewed there, but I'm sure they'll get around to it soon, so check back. Until then, you'll just have to take my word for it.