E193FP problems

I had this exact problem with my new E193FP.  There are plenty of others complaining about it also.  Basically I think it is a very poor monitor, but you get what you pay for eh.

Only thing I found that improves it's quality considerably is to increase the display DPI setting from the default value of 96 to 120.  This unfortunately increases the size of everything on the screen but at least the text becomes readable.

Note that I tried setting the default font size to 'Large' before changing the DPI setting and this didn't help at all, so leave it set at 'Normal' and just change the DPI setting.

Great. I look forward to hearing your outcome.

I ordered and received an E193FP several weeks ago. Exactly as you described, the text was unreadable. I experimented with ClearType, but that did not help (I think it made it worse). Spoke to tech support, they wanted me to do silly things like experiment with screen resolution. I told tech support that was unacceptable, E193FP is not up to Dell's standards; tech offered to send a replacement E193FP. I DEMANDED a refund, and was promised the monitor would be picked up in a few days. It was, but the return information I was given was incorrect. It's now three weeks since I received an email stating Dell had received the returned monitor, and I STILL don't have the credit on my card (Dell has promised it any day now).

I received a call less than a week after the original tech support call from someone who SPEAKS ENGLISH (although they have what sounds like a foreign name). I explained to them that I intended to purchase another monitor locally. This person worked me VERY hard to "upgrade" to a different Dell monitor, I told them I no longer trusted Dell to supply a quality monitor. They offered to send me a more expensive monitor at a discount; under a lot of pressure from the agent I gave in and agreed. I am concerned because there is NO way to contact this person directly with any issues or questions.

I received a 1905FP over a week later. This monitor (which gets excellent reviews in the magazines) is definitely a lot better than the E193FP, but is not as easy to read as my two-year-old NEC LCD1912 (which is NOT a top-of-the-line model). Also, the blacks aren't all that black, and there is no contrast control. The 1905FP is worth the price I was quoted (I still don't know what I was actually billed), but DEFINITELY not worth Dell's list price.

Moral: NEVER buy a monitor until you can see it display text IN PERSON.

Krom, well they gave me a 90 dollar credit for  the piece of junk monitor. I purchased a 1905 and will put the 90 towards.The 1905 ended up costing me 280 bucks with a 65 dollar off coupon. Thanks

 

Message Edited by HowieLong7777 on 04-26-2005 02:47 PM

I know this won't be the answer that everyone wants to here, but hopefully it will help.  I just purchased 7 E193FP monitors.  The text was horrible on all of them.  Especially black text on white background.  I was just getting ready to return them when we decided to have them calibrated.  Using a Monaco Optix XR, we calibrated the monitors to an acceptable level.  This monitor is still not as good as my Dell 2005FPW, but it is nice for the $300 (a piece) that we paid. 

I know that this is a $219 tool to use, but if you knew how much difference this tool can make and how often you need to use it, it pays for itself. 

Best of luck to everyone.

One more thing.  For those of you that do not have a calibration tool, below are some settings that we are using after completing the calibration.  Hopefully, they will help also:

                         Monitor #1                      Monitor #2

Contrast =          100%                              100%

Brightness=        23%                                 57%

Red=                   74%                                 74%

Green=                68%                                 69%

Blue=                  75%                                 63%

The blue gun on the one monitor seemed to be off a little.