I got my 22inch Dell monitor with integrated webcam last week, and from the first day I thought it looked a little strange: most notably around text fonts, there's what looks like visual noise around edges, sometimes coloured, sometimes almost like some weird highlighting or something. If I crank the sharpness option on the monitor down, it fixes it, but then everything goes blurry. Anyone have any ideas? I'm going to call up tomorrow and exchange it if they can't fix it over the phone.

I had a look at it; it looks like someone has run a bad 'sharpen' filter over it. The monitor options (in the hardware, like the actual OSD of the monitor) has a "sharpen" option under image and changing that does basically what you'd expect if you were running a s***ty software sharpen filter over an image, so I think it might be related to that.

It looks like crap out of the box though

^^trog is referring to checking the monitor I have at my place btw, not just another one of hte same model.

Dell SP2208WFP is a problem

Fixed for you.

You probably have to run it at it's native res to get the best picture.

Sorry, shoudl have mentioned, it's being run at its native res with the latest drivers.

Are you using XP?

Try using a ClearType tuner.
http://www.microsoft.com/typography/cleartype/tuner/Step1.aspx

More info here if you need to screw with settings in Vista or something:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ClearType

Try screwing with the colours on the monitor too, the default colour settings are generally not very good and could do with some backing off and adjustment.

Hmm... yeh fiddling with the colours seems to have helped, but now the colours, brightness and contrast don't really match my second monitor (which is a different model 22inch). I think now that I'm looking closely, there's a slight change in hue from the top to the bottom of the monitor:(

still under warranty?

the beauty of Dell is their warranty;

just call them and they will probably swap it out for you, you shouldnt even have to send it back, usually they will courier the replacement to you


definately shoudlnt be any noticable issues straight out of the box on default settings, with drivers installed

Yea matching 2 different monitors sucks. I have a 2407 and 2405 and haven't made them quite the same yet. I just use a 2 screen wallpaper with slight varying colours across it and I hardly notice. You could go 2 completely different wallpapers too.

^^^Dell does have great warranty though. My first 2407 had some worsening wavy flickering lines on it after about 8 months of having it, they came out next day and gave me a new one.

my guess is you're using VGA

wrong, its dual dvi; we tried all the obvious things like swapping cables. It really looks like either a monitor defect or (worse), how the monitor is actually SUPPOSED to work. Google shows a few people with similar complaints.

damn, most of the 22" wide panels are notorious for display bad text running through VGA

I bought that monitor recently and have had no such troubles.

Argh I just spent over 30 minutes trying to explain to the Dell lady what the problem was... long story short, they are sending out a replacement in 2 - 3 working days. Hopefully they'll come when I'm actually home:(

Already got a call saying they will replace it tomorrow sometime! I won't be home tomorrow so I delayed delivery until Friday and I'll give y'all an update then (cause I know you're dying for one).

that's pretty sweet.

30 minutes dealing with the Dell Bangladeshi lady - pain in the arse.
New hardware next day - bloody sweet.

You gotta take the pain with Dell to get the goods but its worth it!

So I got a replacement monitor just now... same "problem". Obviously the screens are meant to look like this:(

LOL. Ahhh thats funny. So it wasn't just that you haven't got cleartype enabled?