Verdict: A cheap and cheerful 22in widescreen TFT with plenty of extras.
There's no point in spending all your time, money and effort getting your rig to run fast and cool if the display isn't capable of showing off all that power with impressive visuals. It might be just one part of the puzzle, but a good TFT can make all the difference between an average PC and an awesome one.
The good news is that prices have fallen fast recently, especially in the 20-22in section of the market, and there's stiff competition out there. The HW223DP from Hanns.G is a budget contender, costing significantly less than £200, and looking at the spec list, it seems to be pretty impressive for the money.
The HW223DP is a 22in panel with a native resolution of 1,680 x 1,050 at 300 cd/m2 brightness, with a 5ms response time, 800:1 contrast ratio and 160-degree horizontal and vertical viewing angles. These are the kinds of figures you'd see on any high-end TFT. Unlike other budget panels, there's a digital DVI input as well as D-SUB, a set of stereo speakers and a 4-port USB hub. The USB hub in particular is a big surprise at this price. However, Hanns.G has spurned HDCP compatibility, so there's no Blu-ray or HD-DVD film support, and no Vista Premium sticker. This isn't a great loss, however, given that HD disc drives currently cost a fortune. Interestingly, the screen is supplied with a component-to-DVI cable for connecting games consoles and other non-PC sources. It's also good to see the full range of cables for all the inputs, since this is an obvious area to skimp and save pennies.
The HW223DP also looks good; it appears more expensive than it is, and it feels solid. If you plan to lug your monitor from one LAN party to another then this screen should certainly stand the test of time. Apart from the slightly lightweight base and lack of height adjustment, the simple design of this screen implies quality rather than cheap nastiness. The DVI port on the rear of the panel is a little close to the stand, so inserting and removing the video cable can be fiddly. Otherwise, however, there's little about the design and build to fault.
The on-board menu options are rather sparse, with just three colour temperature settings built in. These are the industry-standard sRGB, plus 9300K and 6500K, but you can take full control should you wish to set it manually. Other than that, you can only adjust the brightness and contrast, and select between six levels of sharpness.
Out of the box, the image is fairly bright, although we had to set it at maximum to obtain the best results. While our greyscale DisplayMate tests showed the usual lack of distinction at the lower and upper ends - indicative that some detail will be lost in bright and dark areas of images - the colour handling was better than we expected. There was clear definition between similar colours, which should provide a detailed final image. Armed with this knowledge of the panel's potential foibles and strengths, we dived into the real-world testing.
Watching fast-action (non-HDCP) HD content, we were fairly impressed by the HW223DP. It coped well with car chases and explosions, and detail and definition were good, if not perfect. Darker scenes caused some noise. This is by no means a fail, nor is it damning criticism, since the weaknesses we've highlighted are minor and will only annoy visual purists. And again that phrase 'for the money, this isn't bad at all' kept involuntarily springing from our mouths.
Games were a similar story, with good detail and colour reproduction providing an acceptably impressive image. Subtly lit areas suffered from the lack of contrast, however, and shadowed sections were less well defined. As the screen can't cope well with dark areas, games that rely on shadows look black rather than richly detailed. If you're a night stalker, or like being able to see wrenches or guns in shadowy areas, this might be annoying, but when playing well-lit games, the overall impression is admirable. The 5ms response time resulted in minimal lag and blur, which is another welcome surprise for a cheap TFT.
One word accurately summarises the 3W stereo speakers: awful. There's no bass or power, and they're far too tinny to use, so why bother adding them, and pushing the price to more than £180?
Conclusion
The HW223DP is an impressive piece of design on the part of Hanns.G, with sensible compromises and surprising bundled extras. The panel is very decent, with only minor defects (narrow contrast being chief among them) and, unlike other cheap TFTs, it has DVI, so you can maintain a pure digital signal from PC to screen for the best possible image quality. Add in extras such as the four-port USB hub, the component-to-DVI converter, and the clean and robust panel housing, and you'd think that you should have to pay much more for the HW223DP, even though it lacks HDCP. Shadow lovers and HD DVD or Blu-ray owners should pay the £40-odd extra for the Samsung SyncMaster 226BW. Everyone else will be more than happy with this screen, and the saving on cost.
