The nightmare of shopping for a new monitor.

Question

First, I apologize if this has been asked before however Ive been searching the internet and on the Pshop forum and cant seem to find solid info.
The monitor will be used primarily for still image color correction in Photoshop (Im still using CS2) such as would be standard in the advertising industry.
I bought a used LaCie Electron Blue 22 IV (a CRT monitor) about 2.5 years ago and I have been pleased with it, but my OPTIX-XR calibration system claims the monitor now is outside calibration parameters [I suppose the CRT phosphors or whatever the heck they are, are burning out?]. The result is I can no longer get the monitor correctly calibrated and I am loosing shadow detail.
I want to replace this with a 23+/- LCD and $1000 is my target budget.
When I last went through the research 2.5 years ago (I dread going through this again) reliable info was very hard to come by and everything seemed to be up in the air as LCD technology was evolving. I bought a DELL (forgot the model#, but it used it same Philips LCD panel as the Apple Cinema but cost less), but he DELL had brightness uniformity issues so I sent it back.
I lucked out and found the used CRT locally (for about $200) which rescued me.
What are the current market options?
Ive read where the La Cie 324 is recommended as a solid budget solution for color correction work. Can anyone share their experience with this monitor?
Ive always read mixed assessments of the Apple Cinema Display, but it is still an option.
Any other monitors on the market I should know about in my price range?
Additionally, if anyone can point me to respected online reviews which have real substance it would be a huge help.
Thanks a bunch for any input.
-Lovegasoline

Answer 1

Thanks for all the well considered replies.
So, there is a dividing line here it seems. Perhaps wide-gamut is a relative term without an objective reference and is being thrown around too loosely (i.e. marketing teams)?
The idea that only LED is wide gamut further confuses things. But, I can understand the point being made...and perhaps the terms has been applied too loosely?
Apple's monitor line hasn't been updated for a while and rumors abound about a new generation of Apple LED monitors. Even speaking of vaporwear, I imagine the first gen will be pricey as are all other LED monitors on the market. Maybe the price will come down if it is marketed widely...but this is all speculation at this point. I could get a smaller (maybe used) Apple Cinema Display to tide me over and see what the market brings in the next 6 months. But I think LED monitors will just be out of my price range.
The other issue and I suppose this goes for the 'almost' wide gamut monitors as well, like the NEC 2690/2490, is the limitations in Apple's computer hardware & Pshop to really take advantage of true wide gamut monitors. A few years back Karl Lang wrote the an article about this. I'm a little lost in the technicalities and have not kept abreast of them, so I have to ask, has the hardware/software evolved since then to accommodate the monitor technology?:
http://www.outbackphoto.com/tforum/viewtopic.php?TopicID=1700
"A wide gamut LCD display is not a good thing for most (95%) of high
end users. The data that leaves your graphic card and travels over the
DVI cable is 8 bit per component. You can't change this. The OS, ICC
CMMs, the graphic card, the DVI spec, and Photoshop will all have to be
upgraded before this will change and that's going to take a while. What
does this mean to you? It means that when you send RGB data to a wide
gamut display the colorimetric distance between any two colors is much
larger. As an example, lets say you have two adjacent color patches one
is 230,240,200 and the patch next to it is 230,241,200. On a standard
LCD or CRT those two colors may be around .8 Delta E apart. On an Adobe
RGB display those colors might be 2 Delta E apart on an ECI RGB display
this could be as high as 4 delta E.
It's very nice to be able to display all kinds of saturated colors you
may never use in your photographs, however if the smallest visible
adjustment you can make to a skin tone is 4 delta E you will become
very frustrated very quickly.
...and...
Only the Eizo 210, 220 and NEC2180WG have 8-10-10 paths. If you really
want to know... the path in the Eizo is "8-14bit3D-8-10bit1D-10" go
figure that one out ;-) The 2180WG has an actual 10 bit DVI interface
with a 10-10-10 path but nothing supports it so you can't use it yet -
but for $6500 your ready when it does ;-)"
Any comments on that? I certainly do not want this to evolve into a dissertation : )
Real world, is the NEC 2490/2690 worth the price?
Still gathering opinions, so keep any ideas/recs coming if you have them.
Thanks again,
Lovegasoline