Customer Reviews

ViewSonic VX2770SMH-LED 27-Inch SuperClear IPS LED Monitor (Frameless Design, Full HD 1080p, 30M:1 DCR, HDMI/DVI/VGA)

Note: my review was for the ViewSonic VX2270SMH-LED 22" -
I see Amazon has grouped 3 different sizes together - including ViewSonic VX2370SMH-LED 23", and ViewSonic VX2770SMH-LED 27" -
although there are many common traits - be sure to check the screen size for any review.

I bought this after doing a lot of research, as I do a lot of photography and post processing.

sRGB preset (factory calibrated)
100% sRGB gamut
AH-IPS
frameless design
slim

This is a very important monitor (along with the slightly larger sibling VX2370Smh-LED) for photographers or anyone who does serious graphics/color work - as it has a factory calibrated preset for the sRGB colorspace @ 100% sRGB gamut - this is the industry standard color space for photos and display monitors.

To me this is HUGE.

The panels is also a AH-IPS - this is currently the latest technology used on the very high pixel density smartphone screens,
it has also been certified color accurate by Intertek.

The fact that it's frameless (except for a narrow internal border) makes it a very good looking screen too.

I am very pleased with my purchase - knowing I have a monitor that has a factory calibrated preset of 100% sRGB -
this is actually better for me than any other monitor that may be able to claim a larger/wider color gamut -
since those monitors would need calibration otherwise they could potentially be mis-adjusted -
whereas this monitor has 100% sRGB on a preset without the need to calibrate...
and at a price that's only just above the lowest budget monitor
- just a few months ago this kind of monitor would have cost $$hundreds more

Highly recommended for any accurate photographic and color/graphics work.

I looked at about 10 other IPS monitors in this price range and finally decided on this one. I needed a monitor that I could calibrate for web design and photo-editing purposes. Here are some pros and cons:

Pros:
Aesthetically pleasing.
Stand is stable.
Wide viewing angles.
No backlight bleeds.
Able to adjust colors.
No glare or distracting anti-glare coating that other people reported on other brands.
Built-in speakers (they're like laptop speakers, but this isn't important to me).
No eye strain so far.

Cons:
Can't adjust monitor height, so mine sits on books (but I knew this going in).
It can't swivel but it does tilt (again, I knew this going in).
No DVI cable. It does come with an HDMI cable.

A few notes:

This only happens with HDMI and not DVI. My 1yo PC has ATI Radeon HD4350 with latest drivers. The image did not fill the screen at 1920x1080, and the text was very fuzzy. I had to go into Catalyst Control Center and change the scaling options under "My Digital Flat Panels." It still leaves ~1/2" bands on top and sides, and for some reason the OSD to adjust horizontal/vertical position and other things are grayed out (didn't test if it was the same thing with DVI), but I'm OK with it. The text became much clearer, but I went ahead and adjusted cleartype text in Win7 anyway.

Some people reported with other brand monitors that the text was still blurry after this, so they had to disable audio over HDMI. I did not have to do this.

Out of the box on Native color mode, it needed a few adjustments. I turned down the brightness and adjusted the contrast using a website that showed black and white points. The color balance was a little off (the white looked a little yellow-ish), so I used Win7 built-in calibration tool to adjust the color. I also adjusted the gamma using the built-in tool, but I used a website for gamma reference as it was way easier and better than what Win7 gives you.

The control buttons are tucked in, and it's touch-sensitive (responds very well), so it does take some getting used to. But once it's set, I hardly ever have to adjust again, so this doesn't bother me.

Overall, I'm very happy with my purchase. I went from a 17" laptop, so this monitor looks gigantic, and the colors are great. I didn't realize how much eye strain my laptop was causing until I got this monitor. I just wish the monitor had more ergonomic adjustment options, but with all the other options like HDMI and built-in speakers, I can't complain.

It used to be easy... there were bad, fast acting monitors and really expensive, high color accuracy monitors. Today there are a lot of ones in the middle...low cost IPS (like this one)...several other technologies that are similar and some better TN ones.

I don't really play games, so high speed was not a concern...I do a lot of image adjustment, so color accuracy was. Did not want to spend a lot of money (being cheap)...wanted to get something worth more than it costs. (really cheap).

First issue was to decide how big and what resolution. I have both 1080 and 1440 24inch monitors. What I find with the high resolution one is that, in the native format, text is really small...tiny actually. So you increase the font size.. then stuff on internet does not display right.. so back and forth you go. With the 1080...it is ok..but prices have changed.. and now 27 inch is a reasonable price.. but only in 1080. Can one see jagged letters.. ah, no. Can you see the pixels..yea from about 8 inches. (this will depend a lot on how the monitor is connected and what resolution one runs).

So what one gets from this monitor is a low cost IPS monitor, a huge, reasonably uniform screen and a lovely view. Mine has no dead pixels...some slight edge bleed in both lower corners when showing black, and the best out of the box color accuracy I have ever seen. I happen to have a eye-one spectrophotometer, so calibration is quick and very effective, only it actually did almost nothing to it.. it was so small I could not tell the difference between before and after. It is very bright.

This monitor will only do a bit less than 80% of the adobe color space.. but appears to be able to do close to 100% of sRGB..with the typical blue being off issue.

Is it perfect.. no. plugging the cable in is actually a bit hard, as I had to bend the fitting to get it plugged in..putting the stand on is simple, but it would be easy to damage the panel, depending on how you layed it down. Not a fan of the adjustment buttons (not that I had to use them). I much prefer the inside power supply than having that extra box dangling.

Bottom line.. you get a very good monitor for a fairly low cost...and that is about as good as I would expect.

For approximately $300, you get a 27" IPS monitor. WOW. Is this monitor too good to be true?

First off, I can safely report that I received my monitor with ZERO dead pixels. Nothing worse than getting a monitor and seeing a red dot in the middle of the screen. Viewsonic monitors have served me well through the years, and this iteration is no different.

Why IPS? Have you ever had a laptop monitor where you had to be perpendicular to view the screen? Where you constantly had to adjust the tilt of the screen? If you moved adjusted your seat a bit, you lost proper imaging? Well IPS comes to the rescue here. With true 179 degree viewing, this monitor retains its image and color from any viewing angle. With a monitor so big, this is crucial. I can walk around my desk with the monitor not losing visual integrity. IPS is the future and present.

27" 1080P 60Hz matte finish. 1080P is really ideal for 27". 1080P monitors any smaller usually makes the text or icons look tiny. With this 1080P monitor, the imaging is perfect. It's very akin to the size of icons and text you'd see on a 15.6" laptop with 1366X768 resolution. On a desk, it really is an all enveloping image. Playing a game or watching movie really feels like 3D because it really does a good job of comprehensively filling your visual range. At 60Hz, it's middle of the road. Nothing great to say here, nothing bad. They do make monitors that do 120Hz, but that'll cost a good chunk more money. Not necessary in my opinion. 60Hz is plenty good. The matte finish does a great job of reducing glare. In fact, it eliminates it. You lose some of the vibrancy because of the matte finish, but you don't lose any of the clarity or contrast. The contrast, especially dark vs. darker, is amazing. I have no problems seeing black on black differences. This monitor may have the best dark contrast I've ever seen on a monitor.

The look of the monitor is SUPERB. I never knew how much a thin bezel made a difference until now. The image really feels like it's floating in the air. Really gives you an odd feeling like you can see into the picture. Love it! In fact, all my future TV/monitor purchases will have a thin bezel. I'm sold! The stand is solid. Very easy to put together. You dont' need any tools. The screen only tilts up and down, does not swivel side to side. But all in all, the look of the monitor is very minimalistic and superb. Looks really modern and elegant on my desk.

The box came with: VGA cable, power cable, HDMI cable. Can't ask for much more than that.

This is really an amazing monitor. It'd be easily worth $500. But classic viewsonic delivering a quality product at a wallet-friendly price. I can't recommend this monitor more. Buy it, you won't regret it.

UPDATE
I just wanted to add a couple of words to my review. Seems some people are having issues with purple blotches and dead pixels. Mine had no edge bleeding, dead pixels or purple blotches. After a few months of owning this monitor, i can't be happier.

The bezel-less design and IPS technology really lends itself amazingly to a multi-monitor set up. A wider viewing angle with the IPS allows for a lot of flexibility with the orientation of the 3 monitors. I love this monitor so much that I will be buying two more when the new line of graphics cards from ATI and/or NVIDIA come out, the HD89xx and GTX 7xx. I plan on setting up 3 monitors in NV surround or ATI Eyefinity. I have been hesitant to go with a 3 monitor set up because of the bezels of older monitors. This monitor from image to edge of the monitor has less than 1/2 inch of space. So I will finally take the plunge once I am satisfied the graphics cards can properly run 3 monitors without needing sli or xfire. The next-gen of grafx cards due out by the 2nd quarter of 2013 should fit the bill. This monitor is the perfect monitor for such a set up. The only thing out there that will be more seamless is a 3-projector set up, a set up of which I have zero interest. I remember the days when a 27" monitor of this caliber would cost over 900 dollars, and that was only a couple of years ago. I can now get 3 such monitors for the same price. Unbelievable deal really. Thank you Viewsonic!

UPDATE 2:
So I took the plunge and bought two more of these puppies. Paired with a ATI Radeon HD 7970, I run an Eyefinity configuration. The bezel-less design is superb. With bezel correction, my resolution is 5908x1080. Considering the base eyefinity resolution is 5760x1080, the two seams account for an addition 148 pixels of unseen area. That is MINISCULE. This just highlights how great these monitors are for a 3 monitor set up. I couldn't be happier. And all 3 monitors work perfectly with ZERO dead pixels, ZERO blotching. I never had to RMA a single monitor. Not sure if I'm just lucky, but the quality control of these monitors have nothing but perfect for me.

First of all I usually don't read good reviews at all when choosing something because there's no problems noted to watch out for...so I just read the bad reviews for this one.
Here's what others had to say:
First complaint: The monitor doesn't raise up or heighten. Well very few monitors do...so it made me wonder if this monitor was somehow shorter than the others
since people are putting books under the stand. It didn't make since to me since the monitor measures 16.1 high with the stand on the specs. So I set it up and I'm
still baffled. Unless these people are really really tall or using desks that are only two feet high there's no need to place books under the stand. My other monitor
(a Viewsonic VA1912WB) is the same height and its eye level without a monitor raiser or books to raise it up and I'm six feet tall.
Second complaint: The controls are hard to get to. Yes and no. At first they take getting used to (they're located on the front of the stand directly under the Viewsonic
emblem on the bezel. they are touch sensitive but that's because they're touch based. Once you play with them for a minute they're no problem to use except honestly you do need a
flashlight to see what your pressing. And really now how often do you adjust your monitor settings? I think with my other monitor I adjusted the settings twice in the past
eight years. Unless you lead a really boring life your not going to be adjusting your monitor that much.
Third Complaint: It's too bright. That's true, it is at first. So I went in and turned the brightness down about a third of the way, didn't touch the contrast, and that
solved the problem. Just to be sure I used the Win7 calibration tool and it passed fine.
Fourth complaint: The speakers are weak. Well...that's because they're monitor speakers, lol. Are you really going to buy or not buy this monitor because of the speakers?

OK so much for the complaints or concerns. Here's my summary. Its very easy to set up out of the box. Viewsonic was the best brand monitor 13 years ago and still is. They've
been making PC monitors for 22 years and they're good at it. No bad pixels, sturdy stand, incredible colors and sharpness with my ATI Radeon HD7570 (I hooked it up HDMI to HDMI),
the price is really good with it being a Viewsonic(they used to be very expensive years ago)and its a really nice looking monitor. I'm happy I stayed with Viewsonic.

I purchased this monitor to use with my MacBook Air. I'm a retired professional graphic designer so wanted pretty good capability without paying the price of a top of the line monitor. Before purchasing this I tried a Samsung from Costco. While it worked OK I was disappointed with the sharpness. Then I opened a Word doc with a gray watermark and realized the watermark did not show up on the remote monitor. I then played with light gray type and nothing less than a 10% gray would show up. Knowing better what to look for I called ViewSonic's technical department to ask whether the VX2370SMH-LED 23 would discern the top end of a gray scale. I also asked about the difference between eIPS and sIPS technolgy. The answers I got did not give me confidence so I asked to speak to someone with technical knowledge. The person on the line replied "I am the technical person." After a more detailed discussion of my applications the individual told me that they did a lot of graphic design and that this monitor would be great. Even after almost a day of trying to adjust the monitor I was unable to get it to discern the difference between white and 10% gray on a gray scale unless I set the color on a very warm and unnatural color setting. The other complaint is that the controls are touch controls located on the stand below the monitor. It is very difficult to see them both because they are too low and the lack of light. These two attributes combined with the fact that they are sensitive touch controls makes it very difficult to adjust. For general use this is probably a fine monitor however, for about $50 more Dell ultra line such as U2412M does a much better job for someone wanting to use it for graphics and photography

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I recently had a LED monitor go out and I was looking for a good buy on a 23 inch replacement monitor. I picked this monitor up on a lightning deal that had a great price and the monitor had great specs on paper. When I opened it up and installed it onto a computer I was immediately impressed at the picture quality. Without using any drivers or installation disk the monitor came up at 1920X1080p resolution and the picture was flawless. I loved the fact that the monitor also has a very thin trim boarder on the top and sides and this makes it ideal for setting up three monitors on the same computer. I immediately wished I could have gotten three of the monitors for the price I paid.

The monitor came with:

* The monitor
* Power cable
* HDMI Video cable
* VGA cable
* AC/DC Power Adapter
* A quick start guide
* A ViewSonic Wizard CD
* Audio cable
* Mounting base

I like that you can tilt the monitor to set the angle at which you look at the screen as this helps to relieve neck strain. The screen quality is outstanding and if you look at my video I think you will see that. The high contrast resolution and the wide angle of viewing at 178 degrees make the screen appear bright and always in focus with the right colors.

I am happy with the monitor and I like the picture quality and the ease of setup. I did not see any bad pixels so everything looked good there. Overall I rate the monitor at 5 stars as a good monitor at a great price.

There is a minor issue that I wish were a little different. I don't like the location of the screen control buttons on the base as I find them hard to see and to touch. I think they should have been located in an easier to reach and see location. Even seeing the location of the on/off button is not easy. I know this may sound minor to some people but it is just oddly designed. The monitor does come with speakers in the base and an audio cable to connect the monitor to your computer. The speakers are nothing spectacular and they are about what you will get from any monitor with speakers. They are barely adequate to hear the audio tones from the computer and some music.

The good: the pixels are perfect (no "stuck" pixels), and the image is excellent. Windows 7 recognized the built-in speakers without the need for software installation. The monitor packaging is excellent, and Amazon did a great job of providing an outer box to protect the monitor's original packaging. Also very good is the complete connection choice: HDMI, DVI, and VGA. The IPS (in-plane switching) technology does provide for a very wide viewing angle. Very nice built-in horizontal screen adjustment. I was just asked about color adjustment, so in case you don't see the comment, I'll say it here: The color adjustments are: sRGB, Bluish, Cool, Native, Warm, and User Color. The User Color gives you complete freedom to dial in whatever you want, in case one of the presets doesn't work for you.

The not so good: the controls are tucked in below the screen and are hard to get to. If you are someone who changes your monitor settings frequently, you may not be happy. I adjust it once and forget it, so it wasn't a significant problem. There is no vertical height adjustment; mine's sitting on a phone book ;).

The other issue is the default settings are alarmingly bright. I turned down the brightness with the built-in controls as much as I could (leaving the contrast setting towards the high end) and it was still too bright. I then turned down the brightness using my graphics card software control, and got a picture I am happy with. Even with that, however, the black level is not as good as a 23" Samsung LCD panel sitting with another computer six feet away. I use a "blank" screen saver, which is pure black, and the black level of the Samsung is deeper, even though I have the brightness about as low as you can get with the ViewSonic. I didn't do a full-blown calibration of the monitor, like a serious photographer would do, so maybe that would help the black level of the ViewSonic. The black level is an issue only when the screen saver is on and I compare it to the Samsung; otherwise, the colors are very rich and saturated in the ViewSonic.

To summarize, aside from control accessibility and screen saver black level, the image of the ViewSonic is great, and I'm very happy with the purchase.

I was looking for a budget IPS monitor for my secondary Mac and wanted the best bang for the buck. I use an Apple 27" IPS display at work every day & I have a retina Macbook Pro so I am used to using the top of the line panels. I first went with the LG IPS237L-BN. It's color/contrast was good but was defective and being discontinued so I did a bit more shopping around and found this. I'm leaving a review because the price/performance can't be beat.

Pros:
1) Great color and contrast, better display than the LG
2) 100% sRGB compliant which is rare for low end IPS panels (this uses an ah-IPS, most use e-IPS panels)
3) LED backlight = reduced power usage/brighter
4) Tilt-able - minor but some budget displays cannot tilt
5) Built in speakers. Yes, the speakers are very bad, but they work in a pinch.
6) HDMI input

Cons:
Nothing major - would be nice if it would be vertically adjustable.

I have been buying and recommending Viewsonic for years. They make great monitors at really great prices. This one has a beautiful picture, and I love the bezel-less design. Plus it has an SRGB setting which I really need.

But.

After 10 minutes of looking, sliding my hands all over the monitor, checking and rechecking the instruction book, and doing an Internet search, I was finally forced to actually call the company to find out where the power switch is. I felt like an idiot, and it was absolutely infuriating.

It's tucked underneath the screen on the stand, not actually on the monitor itself, and I only saw it once I put my head at keyboard level. Plus the buttons aren't really buttons, they're sensors, and you can't feel them, so making adjustments means ducking your head up and down to look at the screen, then back down to look under the screen and find the position for your finger to hit the button, then back up to see the adjustment, then back down...you get the idea. Hands down the single dumbest product design I've ever seen.

I'd been planning to buy a second one for a dual screen setup. Now I'm considering returning this one because it's just too hard to adjust.