brightness calibration dual monitors

[Dandaman]

After reading various posts here and elsewhere, I bought a Pulse Color Elite system at closeout price.  I've been using the original Eye One puck and the latest Eye One Match software version to set my monitors.  I understand the Pulse colorimeter is superior to the *original* Eye One colorimeter, so my first step was to recalibrate my monitors with the better instrument.  However, whereas before I set my two monitors to approx. 110 lumens each, the Pulse software directions led me by the hand and told me where to set brightness on each.  At the end of the calibration, my main monitor is quite a bit brighter than the other.  An important note:  my main monitor is an Apple ACD 23" and my secondary monitor is the previous generation ACD 20".   The newer monitor tops out with more brightness than the older is capable of.  (And yes, I know many would say even a good LCD is no match for a quality CRT...)  Bottom line:  shouldn't both monitors end up at a similar brightness?  This way I wouldn't know how to edit a photo such that I'd get a good print match OR perhaps the prints would match one monitor and not the other.  Maybe I should jack up the brightness on monitor #2 above software recommendations to more closely resemble monitor #1 while creating #2's profile?

[Jonathan Wienke]

When calibrating multiple monitors to match, you cannot blindly accept the recommendations of the software; the recommendations are intended to get the most out of a single monitor. To match multiple monitors, you must use the same target color temp, white point, and black point for all monitors. The white point should be the highest setting that all of the monitors can deliver, so if one can do 110 and the other 125, you should choose 110 for your target white level regardless of the recommendations of the software. Similarly, the black level setting should be the lowest setting all the monitors can achieve, so if one can do 2.4 and the other 5.2, you should use 5.2 as your setting for both.