Would you find this delta-E acceptable on a new PA271q?

[michael_mutmansky]

Thanks Arlen,

I got confirmation from NEC just now that they have not locked the display to the NEC-only version of the x-Rite i! Display Pro, so there is no explanation for why it may be having problems getting an internal calibration.

I'll try again tonight, but I think there may be something wrong with this monitor...

[Arlen]

Michael, I may have misunderstood what you're trying to do. When you say internal calibration, do you mean Stand Alone Calibration/Self Calibration (p. 25 of the manual), connecting the sensor via the SENS/MEM top USB port? If so, then it appears that only the latest NEC sensor, MDSVSENSOR3, will work for that. The manual says "connect a supported color sensor", and then on p. 26 it says "The supported USB color sensor for SENS/MEM port is MDSVSENSOR3". It doesn't list any other supported sensors for that purpose.

[michael_mutmansky]

Arlen,

Yes, the internal calibration that does not use the SV2 software.  Mine won't perform that without an error.  NEC has told me that they do not lock out the x-Rite device, so that shouldn't be the source of the problem.

A few days ago, I received some advice from NEC recommending that I run the monitor for a few hours before calibration, but that actually made the calibration considerably worse... I'm wondering if they are even trying some of these things before they send advice out.

I just received quite disappointing news that NEC does not believe the problems I am experiencing is a 'defect' per se, and that any replacement they may offer will likely exhibit the same problem.  So it sounds like they are somewhat unwilling to make a replacement and that means I will have to return it to the vendor for a credit or exchange.

I'm so disappointed with NEC after having used a handful of their monitors over the years to good effect (since the late 90's or so).  Not sure what I am going to do, as the Eizo monitors are identical in most respects, so I have little faith they are substantively better, and they certainly are a lot more expensive.  They are way outside what I wanted to spend on a monitor right now.

[dchew]

A few days ago, I received some advice from NEC recommending that I run the monitor for a few hours before calibration, but that actually made the calibration considerably worse... I'm wondering if they are even trying some of these things before they send advice out.

They told me the same thing. In my case, it did make an improvement. I've calibrated twice in a row with better results. That's not much of a sample population but I will continue to do that and see how it goes. I use Amphetamine to keep things awake. I also thought at one point Andrew said he leaves his on all the time, and leaving them on is ok with these monitors. I can't find that now, so I may be mistaken.

Regardless, I do feel like NEC are making generic recommendations that may or may not help, so feedback to them is probably worthwhile.

Dave

[Arlen]

Michael, I've also seen a trend for worse results after the monitor has been on for a while, vs. waiting just 30 minutes after it's turned on. However, I've run a lot of these calibration tests now and don't feel confident that anything like that is consistently reproducible for me. On average my results are now somewhat better than I reported in my last post. Can't really say why, though.

My best set of values, obtained 40 min after turning the monitor on, for my usual printing target 6000K 120cdm 200contrast were Avg=0.54, Max=0.82; and a few minutes later for Andrew's target ARsPhotoEditing values were Avg=0.56, Max=0.83. These values are not much higher than the two sets of values Andrew reported for his target, Avg=0.32, Max=0.57 and Avg=0.44, Max=0.72.

But most of the time my values for my target are in the range of Avg 0.60-0.95, Max 0.93-1.39.

I'm tentatively concluding that those values are good enough, given that dE values lower than 1.0-1.25 are said to be indistinguishable to the human eye, and I can't see any noticeable problems when I look at my images. So I think I'll stick with this monitor. But my mind is still open to other arguments.

P.S. For what it's worth, I also have a 3 year old, heavily used PA272W monitor, and its latest 2 sets of calibration values for my target are Avg=0.57, Max=0.96; and Avg=0.45, Max=0.76. Not much different than the values Andrew reported for his PA271Q.

[michael_mutmansky]

Here's my values for a D50 Photo editing after about 4 hours... really not good at all.

[Arlen]

I agree, those values look pretty bad.

I don't have access to my PA271Q right now, but I made a Photo Editing D50 target (just modified the stock Photo Editing target to D50, no other changes) and used it to calibrate my older PA272W. The Dark Values are similar to yours, but all the rest are much lower, as evident when they are excluded in the second image below.





You might  try using Andrew's target file ARsPhotoEditing, so you can directly compare to the results he presented for his apparently good PA271Q monitor. That's what I've been doing. You can download his target file at the link he provided, or just modify the stock Photo Editing target to white point 5750 and contrast ratio 300:1.

It's looking like there are some PA271Q monitors like Andrew's that are good, others like mine that after some tweaking have increased dE values but are not too bad, and still others like yours and Dave's that are pretty bad.

I'm still intrigued by Czornyj's demonstration of a dramatic reduction in dE values for his initially bad monitor (post #60), though he didn't include dark values like Andrew did; and his report (post #105) that the latest firmware update fixed all 5 monitors where he had tried it.

[michael_mutmansky]

My monitor is going back.  I'll report back once I have a new one running.

[gette]

Hi all!

New user just signed up. Architectural Photographer.

Anyway I just bought a BenQ SW271 and found out that their internal calibration color profiles are incorrect which causes calibration issues.

So.... I bought a NEC PA271Q which apparently has the same issue and may be the cause of these issues everyone is talking about.
Here is some brief info:
https://hub.displaycal.net/forums/topic/pa271q-target-white-point-error/

Using the wrong calibration panel correction can def cause issues, for instance higher Green curve, etc. And if NEC is using the wrong one in SpectraView (which some have confirmed is the case) they this will def cause issues. Just food for thought.

I need to test my calibration (fingers crossed). Waiting on my SpectraView software to deliver.

Anyone else having any more luck or input?

PS - What the hell is with all of these stupid verification questions, especially with a paid account.
This is going to get very old, very fast.

[jmlphotography]

FWIW, I just sent NEC an email requesting their POV on the issues everyone has raised.  I included links to this discussion as well as the one Gette posted. 

I also asked them to post their response here.

[ghostwind]

Interesting thread. I just got this monitor a few days ago from B&H and went over all the options, read everything I could, and did the calibration with the SVII 1.1.40 latest software. I calibrate for 100nits, 2.2, D65, and native gamut. I was surprised that the delta Es were so bad. See attached. My monitor is on the latest firmware too - R1.302 (even though as others have pointed out, the SVII software incorrectly reports it as V1.008). I also have two X-Rite i1Display Pro devices that I used, with similar results. All in controlled room lighting (i.e. dark), etc. I even checked the options in SVII to "Average low luminance levels", 52 (Highest Quality) steps, and "Extend luminance stabilization time". I did many runs with both i1 devices with those options ON and OFF, with different gamuts and peak luminance values, etc. I tried Andrew's target from this thread as well. No matter what I do, this is the best delta Es I can get. Is it a panel issue? Is it a SVII software issue? I don't know. It doesn't look great however.

I also noticed a few items in the OSD menu that I wondered would impact or not things - options like "Uniformity" which is by default set to 5. I set it to OFF, but SVII puts it back to 5. Another option, "Color Stabilizer" defaults to ON. With it both ON or OFF, no difference. A lot of small items like this that I'm not sure what benefit they add if any. Or what potential problems they may cause or not. The documentation is not very descriptive. Am I frustrated? A bit. I expected more. Would an Eizo CG279X be better? Not sure. Would another NEC? Sounds like a crapshoot. So I guess it comes down to accepting it or spending more time figuring it out by exchanging, or getting an Eizo.

One other thing I noticed is that the OSD menu shows the Preset as "SpectraViewII", but the luminance and white point values are not the same as the ones on the calibration report in SVII. So yeah, it seems like NEC is not designing the best software or integrated system. I was really surprised it only does grayscale calibration and just measures 3 patches of the primaries for the chosen color gamut. Why not do many color patches for the CMS if it can program the 3D LUT? Strange. On the fence for now...