LG vs Samsung WXGA+ 1440x900 LED panels - feedback

I've seen a lot of complaining and comparisons about LED panels used by lenovo on T400. Having been an owner of both LG (42T0497) and Samsung (42T0503) panels, I just want to provide some feedback comparing the two models. LG panel came on a T400 2764 which i used for about a month, sold it, and ordered a new built T400 (2767) which came with the Samsung panel. Here is my general comparison between the panels. At first Samsung did not look as good as LG, but after some minor tweaking of gamma and color brightness, I think the both panels are pretty damn close when it comes to quality. If you are wondering how I obtained a new T400 with wxga+ led panel, you can order them from Lenovo right now through educational ordering.

Here is a comparison of some characteristic of the two panels according to my eyes. Everybody is different so you might report different things. I just sent the old t400 away, so i dont have it any more to take pictures side by side.

Brightness: LG > Samsung
LG wins this one. At maxiumum brightness settings its a bit brighter than the Samsung, however when reducing brightness the colors on LG looked progressively worse. At lower brightnesses Samsung looks a bit better.

Colors: LG > Samsung
LG again wins this one. The colors on LG looked more vibrant than on Samsung. The pictures which were biased more towards reds looked better on LG, but the pictures with more blue look much better on the Samsung. Samsung's colors just seem to be biased more towards the cool side. Initially Samsung did not look very good color wise with a little bias towards purple, but reducing brightness and gamma of both blue and red channels produced very nice results and now whites look extremely pure on this panel.

Constast: LG = Samsung
Contrast is very similar. LG was better out of the box, but after tweaking the Samsung the difference is negligible. The real key here is to reduce overall gamma, makes a world of difference. I believe that most of the complaints I see about this panel stem from the fact that initial gamma is not adjusted correctly for this panel.

Horizontal viewing angles: LG = Samsung
Again, its a draw here. I dont notice a difference at all. Horizontal sweet spot is very stable on both panels for regular type of work, however dark images wash out badly on both panels rather quick.

Vertical viewing angles: Samsung >> LG
On the LG panel is had the most trouble with the vertical sweet spot. I could only get either top or the bottom of the screen to be perfect, and constantly fiddled with the screen angle. I dont have such a problem at all on the Samsung, the sweet spot is much better which makes the panel much easier to work on.

Backlighting quality: Samsung > LG
LG was noticibly unevenly lit on the two bottom corners of the screen. Samsung backlight is very even, however not as bright.

Overall conclusion: After working on it for a day (and spending alot of time tweaking it, I have to say that I prefer the Samsung, however out of the box with no adjustments LG was probably better. The colors on the Samsung panel are not as vibrant, but i find it to be much easier on my eyes. My eyes would get tired rather fast on the LG, and so far I did not have a problem like that on the Samsung. It is probably not the best screen for work with photography and such, but for that I have a nice 24" NEC monitor with S-IPS panel. I have not seen any laptop screen even come close to quality i get on the proper monitor. If compared to a desktop monitor, the Samsung is alot like my backup 22" Acer with MVA panel (minus the viewing angles).

 

Did you calibrate the LCDs? If you posted your changes and profiles for other users that would probably be highly useful for t400 owners .

 

i dont think you can call what i did calibrating. I just went in and adjusted gamma and brightness of the three channels till i was semi-happy. I had it for a day so far, so i am still tweaking for best setting. I might post what I have after I am confident that I cant get it any better. I however suspect that these numbers are not going to look exactly the same on different panels even of the same type. Just play with it for a bit, gamma in particular is jacked up way high to start with for this panel. Lowering it really improved the picture quality.

 

nice comparison this is what i'm lookin for

 

Who makes the LED sold on the T500?

 

That was very nice of you to post this information. Thank you.

 

@Zenit,
Please post your adjustments because I will try them and compare to adjustments I have made. Thanks for your insight and look forward to your specific tweaks.

Gary

 

Where are you guys seeing a wxga+ LED option for the t400?

 

You can only get it through educational ordering. I ordered mine through a lenovo rep.

Last night I investigated this panel a bit further side by side with my desktop monitor. One huge weakness the Samsung panel has is the way is displays the Red channel. While I could get other colors pretty close, the perfect red remained elusive. It just looks alot "cooler" and not as vivid as on other panels. The greens and blues, however are very nice.

 

Hmm Im a part time student, and actually going back for my masters is this a school based deal? The reason I asked is I went through the student site and did not see the option.

 

Oh you don't have a color calibrator? I figured you had one since you have an NEC IPS panel. Should invest in one (even cheaper ones help a bit).

 

Well the 24" NEC is calibrated, but it is at work and was not calibrated by myself personally.

I took some pictures of the panel next to my two desktop monitors (that i use at home) with the settings i am using now (on Samsung). The color screens come from http://www.vanity.dk/tft/monitorTest_scale.html
Its a very nice site for basic testing of the screens.
Keep in mind that what you see in pictures if how my camera's sensor sees the panels, not exactly how the look to the human eye. Camera used was Nikon D50. Monitors are top left - NEC 20WMGX2 (S-IPS, 22"), top right - Acer AL2051W (P-MVA, 22").

The worst thing about the t400 is how it displays the red channel - it is a bit washed out and orangish instead of being vivid red. This is one thing no adjustments seem to be able to fix. Green is actually very close to what i see on the MVA panel Acer and Blue is rather close to the blue on the IPS panel NEC. The white did not come out very good, but it is noticible how it is slightly biased towards blue. The NEC actually has the best whites if you look at it in person. The Samsung kinda suffers when it comes to displaying the blacks, but it is almost impossible to capture on camera because panel displaying black looks like a bunch of CCD noise due to lack of light. If not for the crappy red, this panel would actually be very nice. My favorite of the three panels in picture is the NEC (top left).

here are some pictures:

 

Heh, also depends on the monitors people are using here and I assume most aren't calibrated.

 

@zenit,
Don't mean to trouble you bt are how your panel settings working out and if you could, I would still enjoy hearing how you adjusted your panel. Know each panel differs but it may help point in a good direction for tweaking the panel and thanks.

Gary

 

Interesting, I decided that the contrast ratio is poor and the vertical angles are poor on these panels (I had both), so nothing I could adjust would move them into the range of acceptability.

 

I actually dont have the T400 on my hands. A splotchy blemish appeared on the panel and off it went for repair. When i get it back, i will post the settings i use.

I dont know how well it work though, because you have the high nit panel which is a bit of a different animal.

 

completely agree about those two points. Viewing angles and bad contrast are usually not fixable by any adjustments. After looking at a few other machines from different manufacturers with 1440x900 14" panels, I think that most modern panels of that size are total crap. Interestingly, the 13" and 15" ones usually look much better.

 

@zenit,
Sorry to hear your machine needs repairing. So far have replaced palmrest and keyboard in mine and service has been excellent thankfully.

Thanks for posting settings when you can. I know the displays are different but again, it may give me some ideas of what direction to adjust my screen better than I have it now. Thanks again.

Gary

 

I finally got my thinkpad back from repair, and ironically, they replaced the Samsung panel with LG. So, having the LG on my hands again I will take pictures in the similar conditions comparing it to those two monitors side by side. Hopefully will provide some reference.