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HANSOL 701a & 701p 17-inch MONITORS
STANDFIRST
The cost of 17-inch monitors has fallen
dramatically over the past year or so but we suspect you'll have a tough time
finding any as cheap as these two from Hansol
COPY
In a relatively short space of time Korean monitor
maker Hansol has established a good reputation for itself as a leading value
for money brand but these two 17-inch models are really going to take some
beating! The 701a sells for a fraction under £200 (and that's including VAT)! To
put that into perspective, that's what a half-decent 14-inch SVGA monitor would
have cost you just a couple of years ago! Its stablemate, the slightly better
specified 701p has a suggested price of only £233 and that's less than some of
today's 15-inch models. All very impressive but the big question is what's the
catch?
There doesn't seem to be one. True, they're
both relatively basic. There's no secondary inputs for example, and you can
forget any extra bells and whistles like multi-media features or fancy display
options but that said the specifications are perfectly adequate for the sort of
applications we're most concerned about, namely desktop video and
general-purpose PC work.
The key differences between the two models
concern the screen dot-pitch, (0.28 mm on the 701a and 0.26mm on the 701p), the
front-panel controls; the menu system is a little more sophisticated on the
701p, this model also has a slightly wider range of scanning frequencies and lower
power consumption. Apart from the front panels they look almost identical. Both
models support the most common Vesa and Mac resolution and scanning modes, up
to and including 1280 x 1025/60 Hz, though 1024 x 768/85Hz produces the most
comfortable display on this size of screen.
A captive video input lead terminated in a
standard 15-pin D-Sub connector is fitted to the backsides of both models,
(you'll have to buy an optional adaptor if you wan to use them with Macs), in
fact the only back panel socket is for the mains lead. The on-screen display menu
on the 701a is controlled from a set of three small buttons on the left side,
brightness and contrast are handled by two discrete rotary controls below the
screen surround. All picture functions on the 701p are dealt with by on-screen
displays, controlled from a small panel that tips out from beneath the centre
of the screen surround. The main menu is accessed by pressing the 'Do' button, selections
are made and adjusted using a four-way keypad. Brightness and contrast have
their own selector buttons on the 701p.
The 701p's menu looks a lot simpler but it's
actually quite tricky to navigate until you get used to it. The 701a's menu
functions are perfectly straightforward, though again it takes a little while
to become accustomed to the button sequences. Both menus cover all of the usual
picture shape, size and colour parameters, with provision for manually setting
the colour levels (that's in addition to two colour temperature presets -- 6500
and 9300 degrees K). The only unusual feature is a positionable menu display,
which can be moved to any part of the screen.
PERFORMANCE
Following the customary 30-minute warm-up
period the tests began using a mixture of moving video and patterns. Corner focus
on the 701a was very slightly soft, possibly because of the wider dot pitch but
it was only noticeable alongside the 701P display which stayed crisp right up
to the edges. Colour purity and convergence was spot on in both cases though a
patch of 'stain' in the bottom left hand corner of the 701a took a long time to
shift using the degauss function. Power supply stability was good in both cases
with no significant change in picture size when fed with a pulsating test
pattern. Moving video was clean, sharp and detailed on the 701p; the difference
in dot pitch is really only noticeable when staring long and hard at test
patterns.
SUMMARY
Okay, so images on these monitors don't leap
out of the screen in quite the same way as a top-of-the-line Trintron-based
display and we would have preferred a little more headroom in the brightness
and contrast departments but the performance is perfectly satisfactory and quite
remarkable for the price. Both models stack up well for general video and PC duties
though we would be very happy to pay the extra thirty or so quid for the 701p
for the better specification, neater-looking front panel and crisper image.
How Much?
£198 (701a), £233 (701p)
Tube size
17-inch FST/17-inch
Visible display area
306 x 230/306 x 230mm
Dot Pitch
0.28/0.26mm
Max Resolution
1280 x 1024 pixels (both models)
Max refresh rate
160/150Hz
Dimensions
428(w) x
442(h) x 415(d) mm (both models)
Weight
17.0/17.6kg
Hansol, telephone (01252) 360400
CV RATINGS
Features ****/****
Performance ****/****
Ease of use ****/***
Value for money ****
Overall Rating 85/88%
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ã R. Maybury 1999 1902
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