LG Flatron L226WU

At last, the LG Flatron L226WU is a worthy competitor to the Samsung T220HD!

In fact, it even beats Samsung's screen in some regards, with a faster response time, more accurate colour handling and nice extras like a height-adjustable stand and a USB hub.

Handling
In general, the connectivity and handling of this monitor are above average for the 22'' LCD monitor work, with DVI and VGA inputs, a height-adjustable stand and a sleek glossy black case.  Although three stars on this rating may seem modest, many of its competitors only manage two.

To get above this score, we'd have to see a monitor without a non-TN panel which suffers from very weak vertical viewing angles often below the 160° claimed by manufacturers.  We'd also like to see some of the little extras more often seen on 24'' screens, like a webcam, a card reader or HDMI and Display Port inputs.  Nevertheless, all these features cost a lot more, so it would be unfair to be too disappointed by the more affordable 22'' monitors.

Gaming
When it comes to gameplay, the most important statistic on this monitor is its 2 ms response time.  However, experience has shown that plenty of monitors advertised as having a 2 ms response time are far closer to 5 ms, or else suffer from some other defect, such as a high input lag.

It seems our fears were unfounded with the LG Flatron L226WU, which is one of the fastest, most responsive screens we've seen.  Colour images only trail 0.45 frames behind, which is one of the best performances on a 22'' screen, very close to the Samsung 2253BW's excellent 0.35 frames.

There was no reverse ghosting, either, when we were playing games or using our testcard.  There was, though, a minor input lag of around 23 ms, only a frame behind, and there aren't many monitors that can beat that.

If you hadn't already guessed it, this is an excellent screen.  The final thing that we checked was its handling of colours and contrast with its default settings, and we weren't disappointed.  It's not just us, either: our detailed lab tests proved that this monitor delivers great results straight out oof the box.

The average discrepancy between the colours requested by the graphics card and those actually shown, the deltaE score, was as low as 2.2, an incredibly good reading.  As you can see below, the results in the gray rendering test speak for themselves, with only a barely perceptible distinction between the ideal colours and those actually shown; we're a long way from the blue or red dominance that spoils so many other monitors.


If we're  going to be picky, then we should add that we would have preferred a deeper black and better contrast.  When whites are shown at 200 cd/m², our standard test setting, black is at 0.28 cd/m²--or twice as bright as on the best of the competition.  The result is a contrast ratio of 715:1, which, although good, isn't as excellent as some of the other scores for this screen.

One final complaint

While the most efficient 22'' LCDs use around 30 W to show an image at 200 cd/m², this Flatron is a touch greedy with its 40 W.