Philips 225P1

The environment is a pretty hot topic at the moment and manufacturers have been quick to understand that it’s also a selling point. Philips is no exception, claiming presence sensor in the 225P1 22-inch, 1680 x 1050p monitor can reduce power consumption by up to 70%.

Handling: a great stand but a lack of connections

There’s certainly more to the Philips 225P1 than just its presence sensor. It has a height-adjustable stand that’s mounted on a rotating base and it also has a portrait mode. Video connections include VGA and DVI ports and audio is catered for by 2 x 1.5-watt speakers. In fact, with its portrait mode and the notable absence of an HDMI port, the 225P1 is clearly aimed at office computing rather than multimedia and games.

Responsiveness: too slow for gaming

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Average ghosting over ten frames

If you were still in any doubt about the 225P1’s gaming credentials, the response time of 5 ms will soon bring you back down to earth. Even an input lag that’s invisible to the naked eye can’t make up for the noticeable blurring in fast-action sequences. If you still plan on using it for video games though, just be careful what type of games you pick. You’d be better off ditching FPS and other games requiring high response rates in favour of strategy, sports or civilisation games.

Decent default colours

Default colours

Ideal colours Compare the 225P1 to other LCD monitors in out product Face-Off

One of this monitor’s strong points is accurate colour reproduction. Without having to adjust any of the settings, you’ll have quality colours that only specialists and nit-pickers would notice anything wrong with. If you need accurate colours, you can count on this 22-inch monitor to do the job. You will, however, have to weigh that up against the fact that the 225P1 features a TN panel, meaning lower viewing angles, dark patches at certain angles and poor colour homogeneity. Anyone who’s seriously into photo editing would do better to look for a VA or an IPS panel, neither of which suffer this type of problem.

Users who are more sensitive to colorimetric problems will notice a very slight deviation in the brightness of the grey shades. Have a look for a calibration profile if you want to have a go at correcting the colours.

The 225P1’s contrast just about saves the day at 750:1, which is only slightly below the average rating of 850:1.

Granular noise and poor-quality upscaling

Don’t count on this screen to deliver good picture quality in your favourite films. There’s noticeable speckling and the upscaling is mediocre with both SD and HD sources. To do your films justice, you’ll have to make sure you’ve got a decent-quality player.