Acer AL1912M

Acer's AL1912M panel is capable of displaying up to 16.7million colours. This means that it has the ability to reproduce a large colour gamut.

When put through DisplayMate, the AL1912M displayed all the greyscale levels clearly in the extreme greyscale tests, while maintaining a solid black background. It was splendid in the colour blending and 256-level colour intensity ramp tests, where colour banding was not noticeable.

It's not an overly bright monitor - its specifications list a brightness rating of only 250cd/m². However, this was not a problem in our testing environment and, coupled with its contrast ratio of 500:1, this monitor produced a vibrant image, yet neutral colours. Viewing from the sides and from the top was also very good and the amount of blurring we noticed in the motion blur test was minimal.

As an everyday screen the AL1912M is superb. It can be used for office work, games and movies, which makes it a pretty versatile screen. It has analog input only, but this no doubt helps keep the cost down. The AL1912M has a 2cm bezel around the side and top edges of the screen. A simple and narrow base is attached to the neck of the monitor, but this base is not very stable, as it lifts up a little when tilting the screen.

While Acer has a recommended retail price, a quick online search yielded prices lower than this. At that lower price, you should definitely consider picking one up.