Dell SP2208WFP review

Performance
Out of the box and connected via DVI, we found the image had pink tint to it, which was easily corrected. There are also colour presets for multimedia and gaming along with red and blue presets, plus a user-defined preset. The gaming preset resulted in balanced colour levels for F.E.A.R., but the multimedia preset was not useful. It created an oversaturated picture with too much red. The normal or blue preset were better options for DVD viewing. You're also given the ability to change the screen ratio between 4:3 and 16:9, or have it fill the display.

The Dell SP2208WFP turned in unparalleled performance on our DisplayMate benchmarks. It separated itself from the pack. The SP2208WFP's aggregate score of 90 on our DisplayMate suite of tests is the highest such score we've seen to date. There was no area of weakness. It scored highly throughout, with top scores on greyscale and colour tests and uniformity and sharpness tests.

It scored well on our contrast ratio and brightness tests, although there are some displays that were brighter. Still, Windows apps looked crisp, with text legible down to a font size of 7. Though the default image setting was passable, we switched to the user-defined custom mode to lower the red level to get rid of the slight pink tint we saw on a blank, white Word doc.

The viewing angle moving side to side was more than acceptable, but when you move off the axis vertically, the screen darkens and colours shift quickly. With our eyes just above the top of the display and looking down at the center of the image, the image quality begins to suffer. Visitors to your desk will need to pull up a chair to share the display; those standing will see a poor image. In a brightly lit room, you might also find it picks up too much glare and reflections if employed as a straight productivity display.

Movies and games looked fantastic, with rich, vivid colours and smooth movement. The glossy screen coating helped smooth edges, and the 2ms response time (grey to grey) meant there was no ghosting.

We did find that the multimedia colour preset was not the right choice for movie watching, tending too much toward red. Using The Royal Tenenbaums as our test disc, Ben Stiller's red Adidas track suit looked practically radioactive. The Normal colour preset presented a much more balanced picture.

Conclusion
Excelling in testing and delivering outstanding results with DVDs and games, this monitor is a winner. Only its glossy screen coating lets it down. For scenarios where it'll perform double duty as a productivity and an entertainment display, we highly recommend the Dell SP2208WFP.

Additional editing by Shannon Doubleday