Westinghouse goes 22-inch with new LCD

Speak of the devil. We were just chatting up the incoming wave of 22-inch LCDs, and here's Westinghouse with their very own display of the Vista-friendly variety. The LCM-22w2 runs at 1680 x 1050, has a 5ms response time, 300 nits of brightness and a 700:1 contrast ratio. It's a 16:10 widescreen display, but we're not sure about the inputs -- we're guessing DVI and VGA. The 22w2 should be available now for $500.

Update: As noted in comments (thanks Mike), and confirmed by Westinghouse, there's DVI, VGA and plenty more.

[Mike Heck @ Jun 29th 2006 9:31PM]

According to the Westinghouse site, inputs are: D-Sub mini 15 pin, DVI-D, AC-in, Stereo mini jack, Composite in, S-Video, YPbPr, Audio in (Dual RCA)

[bliss @ Jun 29th 2006 9:37PM]

but really, what is size compared to color output... give me something that has auto color calibration or something... that would be worth looking into!

[srstakey @ Jun 29th 2006 9:37PM]

I was just looking at bestbuy.com (which has them in stock) and I see the same specs...maybe if there's a pice cut, I could see a TV replacement in my future :) A line in from my DVD recorder and another from my Xbox 360 and I'll be in heaven.

[falcom @ Jun 29th 2006 10:06PM]

how is it 'vista friendly' without hdcp?

[Spyvie @ Jun 29th 2006 10:32PM]

If it going to be bigger and more expensive than the 20" widescreen displays, why can't it be 1080i native?

[eschreib @ Jun 29th 2006 10:34PM]

What makes a monitor of the "Vista-friendly variety"?

[jdrom17 @ Jun 29th 2006 10:45PM]

To make it "Vista-friendly variety", I would assume that means it supports HDCP, since that seems to be something Vista may need to run 'properly'.

[Wrenkin @ Jun 30th 2006 12:23AM]

HDCP?

[Magus @ Jun 30th 2006 10:06AM]

Question for someone a bit more versed than me perhaps.
LCDs are seemingly falling out of the sky in large quantities with various improvements except...
Why is there no regular wide LCD thats 1900x1200 thats sub 24 inches.
It seems everything is being improved upon aside form the rezolution.

I have 17 laptop display thats 19x12 but i'm forced to buy a 24 regular due to a complete lack of options in anything smaller with the same rezolution. I would hapily settle for a 17 or 20 LCD...
...a bit late now i guess

[jdrom17 @ Jul 1st 2006 9:31PM]

HDCP - High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection. Created by Intel, HDCP is used with HDTV signals over DVI and HDMI connections and on D-Theater D-VHS recordings to prevent unauthorized duplication of copywritten material.

This will be pretty much required, to the best of my knowledge, to playback HD-DVDs and Blu-Ray discs on Vista.

[George Ou @ Nov 13th 2006 4:41AM]

"To make it "Vista-friendly variety", I would assume that means it supports HDCP, since that seems to be something Vista may need to run 'properly'."

C'mon people. This has to do with HD-DVD and Blu-ray DVD playback protection and has nothing to do with Vista. If you don't have HDCP and IF the disk has the HDCP flag checked (which 99% don't at this point in time), then you will not be allowed to play the content at 1920x1080 1080p resolution. This applies to any operating system!

[Archiim @ Nov 22nd 2006 1:57PM]

After getting off the phone with Westinghouse support, I found out that this monitor is NOT HDCP compliant!

LCM-22w2 = NO HDCP

[Thomas @ Nov 24th 2006 10:43AM]

Archiim said "After getting off the phone with Westinghouse support, I found out that this monitor is NOT HDCP compliant!"

Well then someone goofed, this cannot be Vista-whateverized. Too bad, looked like a sweet BF deal.

[T.J. @ Nov 22nd 2006 5:23PM]

Does this monitor have a coaxial hook-up for cable tv?

[Bill @ Dec 1st 2006 9:24AM]

My neighbor purchased a Westinghouse LCM 22W2 for their older compact Presario(sp??) 6010 running XP Home OS. The system will not boot with this monitor attached. When they reinstall their old monitor all is well. Why????

[Frank @ Dec 5th 2006 12:37PM]

I purchased this monitor on Black Friday at my local BestBuy. For $199.99. For that price I can't complain about anything. Screen is crisp & Clean. Using the DSub input. Havn't tried the other inputs yet. Pluged into my computer (ATI Radeon 9800 Pro AGP) no problems, just slect screen resolution and tada - Great Picture.

[Archiim @ Dec 11th 2006 12:40PM]

Consumers should also note that this LCD only has 6-bit color as opposed to the standard 8-bit.

It apparently uses a dithering technique, using nearby pixels, to reduce the effect of only having 6-bit color.

[cloneofsnake @ Dec 14th 2006 10:35AM]

Where did u find out about the 6 bit Vs 8 bit info? I did some research before getting it on black friday, and it seems to be good. I've tried its DSub, DVI, Component and S-Video input, all working very well. All in all I'm satisfied as I only paid $199 for it. Still, I have questions about this 8 bit thing. Windows is set at 16 or 32bit, right? I remember PlayStation one was 16 bit color too, which meant it could display all visble colors to the human eye... or something... So the current LCDs can only do 8 bit??? Like... SNES?? :P

[cloneofsnake @ Dec 14th 2006 10:40AM]

double checked... the SNES had 15bit color depth, and PS one had 24 bit... does this mean this monitor can't even handle SNES colors?

[Archiim @ Dec 14th 2006 2:06PM]

You can tell that the monitor is only 6 bit vs. 8 bit because the its specifications say it only supports 16.2 million colors.

"If the manufacturer lists the color as 16.7 million colors, it should be assumed that the display is 8-bit per-color. If the colors are listed as being 16.2 million or 16 million, consumers should assume that it uses a 6-bit per-color depth."

please see http://compreviews.about.com/od/multimedia/a/LCDColor.htm

A monitor that has 8 bits per color channel will be able to display 16.7 million colors.

2^8 x 2^8 x 2^8 = 256 x 256 x 256 = 16,777,216

[Archiim @ Dec 14th 2006 2:13PM]

Quick clarificiation, the Westy has 6 bits per color channel as opposed to 8 bits per color channel. There are three color channels: red, green, and blue. So the westy has a total of 18bit color depth (slightly greater than that of the SNES). Most monitors have 8 bits per color channel, resulting in a total of 24bit color depth (like the PSone).

Also note that in your Windows display settings, the 32-bit Highest color quality actually refers to 24-bit color (8 bits per color channel) with an additional 8 bits representing an alpha or transparency channel.

[ryan @ Mar 18th 2007 8:37AM]

I own the Westinghouse 22" LCD monitor. Great buy. But why, oh why are the controls on the back- right side of the monitor. To adjust the volume, for instance, you have to guess which button will turn it up or down. Wrong guess and you end up switching the video inputs which can really mess up a good song or video because you then have to toggle through the inputs until you get back to D-Sub.
It isn't difficult to undersatand from a design perspective that the most used controls belong on THE FRONT of a unit...not on the back!

[bryantl @ Oct 2nd 2007 3:39PM]

I purchased the Westinghouse LCM-22w2 monitor 10 months ago for $315 from an Ebay reseller who purchased this monitor at Best Buy 4 days before I bought it. It came factory sealed. (Best Buy was sold out when I drove 2 hours to get one.) It has gone out after 10 months of use and Westinghouse will not honor the warranty nor give me any help with figuring out what is wrong with it to service it. I now have a 22-inch paper weight that was extremely costly considering it only lasted 10 months. I will never buy another Westinghouse product as long as I live.

[lockdown1101 @ Jul 13th 2008 11:42PM]

Trust me, the warranty sucks too. I bought mine in december. I've had a total of like 2 months use of the thing. Cause pretty much the day or few days after me 30 day return expired it died on me. I sent it to westinghouse and it took them over two months to get it back. I used it happily again for about a month and then sent it back and now i'm still waiting for the damn thing... I officially hate this failure of a company "yeah, it looks like it's done but it still says it's processing. I don't know why it hasn't shipped back to you yet"