As mentioned in Tom's Hardware, some budget LCD monitors are only capable of displaying 18-bit colour (262k colours).
"Almost all of the panels sold in the mass market do not operate at 24 bits (16.7 million colors) but at 18 bits (262,144 colors). Yet all of them still claim to display 16 million colors. The minor difference, in this case, is that they don't display 16.7 million, but 16.2 million. In order to achieve this, all of them use a technique called "dithering" that, like the AU, displays alternately the two closest colors. There are now a multiplicity of algorithms that make this possible and more or less effective"
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/display/20040226/index.html
Based on this information, a lot of popular LCD monitors have actually only 18-bit LCD panels that use dithering etc to 'achieve' 24 bit. I like the Samsungs and may eventually get one to replace my CRT (for space reasons, not image quality) so just making sure that the one I get has a true 24-bit panel. Based on the info on the site:
18-bit Panels
Samsung 173P
Samsung 173V
Samsung 172T (I'm surprised, 'T' series supposed to be higher end, maybe because its of an older generation)
Samsung 710N
24-bit Panels
Samsung 173T (successor to the 172T)
Samsung 213T
"Almost all of the panels sold in the mass market do not operate at 24 bits (16.7 million colors) but at 18 bits (262,144 colors). Yet all of them still claim to display 16 million colors. The minor difference, in this case, is that they don't display 16.7 million, but 16.2 million. In order to achieve this, all of them use a technique called "dithering" that, like the AU, displays alternately the two closest colors. There are now a multiplicity of algorithms that make this possible and more or less effective"
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/display/20040226/index.html
Based on this information, a lot of popular LCD monitors have actually only 18-bit LCD panels that use dithering etc to 'achieve' 24 bit. I like the Samsungs and may eventually get one to replace my CRT (for space reasons, not image quality) so just making sure that the one I get has a true 24-bit panel. Based on the info on the site:
18-bit Panels
Samsung 173P
Samsung 173V
Samsung 172T (I'm surprised, 'T' series supposed to be higher end, maybe because its of an older generation)
Samsung 710N
24-bit Panels
Samsung 173T (successor to the 172T)
Samsung 213T