LED or LCD for Photo Editing?

<p>I am looking to buy 32" LED for photo editing, I am not comfortable on laptop or 20" or 22" lcd's, It will cost about $250 in local market. Should i go for 32" LED ??? I can't afford apple products otherwise would love to buy :)</p>

<p>Need Experts views about both option.</p>

<p>I would not get a TV (be it LED or LCD) as usually they have very mediocre panels aimed at saturation and contrast - for photo editing, you need more color fidelity and subtleness. Plus, a 32" TV will still have a resolution of 1920*1080, while any monitor that size will have a higher resolution. But indeed, also a higher price.<br>

For photo editing, you really want a good quality IPS LCD; they can be found for $250, but those will be 22" or 23" most likely. If you really want much larger, you'll need to spend more. In between the Apple Cinema displays and a cheap TV, there are a lot of viable options, such as thew Dell UltraSharp monitors, or the better Asus LCDs.</p>

<p>Regardless of whether the box says "LED" (Light Emitting Diode) or "LCD" (Liquid Crystal Display), the actual picture is made with an LCD panel. In the case of TVs, and computer displays, the "LED" refers to the back-lighting technology. LED back-lights are the "new kid on the block", with earlier LCD panels being illuminated by cold-cathode fluorescent tubes. LCD panels do not generate their own light, so they need a white back light.</p>

<p>Note there is another, newer, technology called "OLED" (Organic Light Emitting Diode), which forms the image without an LCD panel. And Plasma is another completely different technology.</p>

<p>Unless your vision is extremely compromised, a "TV"/"HDTV" is not a very good solution at all for photo editing. With digital display panels, the number of pixels is a fixed quantity. Anything labeled as a TV or HDTV will have a maximum "resolution" of 1920 pixels across by 1080 pixels down. This is for any TV or HDTV, from a 20" to 32" to a 90".</p>

<p>In contrast, a computer display packs a lot more pixels into a smaller display. For example, a 27" iMac sports 2560 by 1440 pixels, about 75% more.</p>

<p>I also agree with Wouter's comments about quality of the display. That matters a lot, when the viewing distance is measured in inches instead of feet.</p>

<p>LED's use far less electricity, last longer, produce less heat than CCFL (Fluorescent backlight). The newer generation of GBr LED backlight displays like those from NEC contains green and blue LED units, that are covered with red phosphor, it provides more control over white point calibration too. </p>

<p>Stay away from HDTV's designed for regular home TV viewing. Stick with those designed for computer video cards which have subpixel dot size structure that is much more finer. The only HDTV's that have similar pixel dot fineness are 4K but are way too expensive right at the moment.</p>

<p>There are LED LCD's computer displays that can connect to cable TV box through HDMI. I have an sRGB color gamut 27" LG 27ea63vp I bought at Best Buy for about $330. Here's a thread that shows how well it calibrates...</p>

<p>http://www.photo.net/digital-darkroom-forum/00cOaL?start=0</p>

<p>I'm not sure of your budget nor how much display cost in your area; but there are quite a few high quality 27inch monitors that can be purchased for $600 dollars. They might require calibration after purchase (pre callibrated screens seem to cost a bit more) or might be 'close enough' for your needs. Some models include aoc q2770, vp2770 and benq BL2710pt. If you support dual dvi there are some korean models that can be purchased for for $350-$450. These models tend to have lower quality stand; require dual dvi (no hdmi or display port) and have very limited on-monitor controls (brightness and such); but they have full rgb and are a bit less expensive.</p>

The three letters you should be

looking for are IPS. That's a type

of LCD panel where the color

doesn't shift drastically depending

on where your head is.