Product Reviews

The growing popularity of LCD displays has led to increasing numbers of smaller manufacturers taking on the big guns by adding innovative and unusual features. One such company is AG Neovo with its 19in product, the S-19.

The first thing we noticed about the S-19 is that it looks nothing like any monitor we'd seen before. It has been designed as an all-round home entertainment device, and it wouldn't be out of place in a hi-tech living room. The base and back of the unit are constructed out of unobtrusive dark grey plastic, while the screen itself is covered by a sheet of darkened glass, in a style that brings to mind the likes of Bang & Olufsen.

Thick and thin

Unlike some LCD panels, which still manage to be big and bulky, there is very little to the S-19. It's a mere 7.5cm thick at its deepest point, and its stand can be folded into the back of the unit when not in use. The stand also allows an impressive degree of vertical tilt, so you can view it from the most comfortable angle. Once upright, the base locks to prevent the screen from tilting back too far and overbalancing.

But if the basic stand doesn't satisfy, AG Neovo provides a range of alternative accessories. First is the very sturdy and robust wall-mounting bracket, so the screen can sit virtually flush against a wall. There's also the £85 LCD Monitor Arm, which can be mounted to a desk or even a wall and gives the S-19 an almost iMac-like degree of movement.

For standalone desktop use, AG Neovo has included some neat touches, such as a socket for a Kensington security lock and a neat row of input ports concealed behind a removable flap. The S-19 plugs into your Mac either through a standard VGA or DVI port, and cables for both are included in the box. Cables are also provided for S-Video and composite video inputs.

The glass covering on the screen means that reflections in a bright environment could be a problem, although they were not as noticeable as we expected, thanks to the dark tint of the glass.

We were also surprised that the glass layer didn't have a detrimental effect on the picture. In fact,

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it was quite the opposite, making on-screen items look even clearer and sharper, and improving the contrast. The only real drawback to the glass layer is how easily it picks up fingerprints: we found ourselves polishing the screen every time we adjusted its tilt level.

The native resolution of the S-19 is 1280 x 1024 pixels, the same as most 17in displays. That will give you plenty of room for graphics work, but it would have been nice to be able to increase the resolution to set the S-19 apart from its 17in and 18in rivals. Scaling to lower resolutions is handled quite well, and again clarity is aided by the glass cover, but we found that text looked a little bit too blurred at anything other than native resolution for our liking.

Fiddling the returns

Unlike some monitors, the standard colour balance of the S-19 is excellent and shouldn't need much, if any, adjusting, although the extensive set of OSD controls allows the selection of three predefined colour settings, or you can fine-tune it to your own requirements. There are also controls for brightness and contrast, sharpness and a range of other features, which are all accessible through a simple interface.

The provision of alternative video inputs means that this monitor is not just restricted to your Mac. You can also plug it into a VCR or DVD player, and use the OSD to switch between inputs. But rather than having a built-in TV tuner, as some similar products do, AG Neovo has made TV functionality an extra, with an interesting twist.

The £75 tuner unit is called a TV Tuner Frame. (It has been disguised as a picture frame.) The idea is you plug it into the monitor and then place somewhere unobtrusive. There's room in the front for a 5in x 3in photo, but make sure the photo doesn't obscure the small hole at the top of the frame, which is the receiver for the remote control.

The basic remote control allows you to switch channels and change the volume (for which you'll need your own speakers), but not much else. We used a makeshift aerial to receive a rudimentary signal in the MacUser Labs, which confirmed that the TV tuner works. The picture on the S-19 looks like it would be equally as impressive as it is for computer images.

Although the TV tuner unit is quite clever and innovative, it seems a little too complicated to us. The AG Neovo S-19 itself looks so good, both in terms of picture quality and styling, that it's a shame that it's not easier to use as a true multipurpose device. However, it's worth having all the same, on the basis that it's one of the most stylish monitors we've seen, with excellent picture quality. But it looks like you'll have to stick to a separate TV for now.