Samsung SyncMaster S24B750V review

There’s no denying Samsung’s new 24in Full HD monitor looks fantastic, but its space-age appearance isn’t its only unusual feature. It also has smartphone-friendly technology built in, allowing it to display images and videos from a range of compatible handsets.

The technology in question is Mobile High-Definition Link, or MHL, which makes it possible to connect a range of Samsung handsets, as well as other compatible models, to view the phone’s display on the big screen. While we can’t envisage many hooking their phones up to a big screen to play movies or games, it could be of use for showing off photos to family and friends.

So it’s innovative, but the S24B750V does sacrifice practicality for style. The stand, for one, tilts a little back and forth, but there’s no height adjustment or portrait mode, and the external power supply is a retrograde step.

Ease of use is below par, with the combination of touch-sensitive buttons and a feature-packed onscreen display making it fiddly to adjust even basic settings. Connectivity is rudimentary, with a single D-SUB input and twin HDMI inputs, as well as two 3.5mm jacks for piping audio to the rather average internal speakers, or out to a discrete set of speakers.

Critically, image quality disappoints too. Where most monitors at this price now use IPS technology, Samsung has stuck with an inferior TN panel, and although it’s among the better TN panels on the market, viewing angles are narrow and the colour palette muted compared to IPS monitors.

We put it to the test with our X-Rite i1Display 2 colorimeter and found the S24B750V to be bright enough at 258cd/m2, but with a disappointing contrast level of 696:1 giving slightly greyish blacks. Colour reproduction, meanwhile, lacks the vivid accuracy of the best models at this price. This is partly due to the high 6,940K colour temperature, which adds a slight bluish tint. With an average Delta E of 3.4 and a maximum deviation of 9.5 in the greens, there’s plenty of room for improvement.

The Samsung S24B750V’s new-age looks and novel smartphone connectivity may be enough for some, but at this price we’d demand much higher image quality than this. With the AOC i2352Vh delivering IPS technology and a 23in Full HD panel for half the price, Samsung’s SyncMaster S24B750V is a classic example of style over substance.

Author: Sasha Muller