:. Introduction .:

If your looking for a monitor that compares to higher end monitors but for the fraction of the cost for your office or just for LAN parties or entirely for a home then we hope you have a look at the Samsung SyncMaster 171s, because its a lightweight monitor that is great if you need a space saving resolution but a bigger screen that's still great for the buck then the Samsung SyncMaster 171s might be just what you have been looking for.

:. Specifications .:

Horizontal Frequency:

The time to scan one line connecting the right edge to the left edge of the screen horizontally is called Horizontal Cycle and the inverse number of the Horizontal Cycle is called Horizontal Frequency. Unit: kHz

Vertical Frequency

Like a fluorescent lamp, the screen has to repeat the same image many times per second to display an image to the user. The frequency of this repetition is called Vertical Frequency or Refresh Rate. Unit: Hz

:. What's inside the box .:

• Monitor and stand
• Power cord
• Signal cable (VGA)
• Quick setup guide
• Warranty Card
• User's guide and driver installation CD

:. Samsung SyncMaster 171s .:

Samsung has a great reputation in the LCD market and have been part of it ever since it all started. They have one of the widest range of LCD's displays in the market and the SyncMaster 171s is one of them where Samsung made sure its a quality product that's affordable and that looks like a higher quality product them it really is. When I first put my hands on the box and opened it and had a look at the size of the 17" SyncMaster 171s my jaw just dropped and I was amazed how sexy this monitor looks and the sheer size of it surprised me. The silver really put this monitor in a different category in style then the other black or even worse beige monitors because ones you use a silver monitor you will just fall in love with it and will never go back, but obviously this is all my personal opinion and everyone else has different taste but I'm still amazed how cool this monitor looks compared to other LCD's or CRT's.

Another nice feature that this monitor has that you mostly only see in more expensive monitors is the pivot mode (90 degrees mode) This option lets you look at websites or programs in a landscape to portrait mode. If you have Windows XP thought you will have to go to the Portrait Display website and update to Pivot Pro 6.0 to get support in Windows XP because the CD Samsung included does not include drivers for Windows XP. Other then that small problem for Windows XP users the Pivot option is great if you serf the net a lot or do quite a bit of graphic design or word processing, this can improve your work area because there is less scrolling needed and you see a bigger picture if the product is for example a magazine layout.

Samsung also has a top of the line Menu that's located in the middle right side of the monitor. I won't go into detail on what each button does because its self-explanatory but let me point out some great options in the menu bar. The most amazing thing in LCD's is that they have an automatically adjusting display that will centere the screen and will also focus it. The SyncMaster 171s also has a nice feature that lets you change the brightness and contrast with out going into the menu, all you have to do is press the positive or negative buttons.

The next thing I had to try was games, people say that games or any kind of video file is not enjoyable on a LCD but after playing some games like Return To Castle Wildenstein, Medal of Honor, or the newly released Grand Theft Auto 3 I was amazed how incredible these games looked and played on this monitor, the image was sharp and crisp and the monitor also did not lag behind.

The only negative points I have come to about this monitor is that Samsung decided not to us a DVI input (even though its a bit hard to see the difference, you can still notice it sometimes). I find this very strange and frustrating because I know there last LCD the 170T had one and it would be nice if this one also had it. I hope Samsung includes the DVI input in there future LCD's because I can see some people turning this monitor down because it has no DVI. Another problem I ran into was when I was using there drivers, very thin white lines where showing up sometimes and it was annoying me but I figured out if I just delete the drivers and let Windows XP use plug and play drivers that the problem disappeared. So if you run into this problem just delete the drivers and use Windows drivers because I find the monitor runs better now.