Digital Trends

Gateway 30-inch LCD March 7th, 2005 | by Ian Bell

Setup and testing Cont'd

PC users will love the 1280x768 resolution and using the DVI input instead of the analog VGA input gives you a much sharper looking picture albeit at a 60Hz refresh rate. The response rate is spec'd at 16ms, which is very good for a LCD of this size. We did not notice too much ghosting or trailing while playing PC games. The Kreisen LT-30FMP has a 25ms response rate and looked just as good in our opinion. We noticed that text scrolling along the bottom of CNN had a slight trail when compared to CRT based televisions, but this is to be expected for LCD TVs in this price range.

There are four picture viewing modes: Standard 4:3 mode, Widescreen mode, Panoramic Mode, and Zoom Mode. Although black bars are added to the sides of the picture, Standard Mode should be used when watching traditional 4:3 broadcasts.  Widescreen Mode will stretch the 4:3 picture to fill the entire screen. If you are watching a 16:9 broadcast than it should fit the screen without looking stretched, although you will notice space on the top and the bottom of the picture. Panoramic Mode will fill the entire screen and makes a 4:3 broadcast look stretched more than it should, it also appeared to cut off part of the picture in a 16:9 broadcast, although it seemed to change depending on the show. The center of the picture in Panoramic Mode is not stretched but the picture on the left and right sides are. Zoom Mode simply lets you zoom in on the picture and cuts off part of the top and the bottom of the picture.

The Gateway 30-inch LCD features PiP (Picture In Picture) which you can use to watch another video source in a small window. You can swap the video sources and windows if you want to as well. The HDTV, VGA and DVI inputs cannot be used in the PiP window which is a major blow to the unit. That includes 480P progressive scan signals using the DVD input. We loved how the Kreisen 30-inch TV would let you do a split window with both the computer input and the HDTV inputs. We would have liked to have seen more PiP options with the Gateway 30-inch TV, especially since it doubles as a computer monitor.

The menu system works well and has plenty of options to choose from including color controls, parental controls for blocking certain shows and more. The menu options change depending on what type of input you are using. For example, if you are using the VGA or DVI inputs than there is an Auto Picture mode which will automatically change the position and size of the picture depending on the signal format it receives. Gateway left this feature out on the component video and composite video inputs so you will manually have to setup your picture.

On the audio side, it is hard to differentiate stereo sounds from mono since the speakers are so close together. If the volume is turned up you can tell if the movie is in stereo but at lower volumes it sounds like it's in mono. The bass is pretty good for a television of this depth however.