DisplayMate shows you how to get the most from your current display and helps you in buying a new one. Once you get used to a perfectly tuned display, you'll want to use DisplayMate regularly. It is designed to be used regularly throughout the entire life-cycle of a display:

Buying     Initial Set Up     Daily     Weekly     Troubleshooting

Buying a Display

• Help in selecting the model to buy
  • Take a DisplayMate disk along with you when you go shopping for a monitor. In store demos are designed to make the displays look wonderful. DisplayMate shows you everything: the good, the bad, and the ugly!

  • Don't take monitor specifications such as dot-pitch or video bandwidth too seriously. They don't tell the whole story and can be quite misleading, even when they are factual and interpreted by experts.

  • The proof of the pudding is in the viewing! Use the revealing DisplayMate test patterns and your own eyes to decide what looks best for you.

• Checking out the actual unit purchased
  No two monitors are alike, even of the same make and model made on the same day. There is in fact a considerable sample to sample variation between monitors for all brands. Use DisplayMate to check out the actual monitor that you bought to make sure that it is in good working condition and that it meets your own visual criteria. Then periodically recheck it during the warranty period in case any problems arise that can be repaired or replaced by the manufacturer for free.

Initial Set Up

• Adjusting each control
  Carefully go through the DisplayMate Set Up Program to adjust every one of the monitor and video board controls to their optimum settings. You will eventually need to do this for every video mode you use.

• Enhancing the image through optimization
  The DisplayMate Tune-Up Program actually improves monitor image quality by taking advantage of inherent trade-offs and compromises between different monitor and video board controls and adjustments. If you follow the program's instructions carefully, when you are done the display will be working at its optimum operating point, for the best image and picture quality that it can deliver.

Using DisplayMate Daily

• When changing resolutions, color depths and refresh rates
  Even if your display has digital memory that remembers many control settings, many others are not stored for each mode. For example, one critical control that is seldom stored is Brightness, which controls the highly sensitive Black Level that is affected by any of these changes.

• When starting critical applications
  Critical applications, particularly those with high resolution graphics images, may require adjustment of some controls when they start up. Examples include Medical and Document imaging applications.

• When the room lighting changes
  This can result from a change in sunlight, in electric lighting, or in your window shades. Brightness, Contrast, and Color Balance are directly affected. Other parameters are indirectly affected, such as Focus. If these are critical, you will need to go through part of the DisplayMate Set Up Program.

• As the display drifts during the day
  All displays drift as they warm up, and they may continue to do so throughout the day. For critical applications, allow the monitor to warm up for at least half an hour. If the monitor drifts afterwards, you will need to go through part of the DisplayMate Set Up Program regularly throughout the day.

Using DisplayMate Weekly

• Tuning the display regularly as it ages over weeks and months
  All the electronic components in your display change and age with time, and that slowly affects the image in subtle and not so subtle ways. As a result you will need to go through the DisplayMate Tune-Up Program regularly over a period of weeks to months in order to maintain top image and picture quality. How often will depend on your monitor hardware and on how critical your applications and your eye are.

Using DisplayMate for Troubleshooting

• Whenever you change any computer hardware
  Any change in your computer hardware configuration can affect video performance and image quality. That's because any form of electromagnetic interference or coupling can show up as a subtle or not so subtle effect on the display image. For example, if you install an new internal modem, it may interact by proximity to your video board or through the computer's power supply. If you install an external modem, it may produce fraying magnetic fields that affect the monitor. So whenever you change any computer hardware you may need to go through the DisplayMate Set Up and Tune-Up Programs to correct any problems that may have arisen.

• For troubleshooting your own video problems
  Use DisplayMate to track down video problems that arise from time to time. This can include problems with video drivers, improper color palettes, compatibility problems, or checking out a bad video cable that is causing streaking. Any of the DisplayMate products can be used as a diagnostic utility.

• For specifying and checking repairs
  Use the DisplayMate tests to precisely explain to the Service or Repair center what the problem is. Tell them which DisplayMate test pattern demonstrates the problem best. You are more likely to have it properly fixed to your satisfaction. When the display comes back, check it out thoroughly and make sure that the problem is no longer there and that no new ones have crept in.

• For telling you its time to buy a new monitor
  At some point after going through the DisplayMate Set Up and Tune-Up Programs, you may decide that your display is no longer capable of performing up to par. Then its time to take out your DisplayMate disk and go shopping for a monitor again. Because you've been using DisplayMate regularly you know exactly what to look for in your next monitor!