Reply 20 of 26, by clb
I have the same Philips 252B9 😁
Indeed, I also noticed that it does have a forced 4:3 mode. For the VGA input side, that is definitely super useful.
Comparing these two displays, there are a few things that make me feel annoyed about the Philips display, and prefer Asus PA248QV more (when using it with CRT Terminator on DVI-D). These reasons are rather silly and subjective, and very small compared to the actually meaningful things like that aspect ratio issue, but now that we're in the topic..:
1. 252B9 power led constantly blinks on and off when it is in standby. As I am typing this, I can see at the corner of my eye that white power led blinking on and off every five minutes. It tends to drive me nuts, because it "steals my attention" every now and then.. so I end up putting blu tack on top of the power led. I don't understand why manufacturers want to make their devices blink for attention when they're not in use.
2. The 252B9 buttons are small and round, much flimsier than on PA248QV, which are larger and square, easier for fingers to reach.
3. I remember 252B9 had that "thanks for saving the nature" notification coming from the PowerSensor thing whenever it detected you're not watching the screen.. that constant reminding of how green I am made me turn the whole feature off.
4. Checking the current resolution, and switching between video inputs is easier on the PA248QV, and a bit tedious on the 252B9 menu sequence.
One area where the 252B9 wins over PA248QV is that when one turns the PC off, the Asus turns the whole display bright RGB=(0,0,255) blue for a couple of seconds. The 252B9 shows "no signal" briefly, over a black background. This is much nicer for the user.
I've been meaning to do side by side picture quality analysis on DVI-D for CRT Terminator with these two displays, though haven't quite yet gotten around to doing so. Not sure if there will be any meaningful differences to be found there, both seem quite decent.