marshall@wind55.seri.gov (Marshall L. Buhl) (05/08/90)
Years ago, I bought a bunch of NEC Multisyncs for connecting to EGA cards. I paid extra money for this original Multisync, so that it would be "compatible with future video cards that run at higher resolution." I could have bought EGA only monitors for a lot less. I wanted to upgrade the systems that have the NECs to VGA, so I bought a couple of VGA cables to try it out. The first user that got upgraded saw the folly of my ways. When running different programs (PC Word, Excel, DesignCAD) the vertical size is off. For some it's too small, for others, it's too tall. This is especially annoying for CAD or paint programs where aspect ratio is important. It takes a while to get circles to look circular or squares to be squares. My user is very upset that he has to adjust the monitor every time he switches programs. And I'm royally p*ss*d because I let my users down. I got suckered in by marketing hype. I called NEC to complain and see if there was a fix. No fix. I told the tech support person that I was upset that I had spent so much extra money for that compatibility with future video cards and it doesn't work right. He said that no one else thought that having to adjust the vertical size is a hassle, and that they were very happy that their Multisyncs WERE VGA compatible. Yeah, right. So now if I want to upgrade everyone to VGA, I'll have to buy new monitors to go with the cards. This will triple upgrade costs. I may just forget about upgrading, bit if I do, you can bet the monitors won't be made by NEC. 8-( 8-( 8-( 8-( grumble, grumble BTW, I upgraded an EGA system that was using a Princeton Ultrasync to VGA and it did not have this problem - at least not with the software that user was using. -- Marshall L. Buhl, Jr. EMAIL: marshall@seri.gov Senior Computer Engineer VOICE: (303)231-1014 Wind Research Branch 1617 Cole Blvd., Golden, CO 80401-3393 Solar Energy Research Institute Solar - safe energy for a healthy future
medici@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Mark Medici) (05/08/90)
In article <1990May7.182644.21562@seri.gov> marshall@wind55.seri.gov (Marshall L. Buhl) writes: >Years ago, I bought a bunch of NEC Multisyncs for connecting to EGA cards. >I paid extra money for this original Multisync, so that it would be >"compatible with future video cards that run at higher resolution." I >could have bought EGA only monitors for a lot less. > >I wanted to upgrade the systems that have the NECs to VGA, so I bought a >couple of VGA cables to try it out. The first user that got upgraded saw >the folly of my ways. When running different programs (PC Word, Excel, >DesignCAD) the vertical size is off. For some it's too small, for others, >it's too tall. This is especially annoying for CAD or paint programs >where aspect ratio is important. It takes a while to get circles to look >circular or squares to be squares. My user is very upset that he has to >adjust the monitor every time he switches programs. And I'm royally >p*ss*d because I let my users down. I got suckered in by marketing hype. > >I called NEC to complain and see if there was a fix. No fix. I told the >tech support person that I was upset that I had spent so much extra money >for that compatibility with future video cards and it doesn't work right. >He said that no one else thought that having to adjust the vertical size >is a hassle, and that they were very happy that their Multisyncs WERE VGA >compatible. Yeah, right. Apparently, the court systems feel the same as you. In fact, Intelligent Systems MLP, the previous owners of Princeton Graphic Systems, filed civil suit against NEC for this misrepresentation. In a recent PC Week magazine article, I read that the case was decided in Intelligent Systems' favor, that the term "compatible" has a generally understood meaning (I don't recall the exact wording), and that NEC did misrepresent its MultiSync monitor (the original, not any subsequent, such as the MultiSync II) as "compatible" with the VGA standard when, in fact, it was not. At the time of the article the court had yet to determine the amount of damages to be awarded to Intelligent Systems, and I have read nothing since. I'm not a lawyer, but based on this decision I imagine that a lot of people have good cause to ask for some compensation from NEC. Perhaps someone will start a class-action suit. My interest in this is that I was once an employee of Princeton Graphic Systems, and had a first-hand experience with this matter as it took place. I was interested to read this article, especially since I was unaware of the suit. Personally, I think that most of NEC's products are well engineered -- although I always knew that NEC was over the line when they claimed the original MultiSync was compatible with VGA. BTW, I have yet to see a monitor made in the past five years that was fully compatible with any advanced video standard accepted after that model monitor became available. Multisynchronous monitors, as any product, should be selected on the basis of available technology and not on the marketing fantasies of the manufacturer. * Just my humble (8-)) opinions, and not necessarily those of my employers * ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Mark Medici/SysProg3 * Rutgers University/CCIS * medici@elbereth.rutgers.edu ----------------------------------------------------------------------------