Today, I purchased a Samsung 245BW 24" computer monitor to replace one of my three year old 21" monitors. But...it's acting almost like it's got the wrong model's firmware installed.

The computer I've got it attached to has an nVidia 8500 video card. The nVidia drivers report that the panel has a native resolution of 1680x1050!?! If I simply "plug and play", I'm not able to set the panel's resolution higher than 1680x1050. If I go to Samsung's website and download and install the driver for the 245BW monitor, 1920x1080 becomes available and works, but the nVidia drivers still report a native panel resolution of 1680x1050 (probably coming from the EDID data?).

I'm running Windows Vista Home Premium, and if I check windows update, it thinks it wants to install the "SyncMaster 2232BW/2232GW/2232GW Plus,SyncMaster Magic CX2232GW(Digital)" driver. It's like the monitor has a 22" monitor's firmware installed. And...sure enough, if I let Windows install the driver it wants, I'm again maxed at 1680x1050 resolution, which I can fix by installing the 245BW driver from Samsung's site again.

Anyone have any experience with this monitor? Does anyone else see this same behavior? I attempted to call Samsung tech support today, but they appear to be closed, and I suspect I'd wind up speaking with some "script monkey" who is incapable of answering my question.

Looking at my monitor, it appears to have a build date of September 2007.

Phoenix

EDIT - I just realized, it's giving my 1920x1080, but not 1920x1200 as a resolution setting.

That is strange. The 245BW that I picked up today was immediately detected as supporting 1920x1200 under Windows XP x64, I didn't even have to restart.

Also when I visited windowsupdate it had a driver labeled as 245BW model not that other one you listed.

Phoenix,
Have you checked for new drivers for your video card? nVidia shows one with a release date of November 6, 2007. ;)

Another thing you can try is to uncheck the box under Advanced properties that says "hide modes that this monitor cannot display" and see if you can force it to 1920x1200 60Hz refresh.

Thanks for the suggestions. I am more convinced than ever that this monitor had incorrect information stored in it's EDID.

I was using the latest nVidia drivers that windows update provided. Unless I'm experiencing a problem that I know the latest drivers on nVidia's site resolve, I generally wait until Mickeysoft picks up em. I also tried unchecking the "hide modes that this monitor cannot display" check box, and that simply made possible new refresh rates, but not new resolutions.

As a final check, I connected the monitor to a second computer, this one containing an nVidia 7600 video board. It experienced the exact same behavior.

I gave up and returned the monitor, or unfortunately, my wife did. I'd bought it at circuit city on a black friday deal, and figured there was no way they would actually check it out. My wife is not a techie, so she called me when the manager hooked it up to a PC and said "it works". She got me on the phone and I told the manager it would not work at 1920x1200 when connected to a PC via DVI. This got quite amusing, as the manager told me:

1. My video card was too old
2. I had something configured "incorrectly"

When I challenged him to hook up the monitor via DVI and set the resolution to 1920x1200, I don't think he understood that, let alone my explanation of EDID data. When I told him I just wanted to return the monitor, he informed me there would be a 15% restocking fee. I about blew a gasket and told him the monitor was defective. He said in that case they could replace it with another of the same model. I "suggested" that if they gave me another monitor from the same shipment, it likely was manufactured at the same time and would have the same issue. He insisted that was the only way to avoid the 15% restocking fee. Since I was on the phone, I said "fine, but if this one doesn't work, I'll be down there in person and demonstrate how the monitor's defective!!!".

However, the manager quickly discovered that since the monitor was a black friday item, they didn't have any more. My wife tells me he just gave up at that point and gave us the whole refund.

So.....a really weird manufacturing error by Samsung and bad customer service by Circuit City (whom I do not normally patronize). The sad thing is I was fairly impressed by the monitor in most other aspects.

Oh well, I guess I'm monitor shopping again.

Phoenix