Dell had booked the Yardbird restaurant in the Venetian to show its latest monitors and PCs. We met up with the monitor group and we immediately were attracted by a new 31.5″ 8K monitor, the UP3218K that was being shown. The unit has a target price of $5,000 and is driven using dual DisplayPort 1.3 connections. The colour performance is 100% of AdobeRGB and 98% of DCI-P3 with brightness of 400 cd/m² and contrast of 1,300:1. 10 bit colour and calibration are supported.
The monitor was being shown in a CAD application and demonstrated the advantage of the high detail, as the monitor has an equivalent of 280ppi. The monitor is due to go on sale on March 23rd.
The next monitor we looked at was a 24″ FullHD touch monitor that uses in-cell touch and can be used in landscape or portrait mode. It has also been designed to be usable when pushed flat or close to flat on the desk. Although Dell expected the monitor to be on its website a week after CES, when we checked it was still not available. Forecast pricing was $399.
Next we looked at a new monitor that has integrated infrared and standard cameras as well as a microphone and speakers and can be used for video conferencing but also supports Microsoft Hello login. The P2418HZ monitor has some hardware controls on the front bezel to support Skype operations, for example to mute the microphone. It also has a hardware shutter to block the camera and dual 5W speakers.
Dell has a new monitor with Skype Controls – note call pick up and audio controls. Image:Meko
The S2718D is a new ultrathin monitor that is in the 27″ 2560 x 1440 monitor, where it is very successful in the market. The new monitor, the S2718D, supports HDR and staff told us that the monitor would be available in February at around $700. Details were scarce at the event, but we didn’t think that the brightness was as high as ‘true’ HDR monitors (for example like the ones shown by Nvidia), so we assumed the monitor was HDR compatible – we heard that the ‘magic is in the scaler’. We found later that the monitor has 400 cd/m² of brightness. We heard that at least one monitor with 1000 cd/m² will be available ‘later’. The monitor has 99% of sRGB, 6ms response and 1,000:1 contrast and has a USB Type-C connection for notebook charging. Unlike other monitors that have the base separately in the box, with this monitor, the base is assembled with the monitor in the box, as the intelligence for the display is in the base. The back of the monitor is very clean looking.
Dell also had news 22″, 23″, 24″ and 27″ consumer monitors with three side narrow bezels. The are all FullHD. The Dell 22 Monitor (S2218H) starts at $199.99, Dell 23 Monitor (S2318HX) starts at $219.99, Dell 24 InfinityEdge Monitor (S2418HX) starts at $289.99, and the Dell 27 InfinityEdge Monitor (S2718HX) starts at $379.99. All four S monitors will be available Feb. 23
Dell also updated the XPS 13 notebook with the latest Kaby Lake processors and Thunderbolt 3. The company also had new gaming notebooks, the Inspiron 15 7000.
Analyst Comment
The gorgeous UltraHD OLED that Dell showed last year disappeared more or less immediately after the CES event last year. It seems that there were a number of reasons for this, among them that for $5,000, professional users demanded extremely good colour performance, but there was some colour shift that meant that those buyers were not satisfied. (BR)
