apple mac 23 cinema display tft lcd monitor free sample

That being said, no one seems to be able to get ANY of the older Apple Cinema Displays to work on the new M1 Macs. These same displays with the appropriate adapter work on the previous INTEL versions of Macs, but not on the new M1 Macs.

I"ve seen a video where someone is using an HDMI to USB-C connection to a Mac Book Pro M1, but so far no examples of the Mini DisplayPort to USB-C working at all.

So for those following this thread, assume that the older Apple Cinema Displays are incompatible with the M1 Macs until proven otherwise. So far all evidence says they are incompatible, even though the current Apple documentation says it should be compatible.

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The Apple Cinema Display is a line of flat-panel computer monitors developed and sold by Apple Inc. between 1999 and 2011. It was initially sold alongside the older line of Studio Displays, but eventually replaced them. Apple offered 20, 22, 23, 24, 27 and 30-inch sizes, with the last model being a 27-inch size with LED backlighting.

There have been three designs for the Cinema Display, one featuring polycarbonate plastic and two featuring anodized aluminum. The first displays were designed to match the colorful plastic of the Power Mac G3 and later the Power Mac G4, while the second revisions were designed to match the aluminum aesthetics of the Power Mac G5 and PowerBook G4. The last available design matched the unibody laptops released in October 2008.

The Apple Cinema Display name was retired in July 2011 with the introduction of the Apple Thunderbolt Display, and the Cinema Display models were no longer offered on the Apple Store website as of August 2014.

The first model—the 22-inch Apple Cinema Display—was introduced in September 1999 alongside the Power Mac G4 and used DVI for video input. It was enclosed in a high-density plastic frame with an easel-style stand and had a display resolution of 1600×1024.

It was eventually replaced by a 20-inch model on January 28, 2003, that sported a widescreen display with up to 1680×1050 resolution and a brightness of 230 cd/m2.

The 20" Cinema Display was updated again June 28, 2004 to match the aluminum design of the new Cinema HD Display. It retained the 1680x1050 resolution of the previous model but saw its brightness increased to 250 cd/m2, and was introduced at a $1,299 USD price point.

The 23-inch model, dubbed the "Cinema HD Display," was introduced on March 20, 2002, and supported full 1:1 1080p playback on a 1920x1200 pixel display.

On June 28, 2004, Apple introduced a redesigned line of Cinema Displays, along with a new 30-inch model that, like the 23-inch model, carried the "Cinema HD Display" name. The new models had an anodized aluminum enclosure that matched Apple"s high-end lines of professional products. An alternative stand or a wall mount could be used with a VESA mount adapter kit that was sold separately. Though the display enclosures had not been redesigned for a long period of time, several "silent" improvements were made to the brightness levels and contrast ratios.

Due to the high resolution (2560×1600), the 30-inch model requires a graphics card that supports dual-link DVI. When the monitor was released, no Macintosh models were sold with a dual-link DVI port. A Power Mac G5 with the new Nvidia GeForce 6800 Ultra DDL graphics card was initially required to run the display at full resolution.

All Power Mac G5, PowerBook G4 15 or 17 inch and Mac Pro Mid 2006 to Mid 2010 models are capable of supporting it without the use of any adapters. Discrete MacBook Pros are also capable of driving the 30-inch display, while all Macs released after October 2008 require an additional adapter. The 30-inch Cinema Display was introduced together with the GeForce 6800, which supports two DVI-DL ports. ATI"s aftermarket AGP X800 Mac Edition also supports dual-link DVI, but has only one port. The Radeon 9600 Mac/PC was another aftermarket graphics card that supported dual-link DVI and was also compatible with older AGP-based Power Macs.

If a computer with a single-link DVI port (such as a Mac laptop with a mini-DVI connector) is connected to the 30-inch display, it will only run at 1280×800, even if the computer is capable of supporting 1920×1200 over a single-link connection.

On October 14, 2008, the 20-inch Cinema Display and the 23-inch Cinema HD Display were replaced with a 24-inch model made with aluminum and glass, reflecting the appearances of the latest iMac, MacBook Pro and unibody MacBook designs. The display features a built-in iSight camera, microphone and dual speaker system. A MagSafe cable runs from the back of the display for charging notebooks. It is the first Cinema Display to use LED backlighting and Mini DisplayPort for video input; however, the LED backlighting is edge-lit as opposed to the fully back-lit CCFL of the previous models, resulting in a lower brightness cd/m2 output. This display is only officially compatible with Macs that have the Mini DisplayPort connector. A third-party converter must be used in order to use this display with older Macs. Furthermore, many newer Apple users with newer MacBooks that solely have USB-C ports have been continuously perplexed by the fact that their Apple-branded Thunderbolt 3 (USB-C) to Thunderbolt 2 adapters do not transmit a signal to their LED Cinema displays. Many users have mistakenly presumed their new MacBooks were incompatible with their older displays, when in fact an ordinary generic USB-C to Mini DisplayPort adapter will successfully transmit the same signal; This is due to a small internal difference in the newer Thunderbolt 2 and the older Mini DisplayPort standards.

With the introduction of LED panels, the matte, anti-glare screen panels were retired, except for the 30" Cinema Display. Apple had already moved away from matte screens in its line of iMac desktop computers on August 7, 2007. Apple had not offered any equipment with a matte, anti-glare screen after the 15" non-Retina MacBook Pro was discontinued in October 2013 until the introduction of the Pro Display XDR in 2019. This had been a cause for concern among users who wanted matte screens for their area of work, particularly graphic designers, photographers and users who extensively view their screens.ease-of-use.

On July 26, 2010, the 24-inch LED Cinema Display and the 30-inch Cinema HD Display were replaced by a 27-inch model that supports up to 2560×1440 resolution. This model was sold for $999 USD.

On August 7, 2006 the Aluminium Cinema displays had a silent upgrade that boosted the brightness and contrast ratios to 300/400 cd/m2 and 700:1. The last Cinema displays are still desirable to professionals being the last anti-glare displays made by Apple (until the Pro Display XDR) and having a true IPS 8-bit (no dithering) fully back-lit panel and slightly higher brightness than that of the newer Apple Thunderbolt displays, which have a reflective glossy screen and an edge-lit panel. These displays (including the LED Cinema 24”) are the last Apple desktop monitors made in 16:10 aspect ratio that is also used on MacBook Pros and provides more vertical work space.

iMac, minus an inch or so of thickness and the few inches below the iMac’s screen. It’s a bright and glossy-screened LCD that has some very appealing features, but a very limited list of supported Macs.

23-inch models, marked the end of Apple’s use of its proprietary Apple Display Connector (ADC) in favor of the industry-standard DVI connection. The new LED Cinema Display introduces quite a few new technologies to Apple’s display lineup, the most controversial of which is a connector that at this point appears unique to Apple, the Mini DisplayPort (Mini DisplayPort is based on

MacBook Air. Apple has said that all future Mac products will include Mini DisplayPort support, and converting cables and boxes may be in the offing. But in the meantime, this new monitor has a very limited audience.

Other new features include an LED backlight that is mercury-free, warms up faster, and may last longer than the CCFL backlights found in most LCD monitors. A single three-headed cable is permanently attached to the display, providing power to your laptop via a universal MagSafe power plug, video signal through the Mini DisplayPort, and a three-port USB 2.0 hub.

The new display also includes an iSight camera and microphone, and what Apple says is a 2.1 stereo speaker system which includes two speakers on the bottom of the display and a third, rear facing speaker on the back of the display that bounces the sound off of the stand and back towards the user. The sound quality of the display’s integrated speakers is much better than the speakers built into the MacBooks, but sounds tinny and lacking in bass when compared to the iMac’s built-in speakers.

The screen specifications are fairly standard for a 24-inch LCD, with 320 nits of brightness, a 1000:1 contrast ratio, 178 degree viewing angle, and 14ms average response time. The glossy screen can help give depth to images onscreen, but it can also be very distracting to some. If you are sensitive to glare, be warned that this display is very glossy, turning into something of a black mirror when powered off.

We connected the display to a 2.53GHz MacBook Pro with 4GB RAM, running OS X 10.5.5 and an Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT graphics enabled. We note the performance of the display at its default, out-of-the-box settings and then calibrate it to 6500K and a gamma of 2.2 using an Eye-One Display II or a bundled colorimeter, if provided. A panel of Macworld editors viewed a number of on-screen test images and rated each display as either Superior, Very Good, Good, Fair, or Poor in regards to color, text, and viewing angle performance as compared to a sampling of similar displays.

We looked at numerous different test files on the LED Cinema Display and found that it had an excellent viewing angle, with little or no color shift when viewed from virtually any vantage point. Gradients appeared smooth, and text was sharp and legible even at very small point sizes. Except for the very extreme edges and corners, color uniformity was excellent across the screen. I wasn’t able to find dead or stuck pixels on the screen.

When viewing a full black screen, there appeared to be some minor light leakage from the bottom of the screen, keeping the display from looking as dark as LaCie’s

324. The display was a little overly bright and cool, with whites having a subtle bluish hue. The LED Cinema Display benefited from calibration with our Eye-One Display 2, which measured the display’s default color temperature at 6700K.

I have two pet peeves with the LED Cinema Display (and Apple displays in general), and they both have to do with customization. First, the stand only allows you to tilt the display. I can live without rotating and swiveling, but I do think that height adjustment is a key feature—who wants to shove books, reams of paper, or inelegant risers underneath a $899 display?

My second beef has to do with adjusting the screen settings. The display has no buttons on it, but a brightness slider is available from your Mac keyboard. Changing anything else requires squinting your way through the calibration process in System Preferences > Displays .

The LED Cinema Display represents many firsts for Apple: the company’s first LED backlit stand-alone display, the first external display designed specifically for Apple laptops, and the first Apple monitor to sport the new Mini DisplayPort connection. Its lack of compatibility with other Macs and its lack of customization settings are disappointing, but it’s a good fit for its limited target audience. The LED Cinema Display is bright, environmentally conscious, and looks great next to a new MacBook.

The Apple  24 inch LED Cinema display  and the Apple thunderbolt display have been a  source of frustration for many people.   They flickers, go black, the screens gets garbage on them, the fans turn on and off.   After reading lots of forums and trying various things I have practically completely eliminated all the flickering on my  24 inch LED Cinema display,  here is how.

It’s  had a problem with flickering ever since I first got it back in 2009.  It started off that once a day or so it just went black for five seconds.   At other times  the  screen is completely filled with gobbledygook  until I sleep the display and restart it.   At other times the screen just flickers black for a fraction of a second,  but all the fans  in the screen power down and then power up again.  Apple have released various ‘fixes’  to the problem over the years which have never fully resolved  the problem. Phone calls to Apple support were of no use after the first year because they just claimed it was a hardware problem and ‘out of warranty.’  The flickering got extremely bad recently with ‘El Capitan’   and the flickering also got worse when I connected a Pegasus Thunderbolt hard drive.

It’s not just the Apple LED Cinema display that has been affected. Even Apple’s latest ‘stunning’ Thunderbolt Displays have problems too.  The Apple help forums are riddled with complaints…

But if you already have one, here are a few things that might help.Run  the display directly from your Mac Mini,  do not daisy chain it with a hard drive such as the Pegasus Promise.  Daisy chaining definitely caused more problems.

Try unplugging and plugging the thunderbolt connector or Apple display port connector,  sometimes the problem can be worse if the connect is not in tightly.

I have a 2009  LED Cinema Display, but if you have a newer thunderbolt display, try replacing the all in one cable with a  thunderbolt cable.  A lot of people have found out the problem was with the cable.  You’re probably better off trying to borrow a thunderbolt cable  or seeing if your local Apple store will lend you one because they are in excess of $50 each.

If  you are having really bad problems, make a corner of your screen a hot corner to put your display to sleep.  sometimes my computer is blinking so badly the screen goes crazy and I can’t see anything,  I can’t even see the menus to ‘ restart’  the computer.  But if I move my mouse to the ‘hot corner’  to sleep the display, and then wake the display up again sometimes the problem goes away.

Here I have activated the bottom left hot corner so that it puts the display to sleep. When things get really bad I can put the display to sleep with my mouse without having to see what’s happening on the screen. Then I can wake it up again with my spacebar and more often than not the problem has fixed itself temporarily.

iMac, minus an inch or so of thickness and the few inches below the iMac’s screen. It’s a bright and glossy-screened LCD that has some very appealing features, but a very limited list of supported Macs.

23-inch models, marked the end of Apple’s use of its proprietary Apple Display Connector (ADC) in favor of the industry-standard DVI connection. The new LED Cinema Display introduces quite a few new technologies to Apple’s display lineup, the most controversial of which is a connector that at this point appears unique to Apple, the Mini DisplayPort (Mini DisplayPort is based on

MacBook Air. Apple has said that all future Mac products will include Mini DisplayPort support, and converting cables and boxes may be in the offing. But in the meantime, this new monitor has a very limited audience.

Other new features include an LED backlight that is mercury-free, warms up faster, and may last longer than the CCFL backlights found in most LCD monitors. A single three-headed cable is permanently attached to the display, providing power to your laptop via a universal MagSafe power plug, video signal through the Mini DisplayPort, and a three-port USB 2.0 hub.

The new display also includes an iSight camera and microphone, and what Apple says is a 2.1 stereo speaker system which includes two speakers on the bottom of the display and a third, rear facing speaker on the back of the display that bounces the sound off of the stand and back towards the user. The sound quality of the display’s integrated speakers is much better than the speakers built into the MacBooks, but sounds tinny and lacking in bass when compared to the iMac’s built-in speakers.

The screen specifications are fairly standard for a 24-inch LCD, with 320 nits of brightness, a 1000:1 contrast ratio, 178 degree viewing angle, and 14ms average response time. The glossy screen can help give depth to images onscreen, but it can also be very distracting to some. If you are sensitive to glare, be warned that this display is very glossy, turning into something of a black mirror when powered off.

We connected the display to a 2.53GHz MacBook Pro with 4GB RAM, running OS X 10.5.5 and an Nvidia GeForce 9600M GT graphics enabled. We note the performance of the display at its default, out-of-the-box settings and then calibrate it to 6500K and a gamma of 2.2 using an Eye-One Display II or a bundled colorimeter, if provided. A panel of Macworld editors viewed a number of on-screen test images and rated each display as either Superior, Very Good, Good, Fair, or Poor in regards to color, text, and viewing angle performance as compared to a sampling of similar displays.

We looked at numerous different test files on the LED Cinema Display and found that it had an excellent viewing angle, with little or no color shift when viewed from virtually any vantage point. Gradients appeared smooth, and text was sharp and legible even at very small point sizes. Except for the very extreme edges and corners, color uniformity was excellent across the screen. I wasn’t able to find dead or stuck pixels on the screen.

When viewing a full black screen, there appeared to be some minor light leakage from the bottom of the screen, keeping the display from looking as dark as LaCie’s

324. The display was a little overly bright and cool, with whites having a subtle bluish hue. The LED Cinema Display benefited from calibration with our Eye-One Display 2, which measured the display’s default color temperature at 6700K.

I have two pet peeves with the LED Cinema Display (and Apple displays in general), and they both have to do with customization. First, the stand only allows you to tilt the display. I can live without rotating and swiveling, but I do think that height adjustment is a key feature—who wants to shove books, reams of paper, or inelegant risers underneath a $899 display?

My second beef has to do with adjusting the screen settings. The display has no buttons on it, but a brightness slider is available from your Mac keyboard. Changing anything else requires squinting your way through the calibration process in System Preferences > Displays .

The LED Cinema Display represents many firsts for Apple: the company’s first LED backlit stand-alone display, the first external display designed specifically for Apple laptops, and the first Apple monitor to sport the new Mini DisplayPort connection. Its lack of compatibility with other Macs and its lack of customization settings are disappointing, but it’s a good fit for its limited target audience. The LED Cinema Display is bright, environmentally conscious, and looks great next to a new MacBook.

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The Apple  24 inch LED Cinema display  and the Apple thunderbolt display have been a  source of frustration for many people.   They flickers, go black, the screens gets garbage on them, the fans turn on and off.   After reading lots of forums and trying various things I have practically completely eliminated all the flickering on my  24 inch LED Cinema display,  here is how.

It’s  had a problem with flickering ever since I first got it back in 2009.  It started off that once a day or so it just went black for five seconds.   At other times  the  screen is completely filled with gobbledygook  until I sleep the display and restart it.   At other times the screen just flickers black for a fraction of a second,  but all the fans  in the screen power down and then power up again.  Apple have released various ‘fixes’  to the problem over the years which have never fully resolved  the problem. Phone calls to Apple support were of no use after the first year because they just claimed it was a hardware problem and ‘out of warranty.’  The flickering got extremely bad recently with ‘El Capitan’   and the flickering also got worse when I connected a Pegasus Thunderbolt hard drive.

It’s not just the Apple LED Cinema display that has been affected. Even Apple’s latest ‘stunning’ Thunderbolt Displays have problems too.  The Apple help forums are riddled with complaints…

But if you already have one, here are a few things that might help.Run  the display directly from your Mac Mini,  do not daisy chain it with a hard drive such as the Pegasus Promise.  Daisy chaining definitely caused more problems.

Try unplugging and plugging the thunderbolt connector or Apple display port connector,  sometimes the problem can be worse if the connect is not in tightly.

I have a 2009  LED Cinema Display, but if you have a newer thunderbolt display, try replacing the all in one cable with a  thunderbolt cable.  A lot of people have found out the problem was with the cable.  You’re probably better off trying to borrow a thunderbolt cable  or seeing if your local Apple store will lend you one because they are in excess of $50 each.

If  you are having really bad problems, make a corner of your screen a hot corner to put your display to sleep.  sometimes my computer is blinking so badly the screen goes crazy and I can’t see anything,  I can’t even see the menus to ‘ restart’  the computer.  But if I move my mouse to the ‘hot corner’  to sleep the display, and then wake the display up again sometimes the problem goes away.

Here I have activated the bottom left hot corner so that it puts the display to sleep. When things get really bad I can put the display to sleep with my mouse without having to see what’s happening on the screen. Then I can wake it up again with my spacebar and more often than not the problem has fixed itself temporarily.

The adapter is plugged into one of the MBPs four USB-C ports, and of course the Cinema Display"s DVI plug is plugged into the adapter. There"s no need to connect the ACD"s USB-A cable (unless you want to use its USB ports as a hub).

After normal timeout sleep of the Mac, it takes about 6 seconds for the ACD to show the screen, noticeably longer than when I had it connected through the Apple TB2 adapter to my old iMac.

System Preferences seems to think the ACD"s native reso is 1280 x 800, but option-click on ()Scaled brings up the 2560 x 1600 option, which works fine. I"m definitely getting 2560 x 1600 (although everything seems huge now compared to the MBP 16 built-in display, even when I knock its reso down to "looks like 1536 x 960").

Aside: a small downside compared to my iMac is that plugging anything into the MBP"s right-hand USB-C ports puts the cables in front of my ADC screen.

I previously tried the Accell Mini DisplayPort to DVI adapter like the one Andreas used, into an Other World Computing Dock display port, which lit the ADCs backlight and it showed up in System Preferences, but no picture at all. I returned the Accell--I"m not sure if it really didn"t work or I would have needed one of the other adapters above. The OWC USB-C Dock is otherwise working great, although I picked it knowing it didn"t have full power to charge the 16" MPB. It was OWC support that suggested there would be a USB-C/DVI adapter now.

Update 9 Jan 2020: After a few weeks with no problems, the Mac frequently wakes up in a mode where the built-in display flashes on and off and the ACD shows nothing. Can"t say whether the Club adapter is causing this but it doesn"t happen when not connected. Rebooting allowed me to reconnect successfully.

Lots of LCDs have "good reviews", but you have to look at who is doing the reviewing (mostly gamers and people watching DVDs - not pro photographers). I was nearly sold on a Samsung 244T, but after finally finding some critical reviews by photographers, I decided against it. The Dells mostly use the same PVA technology.

I"m pretty picky, and don"t want contrast/saturation shift when I move my head, and don"t want an overly bright panel (which is something "they" do to get the contrast ratio up). Anyway, it seems my only real choice is to go with a S-IPS display. The best out there now seems to be the Phillips 1920x1200 display, and the only monitor I can find using it consistently is the Apple 23 inch. Also, Apple seems to have just upgraded some specs of their display, and lowered the price - making it more attractive.

My other choice is to wait for the next generation of Phillips S-IPS - based displays to come out. I"ll bet that NEC will be making a 1920x1200 S-IPS display based on their history, but I have no way to be certain, or have any idea when this might happen. I might just have to wait though.

Oh, the other choice is to go with something like the Eizo displays, which seem to be good implementations of PVA-based displays. But, if I can get an Apple S-IPS for $500 less, that seems to be the way to go... provided I can use it on my PC.

Two years ago Apple introduced its first LED backlit Cinema Display. The 24-inch model updated the styling of Apple’s displays to match the unibody MacBook Pro’s ID. It also added features like a built-in MagSafe power supply and mini DisplayPort input, both targeted at owners of new Macs. Unlike most 24-inch displays however, the LED Cinema Display carried an $899 price tag at launch. Even today they are selling for over $600 used. By comparison, Dell will sell you a brand new 24-inch display for $259 or $539 if you want one with an IPS panel. Needless to say, Apple discontinuing the 24-inch LED Cinema Display makes sense. The company is generally uninterested in playing in value segments and I’m not sure there’s a huge market for $900 24-inch displays, regardless of what logo is on the back.

What is a lot more interesting however is the panel used in Apple’s 27-inch iMac. A 16:9 2560 x 1440 LED backlit LCD measuring 27” along the diagonal. Giving you 90% of the resolution of a 30” panel but in a more compact space. If you need more real estate than a standard 1920 x 1200 panel can give you and don’t want to resort to a multi-monitor setup, the 27-inch iMac was very appealing. There’s just one problem: it comes with a built in Mac.

What Apple has done in the 12 months since the release of the 27-inch iMac is separate the Mac from the display, leaving us with a 27-inch LED Cinema Display priced at $999.

Both the 24-inch LED and 30-inch panels are gone, the 27 takes their place in Apple’s display lineup. The new model is really an amalgamation of its predecessors. You get nearly the resolution of the 30-inch Cinema Display with the features of the 24-inch model.

Those features start with the styling. The 27 has a glass front, reminiscent of the unibody MacBook Pro, complete with its overly reflective glory. Unlike the Macbook Pro however, the 27-inch LED Cinema Display will almost exclusively used indoors. Most rooms/offices having some degree of light control (hooray for blinds) and the display is bright enough to make glare from other lights sources a non-issue. The glossy front does pose a problem while watching videos full screen however. If you ever had dreams of being an actor, expect them to be somewhat fulfilled as you find your face in any dark scenes or objects (e.g. black shirt).

The stand is a solid piece of brushed aluminum. You can adjust the tilt of the display but there’s no option to adjust its height. This can be a major problem if you don’t have a height adjustable desk. Apple has a tendency to build very targeted devices, if you don’t fit the target, prepare to be frustrated.

The 27 uses an IPS panel paired with an LED backlight. You lose some color gamut since Apple continues to use white LEDs vs. RGB LEDs, but you gain a more compact package and lower power consumption.

There’s an integrated VGA camera along the top of the screen, once again a feature missing from the old 30 but present in the 24. Along the bottom you have a mesh grill for the integrated 2.1 speakers that come with the display.

The MagSafe connector can be used to charge any MacBook, MacBook Pro or MacBook Air with a MagSafe connector. It’s a very convenient addition to the display and obviously works very well if you are using the Cinema Display with one of the aforementioned notebooks. If you aren’t however, the short length of the MagSafe power cable is annoying. I’ve got a desktop and a notebook and I wanted to use the power from the Cinema Display to keep my notebook charged while I’m using my dekstop. Unfortunately this meant that I have to keep my charging notebook very close to the display input on my desktop as there’s only 10” of slack on the MagSafe cable (cable to connector, add another 1.5” if you include the connector in the length).

Mini DisplayPort is the only way to get video into this monitor, which pretty much rules out any Mac made before late 2008. Even EVGA’s GeForce GTX 285 Mac Edition lacks a mini-DP port. I was forced to go back to my old GeForce GT 120 in my Nehalem Mac Pro to use the display (which works despite Apple listing it as compatible with only the 24-inch LED Cinema Display). Like many Apple products, if you have the right hardware the combination works flawlessly, if you don’t it’s just frustrating. Atlona is the only company I’m aware of that makes a dual-link DVI to mini-DP adapter. It sells for $149.95 if you desperately want the new Cinema Display and don’t have a video card with mini-DP out. I have yet to try it but customer reviews on Amazon indicate it works with the 27-inch iMac at least.

With MagSafe and miniDP out of the way we’re left with the USB connector on the cable. The USB connector plays two roles. First and foremost it is to connect the three USB ports on the back of the display to your computer. The second role is to connect the internal USB audio device to your computer as well. Driving the integrated 2.1 speakers is a USB audio device integrated into the monitor (DisplayPort audio is also supported). You get basic driver support for the controller under both OS X and Windows 7.

The integrated speakers sound better than notebook speakers, but worse than a good set of desk speakers. There’s very little bass and the highs can be a bit harsh at loud volumes. Then there’s the issue of where the sound actually comes from. The speakers point downward, a couple of bounces later and it sounds like music comes from behind your display rather than straight at you as is the case with standalone speakers.

The speakers can get loud. At their lowest setting I measured 47dB(A) sitting 2 feet away in my office (40 dB(A) ambient noise), but cranked all the way up the sound meter registered 87dB(A). The issue at high volumes is you really begin to see the limits of the speakers. There’s only so much you can do with speakers integrated into a display after all.

Again the speakers are a definite upgrade from what you’ll find in your MacBook Pro, but if you’re a desktop user with a decent sound setup they will go largely unused. While I used them over the past few days, I definitely missed my Klipsch Promedia 2.1s.

Webcams are ubiquitous in Apple"s notebook and desktop lineups, the 27 supports the family tradition with its VGA still/video camera complete with green LED to indicate when it"s active.

Also at the top of of the screen is an ambient light sensor. With the option enabled in software as ambient light increases, the screen’s brightness will decrease and vise versa. For the most part I found the feature worked ok but in my office I often found that the increase/decrease wasn’t significant enough to make a difference as the day turned into night. The sensor was never over active unless I was taking pictures of myself in Photo Booth. The flash before every photo bounced back, hit the light sensor and caused the display to dim significantly. Presumably you won’t be doing that all of the time and if you are, there’s always the option to turn it off.

Like all Apple displays there’s no OSD, everything is done in software. Under OS X this means you need to download the latest update for the 27-inch LED Cinema Display. Under Windows you need to download an update to Boot Camp 3.1. The good news is that the display works under Windows 7, the bad news is you need Boot Camp installed to get brightness control. The downloadable Windows drivers won’t work on a system without Boot Camp installed, in other words, on a normal PC you lose the ability to control brightness. Apple should make the 27-inch Windows control panel a standalone package and not tie it to Boot Camp. It seems as if Apple expects the only users interested in this panel will be those who already own an Intel based Mac. Self fulfilling prophecy much?