If you're not one for loud statements then you'll appreciate the laid back, even bland design on this one. A matte finished body extends to the bezel-black is the best colour for an LCD bezel, and if it's dull enough to refrain from reflecting ambient light so much the better. The stand looks cool with a silver and black colour tone. However the swivel action on the stand is quite hard, and a couple of days of, err, swivelling didn't loosen things much. The control buttons aren't backlit or colour indicated, and fiddling with them in dim lighting is a hit and miss affair. The slight indentation in the centre of the stand is quite useful for keeping a few utilitarian knickknacks like pencils, erasers or screwdrivers.

DisplayMate's Intensity Range Check showed a lot of indiscernible grey squares-this bespeaks a poor contrast ratio. We faced no issues with the 16-shade ramp test, but in the 256-eolour ramp test we had issues with the variation in intensity of colours green and grey. The movie tests revealed slightly less colour rendition and contrast in most HD clips (compared to the Dell and Samsung monitors of the same size). In EEAR we had issues with contrast where the enemies in dark khaki uniforms were virtually invisible when in shadowy areas. This is a serious put off for any gamer especially when playing dark, atmospheric games.

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All in all at Rs 18,500 the L2208w is a costly proposition, both on your wallet and your visual senses. It's a great looking monitor that corrects some of the flaws of Dell's SP 2208 WFP design, but also detracts a lot on the performance front. With the exception of the extreme rarity of you being a diehard HP fan, give this one a miss.