(1) — a.. - Commodore Is Awesome

get an M14385
for review. We unwrap
( 3 inally, we
_ t h e box, remove the plastic wrapping
and have a look. Quite a nice looking
monitor, colour matched to our A4000, the
male IEC plug on the end of the power lead is
a nice touch (so that you can plug it into the
A4000's power out socket), and you do get a
normal power lead to plug into it, so no
problem there. The screen is pretty standard
looking, with anti-glare etching, but is not FST.
But looking at the front of the monitor is a bad
idea because it is then that you notice the distinct
lack of control over the picture presented
on-screen. This monitor's complete controls list
comprises: The On/Off switch, volume,
horizontal hold, vertical size, brightness and
contrast. There are no pots to adjust on the
back of the monitor and even the leads are
moulded, but more on that later.
PICTURE PERFECT?
So what's the picture like? This is obviously the
most important question on anybody's lips
when they are looking for a monitor, and I
have to say that it doesn't look good. Here at
the office we run on an old 1942 monitor for
which the M1438S is a direct replacement, and
we thought the quality of the 1942 was pretty
poor. Unfortunately, it shines compared to the
new monitor. The M1438S gives an image on
a 4000 that looks as though it is coming
through a modulator, with blurry text and
1misconverged colours. I thought I had taken
LUG PROBLEMS
my glasses off
and had had a
few pints when I
looked at our Workbench
screen. Now convergence is a problem
that can be caused by the monitor being
bashed or in extremes of temperature or
humidity, and since it came delivered by a
courier I'm sure that it probably experienced all
those things, so your best bet, if you are going
to buy one, is to make sure you see it in action
in the shop you're going to buy it in if at all
possible.
The M1438S doesn't come with a disk with
optimised DBIPal drivers designed to fill the
screen as much as possible like the 1942 did,
so it is left up to the end user to decide
whether he or she wants to mess with
hardcore utilities like MonEd or just suffer enormous
black borders down the left and righthand
sides of the screen. Although the M14385
is billed as being a 14" monitor, these black
borders mean you only really get about 11:6
inches of viewable area. These problems only
occur if you are using the monitor in a DBLPal
or DBINTSC screenmode, of course, and don't
afflict the monitor running in standard PAL or
NISC modes, but what did you buy a multiscan
monitor for if not to run the Amiga's higher
resolutions on a flicker free screen?
So by now you will probably have worked
out that while the monitor is shoddy for
productivity, it might be OK for games players.
To a certain extent this is true, but if you do
both on a regular basis you will find yourself
constantly fiddling with the horizontal hold
functions to centre the screen when switching
Although it might seem nice at first that Amiga Technologies have put a moulded 23-pin
plug on the M14385, if you need to use it on an Amiga other than a bog standard Al200 or
A4000, or even a different machine, then you will come in for problems. If Amiga
Technologies had fitted a plug to the back of the monitor and provided a 15-pin VGA-type
lead with a 23-pin plug on the end, then at least Amiga 3000 owners or graphics card users
could have bought a replacement VGA-type lead to plug into the monitor.
A replacement for the 1942?
They must have learnt from
g their mistakes...
AMIGA COMPUTING
MARCH 1
between PAL and DBLPal screenmodes. But
there's more trouble afoot. While the picture
for Lo-res (the screenmode most often used
For games) is actually quite nice and sharp, the
sound that emanates from the monitor's
speakers is nothing short of rubbish. As a test,
we tried Worms and Nemac IV on the M14385
and the sound for both games was tinny and
quiet, even on the monitor's highest volume
setting. Even the much maligned 1942
achieved better results, as did a cheap pair of
personal stereo speakers we had lying around.
PURCHASERS
So who is supposed to buy this monitor? The
only people I can think of who would actually
go out and get one of these things is someone
who is sad enough to value kit with matching
company names on each piece as opposed to
the best possible choice for each item. As such
these are the only people I can recommend
Amiga Technologies' M1438S monitor to.
Caveat emptor
4:e
Bottom
line
REQUIREMENTS
RED essentith BLACK recommended
A4000
Al200/ 1
put
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PRODUCT DETAILS
Product M 1 4 3 8 S
Supplier A m i g a Technologies
Price E 2 9 9 . 9 9
Available from most Amigo afflicts
SCORES
Ease of use 1 0 0 %
Implementation 3 5 %
Value For Mon 3 5 %
Overall 5 7 %