Review on Lepow Z1-Silver Portable Monitor: 15.6" 1920×1080 Computer Display with Built-In Speakers, High Dynamic Range, 60Hz Refresh Rate, HD Protector by Joseph Glowacki

This is a preview of a pretty decent screen. (Updated with Viotek LinQ P16C comparison at the end.) I bought it for business trips and took it once before returning it. The quality is on par with what you would expect from a $600 semi-premium laptop panel. I run it from a mini HDMI port, powered by either the USB 3.0 port on my 2016 Dell laptop or the included 5V/2A USB adapter. No USB-C tests yet. Including three cables and case. The cables are of good quality and are similar to Monoprice's own brand products. I don't know why you need it on a non-touch matte screen. The case looks and feels like a larger version of the $15 magnetic folding iPad cases. The quality is good but unlike these cases, this one doesn't stick to the screen. It's more like a folder or folio. It easily sticks to the metal backing of the screen, but if you hold it open side down, the screen may fall off. When in use, the friction is more than enough to keep the screen upright at various angles in landscape mode. However, because the base of the screen must rest on one of the notches on the case, the case always sticks out at least 1.5 inches forward (or 3 inches if you don't fold it back). If, like me, you position the screen to the right of the laptop and use an external mouse, the case limits your freedom of movement. There's no option for portrait mode display, and with mini-HDMI that's not possible anyway. This cable exits on one short side and the other short side has a protruding adjustment knob. Viewing angles are excellent. Typical IPS. The reflection of the display is also typical for a matte display: quite low. A/G coverage, if any, is minimal and doesn't cause any glinting or crunching in text. There are no complaints about sharpness, although the on-screen control range seems to change from blurry (0) to correct (4, the maximum value), rather than from the more typical blur to an overly sharp halo. There is a slight backlight leak at the bottom of my panel, but not enough to be noticeable in use. The linearity of brightness and white balance is very good. The absolute brightness is lower than expected. The panel's native white balance is a very blue 8800K, and here you're seeing a peak output of almost 300 cd/m². Using the on-screen channel balance controls to bring the temperature down to 6000K dropped it to around 200 cd/m. More than adequate for indoor use with light controls, but a little dark when working near large windows. One annoyance is that the inner frame right next to the screen is made of glossy aluminum; If you look from even a slight angle in a lighted environment, the picture will be spoiled. The second annoyance is that the brightness tends to drop to 30 when my Windows 10 laptop goes to the lock screen. (It's been suggested that the "High Performance" setting in Windows power settings prevents this; TBD. Battery life will likely suffer.) Longer sessions are fine, but CTRL-L and back and it'll likely be dark again. . Instead of fixing it with a cumbersome adjustment joystick, you can install a program like ClickMonitorDDC to adjust the brightness with a keyboard shortcut. (A third annoyance is that the monitor misinterprets DDC signals; sending "100" through the software sets the brightness to 255 (off gamut; you have to tell it to send 39.) The color gamut is bad: only about 55% sRGB according to my EyeOne calibrator, although the matte is the same for all three color channels. Native color accuracy is very good. The forty-minute calibration reduced the average error to an excellent 0.7dE, although it was barely distinguishable from the pre-calibration image in the profile preview. It almost matches my three 27-inch 4K LG screens and doesn't look out of place next to them. However, sRGB is the most common display color space; When editing photos or videos on this screen, everyone else sees richer colors. from the end result. The main screen controls are brightness, contrast, black level, sharpness, and RGB controls for color temperature presets. Exactly what the second two do is unique to this screen. Both affect the white point, black point and gamma curve. Expect some fiddling to get the blacks and whites in the right spot. I chose a contrast ratio of 40, a black level of 50, although the values were different when I was controlling the screen from my laptop. I was only able to overclock it to 63Hz, don't worry. The input lag is minimal. Slightly smaller than my LG screens (although it's 10Hz faster) and barely noticeable with my Logitech wireless mouse. Power consumption is modest: no more than 10 W, and maybe half as much. y Dell battery life has been reduced from 5 hours to 3 hours when the screen is on. To digress to the actual usefulness of this screen: it's amazing. Multiple Windows 10 desktops will not replace a second monitor. Probably +50% power. I'm so used to working with large screens that at first I thought I'd bring a proper 20"+ screen, but that turned out to be unnecessary. 15.6 inches is adequate for the closer viewing distances found on laptops. That's all for now. . I think this screen is good value for money. Good picture quality, correct screen controls and no obvious quality gaps. I wish it was brighter, but from what I can gather from reviews of competing screens, it avoided many of the pitfalls. After using this for a week, I bought a Viotek LinQ P16C for comparison. Both panels are similar in brightness and quality. Similar limitations in color gamut and when viewing in portrait mode, and I suspect (based on other reviews) the same quirk when backing out the brightness. The Viotek is slightly smaller, however, with thinner and non-reflective bezels and a large adjustable case stand that doesn't protrude forward. The only thing I don't like (at first glance) is the black back panel, which inevitably gets scratched with use. Otherwise I would have preferred this LePow.