Review on Dell P2214H Professional Widescreen Adjustable Monitor - 1920X1080, 60Hz, Wide Screen, USB Hub by Ralph Thompson

If you're looking to buy a monitor that supports USB natively, look elsewhere. This one is NO. Several things were extremely annoying when setting up this monitor. First, the bare minimum of instructions on how to get your laptop to recognize it when using USB. The setup instructions are numbered dell.com/XXXX, which indicates the location of the driver on the Dell website. Much luck. I downloaded the monitor's drivers and installer, connected my laptop with a USB cable, selected AUTO detect on the monitor (there is no USB option on the monitor - this should have been my FIRST clue) and repeated " VGA cable not plugged in, going to sleep mode in message X. Luckily I have a similar monitor at work and happened to have it and I had the same issue when trying to set it up for the first time.While researching the issue, I found a random support post near this particular monitor on Revain. After installing, uninstalling and reinstalling, the monitor finally worked. Of course I kept the link. I thought maybe this monitor has the same problem. So I am again followed the link to a 3rd party driver to upgrade VGA from USB to USB 3.0 I have this driver yours installed and added, restarted my computer, etc. NOTHING. The scope of delivery did not include an HDMI cable, so this was not possible. The only options were USB, VGA (REALLY? NO MODERN LAPTOP USES VGA TODAY. COME DELL), and a weird cable I've never seen before. SO. PLUGED. I didn't have a VGA to USB converter. Then I remembered the spare HDMI cable I had at home. After connecting everything worked. If you buy this monitor, you MUST use HDMI. Period. If you want to use USB and are adventurous or have the HOUR it took me to get through all of this, do it and let the odds be in your favor. I haven't tried the VGA to USB converter, but I guess you'll still need to find some random driver to make it work. If you look closely at the driver download on the Dell website (which I did after I couldn't get the computer to recognize the monitor) you'll see that the download doesn't even include the USB driver. www.dell.com/p2217h. Also, the Dell Monitor installer will hang and leave you with nowhere to go if the driver installation fails (see screenshot). Such a disappointment! The Dell website is of little help. I googled the problem, found a similar issue on the Dell Community site and it was FUNNY. Unplug everything including the mouse, turn it off, hold the button for 15 seconds and turn it back on. B.S. None of this worked. Maybe I should have folded my heels and chanted "There's no place like home" at the same time. The rest of the monitor is bright and clear. Not very customizable in terms of brightness or contrast. I'm sure these settings exist somewhere, but the menu is archaic. Also, there is no instruction manual. You can find it on Dell's website, but it requires a little digging. Dell, come on. At least tell people that this monitor doesn't support USB natively. I would NEVER buy this monitor if I knew what I know now. I hope this relieves some of you heartburn.