Dell 2407WFP and 3007WFP LCD Comparison

Closing Thoughts

The two Dell LCDs that we looked at today have been out for at least a year now, but it's good to see that they still stack up well against newer offerings. Anyone who purchased a Dell 2407WFP or 3007WFP when they first became available should still be happy with the LCD today. We certainly aren't finished with our LCD reviews, so it's far too early to declare a best overall LCD, but we can still make some basic judgments.

As we've said in the past, for most people looking at purchasing a new LCD price is likely to be an overriding consideration. We haven't looked at any less expensive models so far, but we will get to those soon enough. If you're looking for a good-quality 24" LCD, the Dell and Gateway offerings are nearly equal, both in performance as well as price. The Gateway display is brighter and it offers two component inputs, while the Dell LCDs come with integrated flash memory readers and a three-year standard warranty. At the same price, we currently have to give the Dell 2407WFP the nod over the Gateway FPD2485W, because the Dell LCD produces better overall colors. However, prices fluctuate quite frequently and the Gateway LCD is a pretty close second.

Users willing to spend a bit more money on an LCD can still be very pleased with a Dell 3007WFP, but there's more competition coming out in the 30" market and we will hopefully be looking at some of those offerings in the near future. The current price of $1350 might seem pretty high, but when you consider that the 3007WFP used to cost $2200 it's not that bad. Prices definitely begin to scale exponentially with larger LCDs -- a 24" LCD typically costs almost twice as much as a 22" LCD, and the 30" LCDs are twice the price of a 24" LCD -- but at least you can be fairly certain that an investment in a high-quality display will last you many years. The minimalist approach to inputs and display controls on the 3007WFP are a drawback, but more importantly the fact that HDCP support is only available in single-link DVI mode may be a serious concern for anyone that wants to watch protected content.

The good news is that so far none of the HDCP videos that we've seen are enabling the Image Constraint Token, so for now you should be able to get full quality video whether you have an HDCP LCD, non-HDCP LCD, or even an older analog display. The only thing that appears to be required right now for viewing HDCP content on a computer is a graphics card that supports HDCP. Hopefully, that doesn't change, and given that the encryption algorithms have already been cracked for both Blu-ray and HD-DVD it seems that further locking down content will primarily hurt legitimate users. If you want a large LCD that will primarily be used for viewing videos, a better choice than a 30" computer display is to simply go out and get one of the various LCD HDTVs. 37" and 42" 1080p models can be had for less than the price of the 3007WFP; they may not be better for computer work, but for games and viewing movies the flexibility of a 1080p HDTV is arguably better.

We've always been proponents of large displays, so it's a little odd to actually have to ask the question: is it possible to have a desktop display that's too big? In the extreme, the answer is obviously yes: a 100" display sitting on your desk is more than impractical. What about the 30" LCDs like the Dell 3007WFP -- are they too large? Some people will probably feel they are. A 24" widescreen display looks almost puny in comparison and you will need to make sure you have a workspace that can accommodate the large display. While we would say that some people would be put off by the size of the display, however, in general use it really is a sight to behold.

Users that are looking for more screen real estate might be better off purchasing a couple 24" displays instead, as the final price ends up roughly the same but you get more screen area. Spending $1400 or more on your display is a lot of money, but if it will improve productivity it could be a worthwhile investment. People that do a lot of multitasking as well as content creation could certainly find a use for 30" displays, and some people might even go so far as to run two of them. If you are primarily interested in a large display for Windows desktop use, we have very few complaints about the Dell 2407WFP or 3007WFP.