Why can two calibrated monitors still show slightly different colors?
Asked 11/22/2010
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I have two HP ZR30w monitors connected to the same computer and calibrated both with an i1-Pro, but they still don’t match perfectly. One display shows a slight magenta cast compared with the other.
Is monitor calibration only meant to get displays close rather than identical? I’ve seen similar differences with matching pairs of HP ZR30w and Dell 3007WFP-HC monitors in the office. If two supposedly identical calibrated monitors don’t match exactly, how much confidence should I have that my screen will match someone else’s calibrated display?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
15y ago
2 Answers
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It looks like the ZR30W uses a fluorescent backlight. Although it's a cold-cathode fluorescent, the color still changes a little with the temperature. You want to be sure you let the display warm up for quite a while before profiling it to be sure the temperature is stable. The usual recommendation is something like 20 minutes as a minimum, but from what I've seen an hour is considerably better; if you have really good color discrimination, two or three hours wouldn't hurt.
I should also point out that some monitors (even some that otherwise seem pretty "high end") don't seem to have very stable backlights no matter how long you let them run. I don't know if I applies to your HP monitor or not, but (just for one example) at work I used to have an Apple Cinema display. I could run it for eight hours straight, profile it, and then profile it again 20 minutes later, and both the color and the brightness were quite noticeably wrong. OTOH, even though it also uses a CCFL backlight, I have a LaCie 321 that's so stable I can actually measure seasonal variation. During the summer my office gets hot enough that its temperature shifts a bit, but when I re-profile it again in the fall, it goes back to where it had been a year before.
Originally by user603. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user603
15y ago
0
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Yes—calibration usually gets monitors very close, not necessarily perfectly identical.
Even two of the same model can differ because of panel and backlight variation. In your case, those displays use fluorescent backlights, which can shift color as they warm up, so profile them only after they’ve fully stabilized. While 20 minutes is often quoted as a minimum, an hour or more can produce more consistent results.
Another factor is display stability: some monitors simply don’t hold a perfectly steady white point or color balance, even after warming up.
The measurement method also matters. Calibration devices are not all equally precise across different display types, and small differences in the hardware or profiling process can leave a slight cast such as magenta.
So yes, this is normal to a degree. Calibration improves consistency and accuracy, but it does not guarantee two separate monitors will be visually identical. The same applies when comparing your display to someone else’s calibrated monitor: calibration helps bring them into the same range, but exact visual matching is never guaranteed.
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