The LG Flatron L204WT was our 20in LCD of choice for five months, largely due to its low price and great value. And a further massive price drop puts it in good stead in this month’s Labs.

But the L204WT is by no means perfect. From the factory settings, we had to raise the contrast significantly and switch the colour temperature to 6500K to get the LG to a usable level. The resulting white level was slightly dim, but this did provide the advantage of an excellent black level with no backlight shining through.

The Digital Fine Contrast, which is activated in Movie mode and dynamically adjusts the contrast, is a great feature for editing and viewing photos of any colour and content. However, it can be distracting during a film or game that shifts between light to dark scenes. Watching the contrast swing up and down to compensate is nauseating.

Fast-motion scenes pose no real problem for the L204WT thanks to the 5ms response time. Vertical viewing angles are poor, though; you have to look square-on if you don’t want to see a purple tint instead of black. Colour accuracy is reasonable, although we found many scenes had a blue tinge that we struggled to eliminate using the OSD.

At this price, it’s good to find an HDCP-compliant DVI interface to make the L204WT as future-proof as possible, and this may sway you if you plan to use it for video. It’s still a decent monitor, but in this company its key attraction is price.