NEC Display Warranty Bonus Deal Through June 30: 5 years of Coverage
Related: color space and gamut, deals, display, display pixel density, NEC, NEC PA302W, NEC professional displays
See my reviews of NEC wide-gamut professional displays.
The NEC PA302 with the SpectraView II color calibration software and hardware remains my workhorse display to this day; I started using it way back in September 2013—3.6 years or so ago. Works like new.
The 5-year warranty (4 years even normally) shows that NEC is a company that stands behind its products. Compare that to a typical (and pathetic) 1 year warranty from Apple, Sony, Leica, Hasselblad, Fujifilm, Canon, etc. Heck, Apple makes you pay $300 or so for a maximum of only 3 years total, yet charges a huge price premium.
Look for a deal like the ones that sometimes come along, and thanks for using the link from this site when buying so I get credit.
The PA302W GB-R LED backlighting affords an incredible gamut and outstanding grayscale neutrality—better than the white backlights in most displays which may measure neutral but have a visible magenta tint to the eye.
The NEC PA302W is my workhorse display on which I do all my photography work. It is a 30-inch 2560 X 1600 wide-gamut display with true hardware calibration (not faux calibration). The PA302W calibrates to within 1 delta-A accuracy and has a gamut greatly exceeding AdobeRGB in some areas (like reds).
I also use the NEC PA322UHD 4K display (3840 X 2160), but due to pixel density, I still do all my photo evaluation on the PA302W, because its 2560 X 1600 resolution with much lower pixel density makes evaluating images for sharpness much easier. And its gamut is significantly wider than the PA322UHD. As a 30-inch display the 2560 width is easy on the eyes (pixel density) and the 1600 height is substantially more working room than the typical 1440 height of most display (1440 feels squeezed and cramped to me compared to 1600).
The about $1109 NEC PA272W (2560 x 1440 pixels, 27") is of similar quality and color gamut, also with hardware and software calibration. But I greatly prefer the greater working space of 2560 X 1600 on the PA302W (vs 2560 X 1440 on the PA272W), plus the pixel density of the PA302W is lower, which makes for easier image evaluation for sharpness.
