NEC AccuSync LCD24WMCX 24" widescreen

Features & Build Quality

The selling price is one of the LCD24WMCX's most attractive points and as a result there have been some compromises made along the way. Evidence of this first comes with the 160 degree horizontal and vertical viewing angles which are quite a way below what you'd get from better panel technology. For most people though, these will suffice.

Meanwhile, the quoted 1,000:1 (typical) contrast ratio and 5ms response time are respectable and in line with many other displays out there, although NEC has neglected to mention the contrast ratio when its Dynamic Contrast Ratio technology is enabled.

Personal preference dictates that it's left disabled though, because they're generally not very good and with this one in particular we often found the display flickered as it changed between light and dark portions of web pages as you're scrolling through them.

The LCD24WMCX also sports a respectable 400 cd/m² brightness that isn't too shabby either. And with a 24-inch diagonal, it will come as no surprise that the LCD24WMCX features a 1,920 x 1,200 native resolution like all of its competition.


The screen's casing is of high quality and comes with a piano (or glossy) black finish on the bezel, while the back is a more standard black plastic casing. Interestingly, despite the bezel having a glossy finish, it didn't appear to be a fingerprint magnet unlike some other glossy-finished displays we've seen in the past. And the buttons are also positive and responsive – there are no headaches to be had with some fancy-pants touch sensitive mechanism here.

Sadly, for every upside, there's a downside and next on the list is the LCD24WMCX's stand – it offers only basic tilt movement between -5° and +20°. There's no height adjustment, no swivel and also no rotate functionality – while the latter is acceptable on a fairly modestly priced display, we would've liked to have seen at least basic height adjustment.


The selection of connections is superb though and there are enough options available for you to connect your PC along with PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii without having to keep switching things around. Digital connectivity is covered by HDMI and DVI—both of which support HDCP encryption—and analogue connections are catered for with VGA and Component.

You'll be pleased to know that both HDMI and Component are able to handle 1:1 pixel mapping at non-native resolutions like 1,920 x 1080 when connected to an Xbox 360. We tested both 1080p and 1080i signals and there was nothing abnormal to report – black bars appeared at both the top and bottom of the screen when we turned the Aspect setting to either 'off' or 'expansion'. The expansion setting worked well with the source set at 720p too, as it constrained proportions but expanded the picture to fit the full diagonal.

Along the bottom of the display, there are a pair of speakers that are characteristically poor – that's nothing new though because just about every set of integrated monitor speakers we've ever listened to have been sub-par. With this, you'll notice that there are also two 3.5mm analogue audio jacks—one is for audio in, while the other is a headphone jack—and there's also a coaxial S/PDIF out available as well. Having a headphone jack on the monitor is a good thing but sadly it's pretty useless because it's completely inaccessible for quickly plugging in and unplugging your headphones without having to embark on a bit of a mission.