The NEC MultiSync P212 ($899) is a 21-inch professional-grade UXGA (1,600-by-1,200) monitor featuring a high-performance In-Plane Switching (IPS) panel engineered for continuous use, making it ideal for use in control rooms, medical institutions, digital-image-acquisition applications, and office applications that require precise color and gray-scale accuracy. It delivered outstanding performance in our tests, and offers a wealth of settings and features, but the panel offers a 4:3 aspect ratio model, so if you require a widescreen display, the NEC MultiSync EA244UHD, our Editors' Choice for midsize Ultra High-Definition (UHD) monitors, might be a better bet.

Design and Features
The P212's£1057.27 at Amazon UK IPS panel differs from most other IPS displays in that it benefits from a special manufacturing process that reduces the amount of contaminants in the LCD elements that may result in image retention. This allows the P212 to run 24/7 without incurring permanent damage to the panel. The 1,600-by-1,200-resolution screen has a non-reflective, anti-glare coating, a peak brightness of 440 cd/m2, a 1,500:1 native contrast ratio, and a 4:3 aspect ratio. It also offers a 14-bit Look-Up Table (LUT), which allows for internal calibration using a hardware/software solution such as NEC's SpectraView II Color Calibration Solution, which is available for an additional $250 as a bundle (P212-SV).

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The 10.6-pound cabinet is available in white or black and comes with a matching stand that offers plenty of ergonomic adjustments, including height, tilt, swivel, and pivot maneuverability. Connectivity ports are numerous and include an HDMI port, a DVI port, a DisplayPort, and a VGA port, as well as three USB 3.0 ports (one upstream and two downstream), an audio input, and a headphone jack. There's only one side-mounted USB port on this monitor, and the two 1-watt speakers aren't very loud.

On the right side of the lower bezel are an ambient light sensor, an LED indicator, a Power switch, an input select button, a menu button, and a left-and-right arrow rocker for navigating the menus. There's an up-and-down rocker on the right bezel, along with a button that doubles as a reset switch and an ECO mode selector. As with the NEC MultiSync PA322UHD£1279.2 at Amazon UK and the NEC EA244UHD, the P212 offers a boatload of settings. In addition to the usual Brightness, Contrast, Color Temperature, and Sharpness settings, there are six picture mode settings, including sRGB, REC-Bt709, High Bright, Native, DICOM (for medical imaging), and Programmable. Advanced settings include 6-Axis Hue, Offset, Saturation, and White Balance color adjustments, Uniformity, Metamerism (improves white point color matching), Print Emulation, and Black Level. There are three ECO power saving modes (Off, Mode 1, and Mode 2), an Auto-Dimming setting that uses the ambient light sensor to adjust brightness, and the same carbon footprint meter found on previous MultiSync models.

The P212 is covered by a four-year warranty on parts, labor, and backlight and comes with HDMI, DVI, VGA, and USB cables. It also comes with a resource CD containing drivers and a User Manual.

Performance
The P212 provided excellent color accuracy right out of the box. As shown on the chromaticity chart below, red, green, and blue colors (represented by the colored dots) are perfectly aligned with their ideal CIE coordinates (represented by the boxes). Colors appeared rich and uniform in my test images and while viewing Captain America: The Winter Soldier on Blu-ray.