Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Contents The Lepow monitor arrived in a nice looking white gift style box. It came with two cables, a type-C to type-C and a HDMI cable. The HDMI cable has a full size connector on one end and the end that connects to the monitor is a mini type. Additional included items are the smart cover, a screen protector and the user guide. A power supply connection device was not included. I hadn’t contacted them, however within a few days after receiving my monitor Lepow’s customer service sent me an email stating that they would send me a USB to type-C power cable if needed. Actually I had already purchased one because I was anxious to test and use the monitor. The user guide could be improved. It does have visuals showing connections to various devices - a good thing. Functional menu information is missing. For this reason I took photos of each menu tab. Also the contrast of the guide’s written text is low and the font size is small making the guide difficult to read. Physical Characteristics The monitor has a stylish metal frame around the screen with rounded edges. Its overall dimensions are 14 3/8" x 8 3/4" x 3/8" thick. The monitor weighs about 25.5 ounces without the cover and 39 ½ ounces when the cover is added. The cover is a non slip rubbery material that folds to use as a stand Small magnets at the edges hold the cover to the monitor for protection. The magnets must be built into the cover because they aren’t noticeable or protrude. I can’t locate the actual text, but I believe there was a note somewhere in the guide about keeping magnets away from storage media. This is a fair warning but I don’t think the magnets here are strong enough to be a real issue. Functional Elements and Location All of the functional elements of the monitor are along its left and right edge. The left edge has a speaker, the HDMI port, an audio jack, and a fully functional type-C port. The right side has a speaker, a type-C port (for power supply only), a spring loaded lever type extension, and the on-off switch. The lever is called “the roll key” in the user guide. The roll key is spring loaded to center but it can be moved upward or downward to operate. This key can also be pushed. The user guide describes its use. Depressing the roll key provides brightness control. Depressing it longer brings up the functional menu. Using the roll key’s up and down movement along with short depressions of the on-off switch provides menu item change control. The process is easier to learn while using rather than describe. One mistake I made in learning was to accidentally change the language to Chinese. I had a heck of a time determining which menu item was needed to change language back to my native tongue! Power Requirements Before purchasing the monitor I reviewed the specs for information on voltage, current, and power draw and found nothing. So I performed my own checks. The monitor does not have a built in battery so it requires an outside power source. I used two sources as a check. One was a 120V plug-in module to USB port as is used for many devices. The second was a DC source that supplied 5 volts and up to 4 amps to a USB port. Power Usage The test device was an in-line USB meter measuring voltage, current, and wattage. The monitor when first turned on defaults to 30% brightness. At this brightness level usage is 5.3 volts and .7 amps (i.e. 700 ma). Power draw is 3.5 watts. Ramping the brightness up to 100% the voltage remains the same but the current draw is now 1.26 amps (1260 ma) and 6.69 watts. These numbers show that a USB connectable battery box of reasonable size can be used as the power source. Except for varying the brightness as noted all testing was done at the defaults as the monitor came from the factory. It is possible that changes in other parameters (such as contrast or color parameters) might increase the current and power draw however I don’t believe the difference would be that significant. The guide states that the source should be 5 volts, 2 amps, or above. Some wall wart USBs could be closer to 1.5 amps in terms of output capability but even these might be adequate. My tests with a USB having 4.2 amp output capability did not change the monitor’s current draw - remaining at about 1.26 amps. Visual Tests To provide a video source and for visual comparison purposes I connected my gaming laptop to the Lepow monitor via the Lepow supplied HDMI cable. I used 100% brightness level on both the monitor and computer. Photos were taking using a Nikon 300 DX camera with a Sigma 18-35 Art lens - a superb lens for this type of test and lighting. Other than cropping no other changes were made to the photos taken. The major light source was diffused daylight coming from camera left. I took photos in my sunroom with the shades closed (200 lux) and with them open (750 lux). The light hitting the table was read as the intensity. The photos show the results. Visual Conclusions It is difficult - virtually impossible - to do accurate side by side comparisons between monitors because there are so many types of displays and display variables involved. However there is a qualitative sense to be gained in my test comparisons. Overall the Lepow monitor provided an impressive display especially since it was tested under just marginally adequate lighting. This monitor did have less contrast and grayer blacks than what my computer display showed - but again such comparisons are not entirely valid. As examples, I didn’t make any changes to Lepow color and contrast settings and my computer display is currently profiled for accuracy to a specific photo paper.