Some of these are also extremely barebones setups. On one of the models I've read about there's no on screen display, and only 1 input. There's sometimes buttons on the frame but they don't do anything besides power.
That's true of almost every big computer monitor. My HP ZR30w has a couple display port inputs, and the 30" Dells around here have a single DVI connector. Neither have OSDs or support any resolution other than their native.
Dell U2711 has every kind of input known to man (well, the currently popular ones, anyway), has a decent OSD, and supports every common resolution starting from 640x840. The 30" from the same line is no different.
That is quite strange, since I've never seen a 30" monitor with any "extra" features, nor have I read a review of one. I assumed it simply wasn't done.
I was very surprised when I got a 30" monitor with more than one input.
the 30" dells you see are the 3007, it just has a dual link DVI input and no OSD. All the newer models 3008 and 3011 have a plethora of inputs:
2x DVI
1x DP
1x HDMI
1x VGA etc
My 27" Dell is covered in ports (5 inputs of all kinds, USB, CFCard, SDCard, you name it...) and has a pretty fancy OSD to go with the 5 physical buttons and 6 LEDs.
Granted, I don't actually use any of the ports other than DVI and USB, so it has always seemed a bit overkill to me.
If you would have read the article you're commenting on, you would know that the buttons do work. It was just a case of Jeff Atwood (unintentionally) spreading lies.
Some do; some don't. Source: both of my flatmates have bought these screens; the buttons don't work on any of them (and nor do any but the DVI inputs). It's not like it really matters (after seeing these things I'm saving my pennies to grab a couple myself :)!), but the quality and functionality does differ from manufacturer to manufacturer (and from batch to batch internally - 2 of the 3 can overclock to a 120Hz refresh rate, the other can't).
