1- They want you to fall into the trap of "the bigger number is better".

It's an example of useless marketing.

2- What's really going on:

NTSC in this case refers to the original NTSC primaries, which is an OBSOLETE standard. Nobody uses these primaries anymore. TV manufacturers moved towards a narrower set of primaries to make the image brighter.

So comparing the monitor's gamut to NTSC is pretty dubious since the standard is obsolete.

3- Ideally, you want the monitor's primaries (the exact color of r, g, b) to be equal to the standards (unfortunately there are three standards... SMPTE C, EBU, and Rec. 709; but they are all pretty close). If the primaries exceed the standard / are more saturated than the standard / the gamut of the monitor is larger, then the image will be oversaturated. You could deal with that through digital signal processing... but consumer equipment would take shortcuts or omit that kind of signal processing altogether (the ultimate shortcut).

To add on:

Most of those figures compare the areas between what the monitor does and what the obsolete NTSC standard is.

By transforming everything into the Luv color space (which will change the areas involved), they are playing with the numbers to make them look better.

But anyways, it's entirely an exercise in completely useless marketing. The sensible way to market the monitor would be to mention the xy coordinates of r, g, and b. Those numbers are needed to compare the gamut to NTSC, so they would have these numbers anyways.

Glenn's technical knowledge far exceeds mine, and yet with three decades of color correction / monitor calibration experience, my evaluation was precisely the same as his when I read the original post:

"Nonsense!"

So, Jay, what have you decided to do?

Grazie

I appreciate the explanations.

In all the monitor specifications I've read over the years, I don't recall ever reading that specific information (maybe I just glossed over it).

Also, I should have mentioned in my original post that this monitor was not a color correction monitor (although I may try to use it for that as a stop-gap measure).

Graham, I'm attempting to follow your lead (again). I've been very frustrated in not being able to "see" my HD footage in its native resolution. So to make a long story short, I've ordered a Sony 32" Bravia XBR9 to serve as a preview monitor. I've looked at various models and manufacturers. Not being technically inclinded, as Glenn is for example, often I wind up confusing myself, hence the original post. In the end, I reverted back to visual comparison and personal taste. After eye-balling the monitors side by side at Best Buy and Sound Advice, I settled on the Sony. That particular monitor provided the best image, based on what I saw in front of me.

Now, before everyone jumps on telling me that LCDs are no good or that such a unit is not suitable for color grading, please know that I am well aware of that. As I've said, this is a stop-gap measure.

A very small amount of my footage ever makes to broadcast, so that's not my first concern, although I work as if it were. As discussed in another thread (which I can't find), I am concerned about how my footage looks on other monitors--CRTs and LCDs. I can't know how my images will look on a LDC screen if I don't have one handy in my editing room.

You should probably turn off "live color creation" and stuff like that on the Sony monitor, if it has it. It's one of the things they do to make the image look better in a show room. :/

No idea how to do it, but there might be information if you search around. Maybe people on avsforum.com would know (I'd search it).