How Red is Your Rose?

I've been using a new monitor for several days. I noticed almost immediately that the color was quite different from my previous monitor but I've not taken the time to properly calibrate it. Then this afternoon I purchased PANTONE huey. It's a simple little gadget (colorimeter) that sits on your desktop continuously monitoring light conditions and adjusting your settings as necessary to maintain a calibrated monitor -- CRT or LCD. Optionally, you can set it for manual adjustments only.

To get it started you install some software, attach huey to your monitor while it reads some images, and then set it aside. It's the easiest monitor calibration method I've used. You can use huey for Mac or PC and it comes in Basic and Pro versions. The Pro version gives you a little more control over settings and supports multiple monitors. PANTONE huey is aimed at those who want good color-matching but where super precision isn't absolutely required.

• Keith Cooper provides a fairly detailed review of the basic huey package, with screenshots.
• Mason Resnick reviews huey after trying it out on both a Mac and a PC.
• Jan Kabili, writing for MacWorld, gives huey 4.5 (out of 5) mice.

If you purchase huey in a retail store, as I did, you may need to download the free 1.0.5 update which adds Windows Vista compatability. I was pleased that the package also included a USB expension cord so that I didn't have to jump through hoops to get the colorimeter to reach to the USB port on my computer.