I'm looking to buy 1 or 2 new monitors (for home and for work) and was thinking about LCD. I know if I ask what's a good one to get I'll get 50 replies with 50 different answers. What I'm wondering is, is there a bad brand to buy? Anything that is consistantly doing poor? Also I saw something about monitors coming with dead pixels. What are those and how common are they?

Everything not-NEC or not-Sony (Sony really is second fiddle to NEC imo).

Dead pixels are just an unavoidable down side to LCD's...although they are rare. Different manufacturers have different policies concerning their dead pixel policy.
I was lucky that I have had no dead pixels on my Dell 2407 widescreen...although dead pixels can appear with age.

The things to look out for are high contrast ratio (800:1 min, I would say), a good response time (16ms black to white) and brightness (depends on size of monitor). I also look for DVI input. With mine I also have HDCP support which future proofs it to some degree with new copy protected HD media. What size monitor are you looking at getting?

All I can say is that within my price range I was looking at Dell and Samsung, but depending on price, it may be worth looking at Apple Cinema displays also.

As for what not to buy - anything that is too cheap...especially for graphics. You get what you pay for.

I have a Xerox on this machine, and its glass fronted, relections can be a pain but its soooooo much easier to clean so i'll be going this way next time......i also have a CTX which is good and can be rotated and i have a very cheap I.T.Works which is good too, though my sister has a cheap no name monitor that is terrible, so cheap may be best avoided, IMHO don't buy it unless you can see it working and have a good look around it and see what the viewing angle is like. Ask what the dead pixels policy is, my Xerox had one but it was white and impossible to live with, they shop assistant said he shouldn't really change it but would, i would have been livid if he hadn't as it was like a great white beam LOL.......so if they say no to changing for a dead pixel out the box, don't buy it or insist to see it working in the shop. In my experience if they are OK from new they will be ok in the future, i may have just been lucky though.......oh and get DVI if possible........Steve

I guess it's also what you want and what performance you want out of it. Personally, I'd stay away from lesser no name monitors. If you are going with LCD make sure it has DVI  and has a glass front. If it's all possible try to purchase the monitor live another words where you can see it actually plugged in and working so you can see the images on the screen. If you purchase online the best place IMHO is Newegg where you can read the customer feedbacks about all the monitors they sell. Newegg also has a good rep and return policy. One could name a whole bunch of monitors that in their opinion wouldn't be good. However, it's been my experience doing this that there is always those few who have said monitors and have no problems with them getting upset you called their monitor a POS...LOL!

The best thing you can do is go to a store and see for yourself. That's what I did.
In my experience, Samsung monitors are very good. Clear and bright colors, no yellowish or greenish tints, and a fully uniform brightness distribution. 
NEC and Sony were as good as Samsung, but more expensive.
Other brands performed less. Even Eizo.

I was eyeing a 19" ACER monitor on amazon being sold be Tiger Direct for my home monitor. ( have fifty bucks in gift cards from there )I'm having trouble seeing things in certain games and sometimes in Poser. It's too dark. I've set the gamma in Adobe and switched to a better video card, which helped some, but not enough. 

The work one (same size) will be at the farm, used mostly for checking markets and email, with some web use.  That one it's super important to have good side viewing because there are times 3 people are looking together at the thing. 

We are planning on looking at some in person before buying anything. I was just wondering if some brands were notorious for having poor quality monitors.

What people say here about seeing a monitor in action first is the best advice. I must admit, when I purchased this Dell I hadn't (being a web based company), but they do offer a 21 day money back guarantee.
I must say, I'm very happy with my purchase.

Just research as much as you can and read the advice and comments of users.

Cheers

A TV Show (i forget which one)  stated that 3 out of every 5 TFT Monitors are Samsung based or rebadged.......Steve

Amdek 817 17" VGA monitors were the worst I ever saw in my long carreer...but I doubt you'll run into them..;)

The Sony at work after less than a year started having problems with color and contrast and a tech I knew through work returned three Sonys before giving up on them.

Edit to add.
I also had a DELL that would fluctuate through the day. That one was just over a year old. Not good.

What type of Dell monitor were you having problems with? I know the 24" 2407 monitor from Dell, uses the same display as the equivalent Samsung.
I'm extremely happy with my Dell - usuing the Eye-One calibrating system, I have had to make hardly any adjustment tweaks after the first calibration.

Cheers

I have 4 Sony LCD monitors currently.  None with dead pixels and all performing beautifully.

My screen is a 22 inch flat panel widescreen by Lenovo.  I'm quite impressed with the clarity and resolution of it. It's very, very nice.

Quote - Everything not-NEC or not-Sony (Sony really is second fiddle to NEC imo).

This I can agree with, with one exception - Philips. I had a 17" Philips CRT that I had bought in 1995, and gave it to my mother in 2003-2004; she's still using it today w/o problems as a basic home office monitor. I bought my current 25" NEC CRT monitor four or five years back (damn... can't remember), and it still works perfectly on my Mac. I stuck w/ CRT as my main monitor for three reasons: 1) Bang-for-the-buck vs. LCD... I spent $500 or so back then for it, whereas the best LCD I could get for that dough would've been 17". Things have changed a bit by now, but still, CRT's are cheaper. 2) Resolution. I run w/ 1600x1200 on my CRT, but can easily crawl up way higher. Most LCD's back then couldn't do much beyond 1280x1024 unless you were really willing to cough up the money. Today they've gone up, but you have to keep an eye out for that. Bigger monitors mean you can do higher resolutions. 3) Color calibration. Back then, you couldn't color-calibrate an LCD monitor w/o a very expensive monitor and even more expensive gear to do it with. I can do it by eyeball on the CRT, or get a cheap 'spider' (serial or USB connected automatic calibration device) to do it for me. Nowadays, LCD monitors can be calibrated fairly well, but not as quickly (or as easily w/ a spider - by eyeball it should be okay, though). But then, this is just MHO. If I had the dough nowadays, I'd go grab a large-ish Apple Cinema LCD monitor and be perfectly happy. However, since I don't have that kind of scratch, I went with what I could do at the time, and will prolly do so again when this one starts to fade. /P

I have an Acer 22" LCD widescreen monitor at home.  I am very, very pleased with it.  I am planning on purchasing a second Acer widescreen to replace the 17" flatscreen CRT that I am currently using as a secondary monitor.

I have a 19" Acer LCD at the office.

Acers are inexpensive vs. other brands -- and provide excellent quality, in my experience.

personally I like Samsungs.. you can get some nice deals on them if you watch the stores...

One thing you should know about CRTs - there's no development anymore. They're cheaper and cheaper, the profit margin is almost nonexistent, and many CRTs that are sold now are made of inferior quality cheap components. 
My first 17" CRT - pretty expensive at the time, 10 years ago - was very good. An Iiyama VisionMaster 17, it was. Died a year ago.
The 19" CRT I bought two years ago, also an Iiyama, was much, much cheaper than the old 17" CRT. And it's already fading.
The 19" Samsung I bought a year ago is very good. Brigth, sharp, doesn't need calibration after the initial setting. I bought a second Samsung, same model, half a year later. Copied the settings of the first one - and surprisingly, the colors and brightness on the screens are identical when they are connected to the same graphics card.. Which NEVER happens with CRTs, you have to calibrate those individually.

Also got a Dell 24" screen that I'm very happy with.