Whatever is comfortable to look at is right for brightness - I find ~75% is about right normally. Default is usually fine for contrast. Color temperature often needs adjusting (because the picture is too blue). Assuming you have XP or Vista, you may want to set up clear-type font smoothing (through the Windows Control Panel). It takes a day or so to get used to but is a vast improvement.

The critical setting is to ensure that the screen resolution exactly matches the native resolution of the monitor. I've seen many flat-panel monitors with a native resolution of 1280 by 1024 running at a screen resolution of 1024 by 768 - this is just such a waste.

Kaled.

Thank you for the tips Kaled. My color settings were good, and I did have ClearType font already installed, so I didn't need to get used to that.

My contrast is now at 50% and bumping my brightness up to 75% really seemed to give that final touch. Now the screen looks much better a bit brighter.

Any other opinions or tips?

As for the setting with Contrast and Brightness, what have you found to be optimum with your screen? (From settings of 1 to 100)

LCD monitors, ambient lighting conditions, and user preferences vary widely, so it's meaningless to compare settings between different monitors.

There is software that will help you set up your monitor using objective techniques, as well as hardware that will do the necessary evaluation more accurately than your eyes. Often, the software is provided by your monitor manufacturer.

At the low end, you can probably download test patterns for free that will help you out. (You want images for adjusting gamma. While you may not care about the full adjustment for gamma, getting the brightness and contrast right are the first step.)

Search for websites on "gamma adjustment" and "LCD monitor adjustment".

Most recommend first turning the contrast control to minimum, then adjust contrast so that black is black. (Or as black as possible.) Then adjust the contrast control for the level of white that you would like.