Ok , some results.
For openers, here’s an interesting website:
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http://www.colourcollective.co.uk/uk/>
See the article on calibrators.
More to the point, I visited my supplier just while the digital guy was running print profiles with the Data Color Studio suite, and it wasn’t sweet at all. Soft proofing after profiling showed color casts in white areas that changed from profile to profile, done minutes apart. The 3D projection of the profile was ghastly. Of course, I wasn’t looking for the whole suite, just the monitor cal, so I checked out the article in the link above.
I’ve come down on the side of the i1 Display 2. Unfortunately, they have no stock, so I ordered one through Amazon.
Here’s another interesting site:
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http://www.ugra.ch/index.php?show=3>
If you check in the color collective site, you will find an article on the LaCie 724, which has a report by UGRA on the 724. It looks quite good, yet, the same store I checked today is returning two 724s to LaCie for non-uniformity, both for luminance and one also for color cast, from magenta at one corner to blue at the other.
I’m intrigued by UGRA. It looks to be a serious, carefully structured organization, sort of the Wilhelm Imaging Research of calibration and profiling, but much more intensive. We most likely will hear more from them.