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Patrick is the expert on this. I'l call him to the MSG. 

Do a search for Dell 2209WA. It's been discontinued but if you can find it, it's a great monitor for the price. Here's a link to a review: http://m.cnet.com.au/computers/339294389.htm?redir=1

Patrick, or anyone else, can you recommend a higher end LCD for comparison purposes? 

My 244T is still going strong (knock wood) but I had been thinking I would spring for an Eizo or LaCie next time around.  Would love your opinion on those...

Thanks for posting the reviews Patrick.  I will definitely read them over.  TFT Central looks like a great site for reviewing any model I might be interested in.

I was also hoping for input from people who might have some personal experience of using them

But you can't always go by specs only, for example, the number of megapixels in cameras. Two cameras can have the same number of megapixels, yet there can be a huge difference in image quality. Is it possible for two monitors to have the same specs, and still have a big difference in quality? If it's safe to go by specs only, maybe the HP is the best deal, but then again, I've heard bad things about HP's computers, so I have doubts.

My trusty and dead-on accurate Samsung CRT monitor finally got to the point where I could no longer perform an accurate hardware color calibration 
The blue gun was dying.

While I really, really was in love with the idea of a 30" monitor, the cost was too high to justify.
I finally decided on the NEC MultiSync LCD 2690WUXi(2).
The almost 26" screen is wonderful and I have a 20" Dell LCD set to the side to in profile mode for my Photoshop tools.
That leaves me the entire NEC screen for my image!

The NEC has a built in 12 bit color look up table (LUT) and this monitor's color gamut has 97.8% coverage of the Adobe RGB color space.
If you get the NEC Spectraview software with it; hardware color calibration is a total no brainer. It utilizes the built in LUT for calibration.
Just set up the puck, hit go and the monitor calibrates itself without any human intervention.
In addition, this monitor's color gamut has 97.8% coverage of the Adobe RGB color space.

I have used Eizo monitors and I find this NEC to be equal or better.

Here's a link:  http://www.necdisplay.com/Products/Product/?product=8899a96d-28dc-484f-a4de-14309a636738

It looks like a gorgeous monitor, but I'm not sure I want to spend that much. I think I paid around $800 for the Samsung 244T. Patrick's HP monitor sounds good, but I'm leery of HP, and the price sounds too good to be true. Decisions, decisions....

I'm very happy with my LaCie 324 (24"), which I got about a year ago, mainly due to Rinder's recommendation.

I too am in at the point of buying a new monitor. After some research i've found out Dell U2410 could be a relatively good solution to have IPS matrix and not pay $1000+.

However, I remembered that Yuri wrote that it could be "dangerous" to have too good colors and contrast (comparing to his suggestion-30' Apple Cinema Display): "Yes…there are monitors out there that have better colors and better contrast such as the DELL 24″. Unfortunately such monitors display your images too good and you end up, under-saturating, under contrasting and sometimes under exposing as well." (source).

I wonder what do you think of this? I'm afraid I'll see images properly exposed and saturated... but when one (i.e. buyer) would look those images from more "average" monitor the colors would look dull.

EDIT: Would monitor calibration with Huey (that I have) solve such problem or not?