When we briefly noted yesterday that Gateway was releasing a 30-inch LCD display, you probably thought to yourself, “Oh great, yet another ridiculously large, re-branded Samsung panel, exactly the same as existing models from Apple and Dell but with a different case.” Well my friend, you would be wrong. As it turns out, the XHD3000 Extreme boasts a number of unique features, the most notable of which is a ludicrously high native resolution of 2560×1600, which Gateway is calling “1600p.” While you probably won’t be able to find any 1600p content anytime soon, the XHD3000 will be happy to upscale lower resolutions up to 1600p and according to Gizmodo “everything, even good old 480p, looks amazing stretched to full size.” With a resolution like that, you might be tempted to use this display as an HDTV as well, so you’ll be glad to hear that Gateway has seen fit to outfit this behemoth with DVI, VGA, HDMI, component video, S-video, composite video and USB inputs. While the XHD3000 is meant to serve as a computer display, Gizmodo reports that it’s more than capable of serving double duty as an HDTV: “in general it is at least as watchable as any of the bestselling Chinese LCDs on the market, if not better.” If you’re tight on space and picky about your resolutions, this $1700 LCD just might be for you.

For more on the XHD3000:
– check out Gizmodo’s review