Last year for my birthday I got a brand new LCD monitor. Its a nice 17" Samsung 712N which does the job nicely at home.
Thankfully it doesn't have any dead pixels... yet. I have heard tons of horror stories on the " internets " about how some unlucky person sees a shiny new LCD monitor at their local retails store, buys it, takes it home and a couple days later, BAMN! Dead pixels a plenty. Well, not really but the number of dead pixels range from 1 to 3 or so in 6 months to a year. It hasn't personally happened to me ( knock on wood ) but from what I have read, depending how old the LCD is and where you bought it from (online vs retail shop), you can exchange it hassle free or for a small shipping fee or restocking fee. Save your receipts people!
Anyway, here is a link to a page which runs a "Dead Pixel test" on, you guessed it, your LCD monitor. All you have to do is go too http://www.gdargaud.net/Hack/DeadPixels.html . You have two choices, a "normal" and a "Without JavaScript" for you paranoid freaks that disable javascript in your unsecured browsers (MS IE, rightly so!).