Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsMy Advice - Don't spend $600 on a Monitor right now
Reviewed in the United States on February 12, 2019
Gaming Monitors right now have too many flaws to dump this much money into them. Just get something that's $300 and live with the flaws.
Major flaw of this monitor is backlight bleed splotches. In decent ambient lighting they are hard to notice, especially in colorful games. In games/movies/screen where the majority of the screen is black, there are white splotches on the screen. My lower right is particularly noticeable. It's just not acceptable for a monitor this expensive.
When the conditions are right (which is about 80% of the time) this monitor is gorgeous. But when they're not, it enrages me to no end.
Pros:
-Excellent Color
-Very Black Blacks (3000:1 contrast ratio way better than the 1000:1 TN panel I upgraded from)
-Pixel Density is decent. Exactly the same as a 24" 1080p monitor. I hear 27" 1440p looks sharper due to higher pixel density, but 32" 1440p certainly doesn't look bad.
-FreeSync 2 (adaptive sync) works perfectly well with NVidia Cards (Using RTX 2070). However, you have to edit the VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) using a program called Custom Resolution Utility (CRU) or you may experience flickering. (see this youtube video for how to: https://youtu.be/EYcFKeiDzmM)
-High Refresh rate. Images look smooth at high refresh rate, however, see Motion Blur and Ghosting in Cons
Cons:
Backlight Bleed - by far the biggest con. VA panels are supposed to have little to no backlight bleed. However, I think because of the curvature of the screen, this monitor has characteristic backlight splotches. The splotches are almost worse than a uniform backlight bleed because they are very distracting. Contrast looks awesome in dark scenes EXCEPT for the splotches of white in a few places on your screen. My lower right corner is particularly bad. This is my number one reason for not suggesting buying such an expensive monitor, as the panel technologies still haven't solved this is. HUGE CON. This can be improved by having ambient lighting in the room. When you have daylight in the room for example you have to strain to notice the backlight bleed. Also, if the game is really colorful or really anything except pure black (like loading screens) then you would be very hard pressed to notice. However, when you have a very dark game and your room isn't well lit it will make you want to smash your screen.
-Motion Blur - Motion blur isn't terrible, but definitely noticeable coming from a TN panel, even with overdrive on. If it weren't for the backlight bleed, for me this trade-off would be worth it for the increased contrast, blacks, and color compared to TN Panel
-Ghosting and Anti-Ghosting - Noticeable ghosting with Overdrive (AMA) off, Noticeable Anti-ghosting (looks like black streaks) with Overdrive (AMA) on Max. This isn't a deal breaker for me, but the tradeoff for VA contrast and colors vs TN is ghosting/antighosting and motion blur. Not a major con for me, but it will give your monitor/games a very characteristic look that is hard to explain.
