[jeroendebruyne]

Hey guys,

Hopefully someone can guide me a little on what monitor to buy.

I always had the Dell Alienware AW2721D 240Hz, long time ago reviewed here and always loved the display… for me the 240hz and the very light coating was amazing. Now i moved new home and in transport the monitor got damaged.

So i am trying to decide with all the different monitors… basicly i think i still want 1440p instead of 4k ( maybi im oldskool?) , or should i jump 4k…
Also want the 240hz

I want the same sort of very light coating as on that monitor as i hate grainy monitors.

Also hard for me to decide oled vs ips… couple of years ago when i started to look for maybi upgrading to oled there was alot of fuzz that they didnt have same brightness levels.. is this still the case?

Thanks looking forward to some suggestions

[PCM2]

Hi jeroendebruyne,

I’m personally a big fan of ‘4K’ UHD monitors and the experience they provide, but it’s a very individual choice. It’s a much more demanding resolution for gaming and there’s naturally a price increase involved in choosing that over a 1440p / QHD model.

Glossy screens would be a natural progression from your ‘very light matte’ Alienware. You’d have plenty of glossy options to choose from in the OLED space and many of them have very effective anti-reflective treatments to avoid obvious reflections in most lighting. Most people will set their monitor between 100 – 200 nits for regular SDR usage and any current OLED provides that. Some of the newer panel generations can go significantly higher as well (for regular SDR usage without strong ABL / Automatic Brightness Limiter behaviour). What brightness level do you use on your current monitor?

[jeroendebruyne]

I put pretty much high brightness on the alienware i think around 80.

What i am also scared of is the text fringing on oled? Atleast so i have been reading..

I do 80÷ work for my small business( it engineer) and play some league and cs in my spare time.

But with all these models i just dont know what to get its so overwhelming…

Thanks!

[PCM2]

I give my thoughts about OLED fringing in relevant reviews and summarise my thoughts in this article. It’s very subjective, but as noted there it’s improved with higher pixel density and I personally find it more noticeable on the WOLED models than QD-OLED models.

Your current monitor at 80% brightness is ~400 nits, which no OLED will give you (without annoying ABL behaviour – that sudden dimming when more bright shades are introduced). The exceptional OLED contrast and consistency can help aid perceived brightness, so you might find a model which can manage ~300 nits works well. If you go the QD-OLED route you’d need to look for one of the newer QD-OLED models with VESA DisplayHDR True Black 500 support as this indicates they have a higher brightness panel and can sustain ~300 nits comfortably under SDR for any content. For example the MSI MAG 272QP QD-OLED X50 we’ve reviewed if you’re sticking with QHD. If you’re happy to try WOLED then the glossy version of the Gigabyte MO27Q28G we’ve looked at (MO27Q28GR) would be a good one to consider. That can actually sustain nearly 350 nits under SDR for any content.

[jeroendebruyne]

And what if i would go 4k/240hz route or 1440p/240hz ?

Do you have some suggestions for those that are not oled?

Lets say i stay ips for now since i do most productivity work anyway, 1440p 240hz, something similar like the alienware i had?

I would really like the same sort of panel as the alienware, was such a good coating. Also hate bad uniformity on monitors.

[PCM2]

It’s not very straightforward making such a recommendation, because I’ve only tested a limited number of monitors. Most reviewers and indeed users will not talk much about how “grainy” a screen surface is as the average person is surprisingly tolerant to or used to a grainy screen surface. Therefore you’d only be able to tell that from sensitive users (or a reviewer like me) reporting back on that. The AW2721D was quite exceptional in that respect, unfortunately, and it would be difficult finding a gaming LCD that matches that particular quality of it.

Perhaps you could consider the Gigabyte M27UP, which has what I’d classify as a ‘light to very light’ matte screen surface. It has a light misty graininess which you may be fine with and not find bothersome, but it’s hard to say.

[jeroendebruyne]

I will check the gigabyte otherwise i think i am going to buy the Alienware AW2723DF

It might sound stupid to buy “older tech”, but hey it works.. i think i will wait the oled a little untill brightness/text clarity is better.

I am also a bit worried with league in 4k, and scaling in league really not that good. Its pretty much all i play besides work.

Thank you for all advice!

[jeroendebruyne]

I bought the Alienware AW2723DF, its similar to my old AW2721D.

Just I don’t like out of the box it has standard mode , white feels a bit yellowish and all dark tint.

I used custom color now seems better with these settings, not sure if they are correct/good.

Gain RGB 100% RGB
Offset 50% RGB
HUE 50% RGBCMY
Saturation 50% RGBCMY

[PCM2]

Thanks for sharing that – I’m glad it’s similar to your outgoing model in the areas that were important to you. 🙂

[jeroendebruyne]

After all i had to return the monitor its nowhere near same ln colors as the old aw2721d

Maybi its time that i go 4k ips and buy the gigabyte m27up , oled i dont want because of the text fringing i work all day on my monitor and game a little at the evening when time… maybi 4k will be better for my web work to instead of 1440p

Is the m27up any good or any better options at this time?

Is the screen verry light for coating?

I also seen some people saying on reddit eyestrain with m27up

[PCM2]

Ah that’s unfortunate.

I do recommend the M27UP specifically and there’s nothing I’d recommend above it in the LCD segment based on screen surface. It’s not necessarily going to be as ‘light’ as the Alienware screen surface, but it’s still what I broadly classify as ‘light to very light’ matte. I make some comments on it in the review.

Viewing comfort is a very individual thing, pretty much any model can cause viewing comfort issues for some people for various reasons.

[jeroendebruyne]

I orderd it and will see tomorrow, what i didnt read before ordering is the really bad viewing angels. Both coating ans viewing angles i am so sensitive to.

If it turns out to be that bad on viewing angels what options are left in same segment? I just dont want to go oled yet as im pretty sure the text fringing even on 27 4k would drive me crazy.

Thanks

[PCM2]

Maybe the MSI MPG 274URF QD if you can find it, but it has been discontinued in many markets. It has been replaced by MSI’s version of the Gigabyte M27UP. And those ‘dual mode’ screens with the same or very similar panels and drawbacks are all the rage now. I come back to what I said in this post.

The fringing on 27″ ‘4K’ UHD QD-OLEDs is really very minor and difficult to notice. I’m not sure why you’ve decided it would drive you crazy, you should try to see one for yourself in my opinion before dismissing that excellent panel technology that will deliver exactly what you want in other respects.

[jeroendebruyne]

Yeah I will see the Gigabyte M27UP now and if I have probles with the drawbacks I will return and try to go 4K oled. I don’t have a store near by to test so all I can go by is the stuff on the internet.

Yeah im kinda scared of the text fringing because 80% I do is web work and rest is maybi games in weekend or evening if I can… so text clarity is really important to.

[jeroendebruyne]

I received the Gigabyte M27UP, 4K is really nice! I should have upgraded long time ago.

BUT the panel is so bad with viewing angels, I can’t understand who can even use this. Viewing left and right the colors are like 100% different ( yellow blueish etc…).

Looks like I might have to go OLED… all IPS panels I tried so far ( tried 3) are all so bad compare to my old AW2721D .

[PCM2]

The viewing angle (or colour consistency) weaknesses are definitely going to be more annoying and noticeable on the desktop, unfortunately. Out of interest, how close do you sit to the monitor? And do you observe this shift in white point even if you move much further back (try >2m for to test) from the monitor and keep your head central? Your unit could have some uniformity issues which are adding insult to injury there, so to speak.

[jeroendebruyne]

If you sit like 1 meter or more from the monitor ofcourse its not that bad. But who sits 1m from screen 🙂

On normal position I don’t understand anyone who can use this monitor. Anything out of “eyesight” is yellowish. Very bad viewing angles, as also reported on other sites.

I don’t know what I will try next, if the asus oled would be same text clarity as this 4K I would order it directly but I kinda have my doubts. Could order one and just return it.

[PCM2]

I also found the viewing angles to be quite weak and shared some thoughts and demonstrations in my review of the M27UP. Believe it or not these weaknesses don’t bother most people and it isn’t the worst IPS model I’ve used in that respect – but it’s nowhere near the strongest IPS performers. And especially if spending a lot of time on the desktop, those weaknesses can be a nuisance. It had a vignetting which becomes stronger as you sit closer to the monitor but was noticeable from any reasonable ‘normal’ viewing distance. Going slightly off angle would cause this to shift as well. And if you have any uniformity issues on top (not uncommon) it can make things worse. I could’ve been more critical of that aspect, but it wasn’t a screaming issue on my unit compared to some other models I’ve used recently. And the uniformity on my unit was relatively strong, which helped somewhat.

The reason I asked what things looked like for you from an extreme but still central viewing distance is because that’s how you eliminate viewing angle related issues. Any remaining issues are related to uniformity. Of course in practice you observe the result of both issues together. Anyway, hopefully you do get on with the OLED models because as long as the fringing doesn’t bother you there’s a lot to like about them. 🙂

[jeroendebruyne]

I think I might bite the bullet and go for the xg27ucdmg , just one more question if you can help. For example on my alienware aw2721D im using a brightness of around 55.

Will the oled monitor be to low brightness in compare ?

[PCM2]

I think that’s a great choice. Your old Alienware ~55 brightness would be ~250 nits which the ASUS can slightly exceed (with its very stable ‘Uniform Brightness’ setting active, so no sudden dimming).

[Author]

Posts