Does My 27" 4K Dream Monitor Really Exist?

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digitalforce

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Long story short, I'm looking for a 27" monitor that I am not sure exists or is coming soon but wanted to check with the experts before I finalize on my decision. Even though I could wrote a novel here, I'll keep it brief in the points below:

1 - Budget: Below $1000 - I don't even want to venture into the $1800+ realm of the ripoff GSYNC HDR monitors but if someone can compel me why I should spend a small fortune, I guess I'll consider...

2 - Resolution: 3840x2160 My ideal monitor would be OLED or Plasma 27" 4K monitor for PC gaming (GTX 2080 Ti). Yeah, yeah, I know those don't exist and may never even exist in OLED but my two most important factors are: DEEP BLACKS and VIVID COLORS with a high contrast ratio. So in a nutshell, image quality. I play mostly RPGs and fantasy games so twitch FPS is not my requirement. I have yet to find a 27" monitor with a VA panel or any other panel besides the standard 1000:1 static contrast stuff out there. I also have a PS4 Pro that I would like to input as well so HDR is also a bonus.

3 - Size: 27" I currently have four monitors that I am doing tests on (I do reviews so I get to keep some, others are on loan) - Acer Predator X34, LG 24UD58-B, AOC U3277PWQU, and Samsung U32J590. I love the deep blacks of the two VA Panels (AOC and Samsung) but I am spoiled with the sharpness and surprising great colors of the LG 24". I recently tested a Samsung 43" 4K HDR set that was GORGEOUS but too big for my desk. Also, I am finding even the 32" are a bit too big and not as sharp.

4 - Features: Ultrawide is out due to the PS4 pro issue unless some one can point me to another ultrawide that has better colors and blacks than the Predator X34. GSYNC and HDR are bonuses. Glossy, VA would be preferred even though are becoming more and more rare.

5 - Summary: In the end, you can see that I have a big list of wants but in the end, I am guessing 27" 4K with the best picture quality will be my sweet spot. I'm spoiled because I have a Sony 75" 4K with HDR and the other TVs in the house are Panasonic Plasmas. Tired of having to downgrade and pay more money when it comes to PC monitors... Any help is appreciated :)
 
IPS not good enough? I like VA personally, but IPS is more than fine in terms of picture quality.
 
I think it's possible for your unicorn of a monitor to exist, but probably not at the price point you're currently targeting. Something like the Dell UP2718Q has all the features you want, it's just $1500. It's a 27" panel @ 4K60, IPS, and it's got 384 local dimming backlight zones and proper HDR support.

Aside from OLED displays, which don't much exist in the 'monitor' spare, local dimming zones is how you'll get the contrast ratios you're looking for. My current 'monitor' is a Vizio 60" 4K display that supports local dimming (64 zones) and the blacks are lovely. You mostly find the local dimming feature in TVs though, not so much monitors.
 
There is only one God panel out there right now, but it costs twice as much as you want to spend.
Acer/ASUS have built displays out of it, but they're all $2k. It will likely be another 1-2 years before it comes down in price.
You can look into the Acer Predator X27
Asus built the ASUS ROG Swift PG27UQ

Thankfully the 4k, VRR, adaptive sync, HDR, FALD, 10-bit, P3, future is here. It's taken probably 2-4 years longer than anyone wanted to wait and it's stupid expensive due to few competitors and not a lot of panels getting made, but at least now it exists. It's just a matter of time before it's cheap.

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EDIT: If you don't care about any form of adaptive sync, and 60hz is fine, then you could look into the Dell UltraSharp UP2718Q. HDR/FALD/10-bit. It's actually designed for color critical work as opposed to gaming, but should do okay at that too if you don't care about those specific technologies.
EDIT 2: NM, it's still not in your price range. But I'll leave it here anyway so you know it's an option that exists.
 
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l88bastard said:
Son, pony it up and drop a deuce on the Predator X27
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I would but I've read that even this monitor has seems serious flaws including a loud fan.. also, I can buy a 55" OLED for this price. Would almost rather buy a bigger desk and put that amount of money there.

cybereality said:
IPS not good enough? I like VA personally, but IPS is more than fine in terms of picture quality.
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IPS is fine but the inconsistencies are horrible including back light bleed and IPS glow. As I mentioned, I currently am testing a 24" LG IPS 4K that is great but just a bit too small. My son has a 21" HP IPS and the blacks are literally just gray.

sinisterDei said:
I think it's possible for your unicorn of a monitor to exist, but probably not at the price point you're currently targeting. Something like the Dell UP2718Q has all the features you want, it's just $1500. It's a 27" panel @ 4K60, IPS, and it's got 384 local dimming backlight zones and proper HDR support.

Aside from OLED displays, which don't much exist in the 'monitor' spare, local dimming zones is how you'll get the contrast ratios you're looking for. My current 'monitor' is a Vizio 60" 4K display that supports local dimming (64 zones) and the blacks are lovely. You mostly find the local dimming feature in TVs though, not so much monitors.
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Thanks for the suggestion on the Dell. I hadn't seen that one yet and maybe I can pick it up refurbed or used to save some $$$... has anyone here personally tried it out?

UnknownSouljer said:
There is only one God panel out there right now, but it costs twice as much as you want to spend.
Acer/ASUS have built displays out of it, but they're all $2k. It will likely be another 1-2 years before it comes down in price.
You can look into the Acer Predator X27
Asus built the ASUS ROG Swift PG27UQ

Thankfully the 4k, VRR, adaptive sync, HDR, FALD, 10-bit, P3, future is here. It's taken probably 2-4 years longer than anyone wanted to wait and it's stupid expensive due to few competitors and not a lot of panels getting made, but at least now it exists. It's just a matter of time before it's cheap.

===

EDIT: If you don't care about any form of adaptive sync, and 60hz is fine, then you could look into the Dell UltraSharp UP2718Q. HDR/FALD/10-bit. It's actually designed for color critical work as opposed to gaming, but should do okay at that too if you don't care about those specific technologies.
EDIT 2: NM, it's still not in your price range. But I'll leave it here anyway so you know it's an option that exists.
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Thanks again for the suggestions. Yep, I am aware of the Predator X27, etc and while I'd love to try those out, I personally don't feel like contributing any money to an absolutely ridiculously priced set and as I mentioned earlier, I'd rather invest in an OLED TV at this point. Sad but true :(
 
digitalforce said:
IPS is fine but the inconsistencies are horrible including back light bleed and IPS glow. As I mentioned, I currently am testing a 24" LG IPS 4K that is great but just a bit too small. My son has a 21" HP IPS and the blacks are literally just gray.
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I don't think there are any 27" 4k VA panels out there right now, they're usually only 32".
 
Yes VA is 31.5" 4k I don't think there is a single 27" 4k VA panel not one I remember at least. There is 27UK850 https://www.prad.de/testberichte/test-lg-27uk850-w-attraktives-gesamtpaket/ but you can probably get same or older variant of the panel in cheaper LG 27" 4k IPS monitors with standard gamut and no HDR input in firmware.
Ideally you would want local dimming IPS though a VA at 27" can be usable as well. There is only subpar local dimming terribly lottery 1440p Samsung VA 27" 144Hz and then the expensive 4k monitors with local dimming in various sizes and refresh rates 27-43".
 
digitalforce said:
Thanks again for the suggestions. Yep, I am aware of the Predator X27, etc and while I'd love to try those out, I personally don't feel like contributing any money to an absolutely ridiculously priced set and as I mentioned earlier, I'd rather invest in an OLED TV at this point. Sad but true :(
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Honestly it might not be a bad way to go. I check slickdeals on nearly a daily basis, and it's common to find 55"~ LG OLEDs go for around $1500. If you don't care about higher Hz and you're okay with having a display that occupies your entire desk and you can get decent viewing distance (for me that's out of the question, I don't think I want anything larger than around 40" MAYBE on my desk. Ideally 27-34". But everyone has their preferences).

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If you don't mind waiting for a bit I just fell on this gem: https://www.144hzmonitors.com/monitors/acer-nitro-xv273k-review/
I think this is the monitor I'm waiting for. It doesn't have full FALD (it's unknown how many zones it has... "some" is the answer) and it "only" supports a weak HDR400. However it has all the other checkboxes. The same display as the X27. Freesync. 120Hz with option 144Hz overdrive. 8+2 bit FRC (ideally it would be 10-bit, but this is a close second). IPS (which is my preference, I know you're looking for VA).
It is capable of doing 98Hz + HDR + 10-bit + Freesync Simultaneously. It also supports LFR. All for an MSRP of $899.

If they are crucially able to nail that price point along with this feature set, it looks to be a winner. Supposedly due out Nov/Dec. I'm guessing more likely early next year in any significant number. But, considering the price and the features, I can wait.

EDIT: Just for reference they are also simultaneously releasing a Gysnc version like this one that is lower cost than the X27. The XB273k, as opposed to the Freesync XV273k model. If you can't see it, the second digit is a "B" instead of a "V". Hard to distinguish without the "Predator" vs "Nitro" branding.
 
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I'm genuinely curious about this, why spend 1k or 2k in the case of the Predator X27 for a small-ish monitor when someone can get a really nice, big TV for that price range?

4k displays are an unexplored area for me. I'm primarily a twitch gamer, so I'm at 1080p and my concern is high refresh rates. So I really don't know much about 4k displays, never really having looked at them.
 
doublejack said:
I'm genuinely curious about this, why spend 1k or 2k in the case of the Predator X27 for a small-ish monitor when someone can get a really nice, big TV for that price range?

4k displays are an unexplored area for me. I'm primarily a twitch gamer, so I'm at 1080p and my concern is high refresh rates. So I really don't know much about 4k displays, never really having looked at them.
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Your question is perplexing. You state that you don't know why people don't just buy big TV's. But then you talk about how you're a reflex gamer and you prefer to play at high refresh rates. You just answered your own question, at least your own question from the perspective of being a PC gamer.

But to more fully explain it: there is diminishing returns on size, especially when considering viewing distance. Some don't care about sitting 4' from a 65" display, but most that game want to see the whole thing at once, and then also use it for browsing and other desktop activities. Meaning you either have really low (we'll say perceived) DPI and you have to turn your head a lot, or you're sitting much farther from the display and you defeat the purpose of having a massive display. That combined with the earlier response of: there isn't a TV that exceeds 60Hz and you complete most of the "picture".

The other issues are finding a display specifically with 4:4:4 chroma subsampling (although this isn't as much of an issue as it used to be), not have a terrible PWM, have minimal input lag (usually in the form of some gaming mode that will bypass things like scalers and any form of motion enhancement), and hopefully have a decent color gamut.

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EDIT: For some personal editorialism, I personally don't want a display greater than around 34" at 4k for high DPI reasons. I spend far more time with productivity apps than gaming. Still, I could probably "live with" a 40" display, but that is more or less my max, at least at 4k. Anything larger and for me personally there is severe diminishing returns. Not to mention there currently isn't a display of that size at anything over 60Hz @ 4k.
In any case, with 4k at 34", one can easily play games at 1080p for a 4:1 pixel ratio to increase frame rate. Or play at 2560x1440, which although doesn't have a direct pixel ratio for some reason seems to scale just fine on the much higher resolution 4k displays. To me, that size is sort of the all-rounder. But then I don't care as much about high hz past around 100.
 
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I think we just have a fundamentally different perspective on displays. You want a best of both worlds solution between productivity and gaming. Maybe this is in part due to space considerations? I'm fine with separating those tasks into two different setups. My desk in my home office has three monitors, two 24" and one 20". Sometimes I flip open my laptop for an extra 14" display. I prefer working on that multi-display arrangement to a bigger 4k display, even though both offer roughly the same amount of desktop space.

As far as gaming, I also view high resolution and high refresh rates as contradictory objectives. LTT happened to put out a video on the subject just yesterday. The title is click-baity and overly harsh, but the contents of the video itself sum up why I haven't ever seriously looked at 4k gaming. Again, this is probably because I primarily play twitch fps games.

Anyway, when I look at how amazing of a TV I can get for less than the cost of the Predator X27 I think "why would I consider the monitor". Now I believe it is because I'm not concerned about space and I'm not looking to solve multiple objectives with one piece of hardware.


 
doublejack said:
As far as gaming, I also view high resolution and high refresh rates as contradictory objectives. ........ Again, this is probably because I primarily play twitch fps games.
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It only is (a) for the time being. And (b) without spending a huge amount of money.
It is undeniable that the "goal", especially if you're a person interested in the so-called "PC Master Race" is to have everything. Why would I want to game at 1080p 144hz when I could game at 4k 144hz? Those aren't contrary objectives. They're just objectives that currently cost more than most people can dump on a system. I absolutely want to game at 4k, AND have the high frame rates, AND have HDR, AND Sync, AND DCI P3. There is absolutely no conflict there in my mind. If you could game at 4k and have 1000 FPS, would there be any question that you'd take that over 1080p 1000 FPS (all other visual qualities staying the same)? If you say "yes" then you're being intellectually dishonest.

The real discussion you're having is what the priority is that comes first. For you, all GPU power being limited, you'd rather have refresh and frame rates over having higher resolution. But the bottom line is if you could have both you'd pick it every time. And with that, people are picking displays to choose those priorities. The first 4k 144Hz displays have just started hitting the shelves. And there is zero reason to not buy one outside of cost, as even if you want to game at a lower resolution to make achieving higher frame rate possible, these displays will scale just fine without a noticeable decrease in quality (versus a native display at the same resolution).

Now, if you're going to argue you "must" have 240Hz, that's a whole other bag of worms. And I'd argue you're going to have just as much of a problem getting the GPU power to render those frames (especially with frame timing) as well as being severely CPU limited to have it even really be a consideration. Let alone if there is even a perceptible difference between 144Hz and 240Hz past bias.
Screen size as related to TVs is also another bag of worms. But my argument still holds. If possible we'd want all displays of every size to have high Hz, Freesync/G-Sync, P3, and HDR. The issue is they don't. And that's once again why we have to choose priorities. But in a perfect world, we'd have all of those things. Unfortunately TV's are a long way behind having all those features, and this is especially an issue if you are remotely considering using one for desktop computer use. If all you want is big with nice color (as that's easy-er to find) then TVs work just fine. But if you want to have any gaming features (such as low input lag, chroma subsampling, PWM free, 120+Hz, etc, etc let alone just consistently having DisplayPort) then using a TV is a problem.

Past that, feel free to agree to disagree.


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EDIT: spelling, grammar, clarity.
 
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UnknownSouljer said:
Why would I want to game at 1080p 144hz when I could game at 4k 144hz? Those aren't contrary objectives. They're just objectives that currently cost more than most people can dump on a system.
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You're right. Those aren't absolutely contrary objectives, they are only contrary for now because of technological limitations and budget constraints. As soon as I can get something like a 24" or 27" 4k display, and a video card to drive it, that are capable of 144+ Hz and are an affordable price, I'll be in.
 
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