Recommend: monitor for home office and photo edits

knight427

knight427

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 10, 2011
Messages
183
I'm looking for advice on the perfect monitor for my needs. Max budget is around $700, but spending less means I get my next lens sooner.

I work from home most days (engineer) meaning I use very large spreadsheets and spend too much time writing ridiculously complicated emails. I also do a lot of MS Teams meetings where I am waiting for my turn to present (but working on other stuff while waiting).

My hobby is photography. I sell a few dozen wall prints per year, so I'm officially losing money (net) but losing less due to these sales. I'd like to get a dock and switching system so I can flip from work to photo editing very easily. Because I do sometimes make large prints, I would like accurate colors, but I also don't think I need top-end caliber.

I've mostly been looking at 27" and 32" 4k IPS monitors. HP z27xs G3 Dreamcolor and HP z32 are typical examples (along with their Dell counterparts). I'm open to any brand, but having access to manufacturer outlet pricing is a big advantage to Dell, HP has it too but generally fewer in stock, I think they dump a lot of their refurb on resellers.

For photos, 27" 4k gives me better ppi than 32" but for productivity work, I'll have to upscale text more.

I've also looked at the 34" class 21:9 segment. Those seem mostly for gaming, but having that much side-by-side real estate looks tempting for productivity.

Further down the list of priorities is clean installation. I'm behind the times in connectors, currently using DP to my old 24" monitor. With USB-C, can that handle both power and video? Having fewer cables would be nice, I'm looking to upgrade my desk and hide wires as much as possible.

If you've made it this far, I bet you have some great advice. Please share.
 
I switched to an ultrawide about 18 months ago and I'm never going back. Its so much easier to have 3-4 windows open and is also great for toolbars in Photoshop & Bridge. If you wait for MPP or similar deals at Dell I bet you could get a 34" near your price range, though the 38" is just right for productivity IMO. I'd personally avoid refurb with monitors as I've done it before and the color was off, which is a dealbreaker for me.

After way too much research I found that the sweet spot for color accuracy is 100% sRGB coverage and ignore anything other than that, ie wider gamut, Adobe RGB, etc. Its just not worth the hassle, and introduces some new issues like color consistency across devices. Plus usually high-gamut monitors are much more expensive and will drastically limit your options.
 
Thanks for sharing your experience. I looked into the 38” segment. There are a lot of options but I found the HP z43 as maybe a good balance. I’m a bit concerned about low pixel pitch, 4k is just over 100 ppi at this size. There is a z38c which is curved but they cut down to 1600p so density is about the same but the panel seems a bit weaker in specs.

Honestly I had no idea how big monitors have gotten. I thought 32” was crazy.
 
Yeah but I get it, computer hardware can push more pixels now and everyone's used to giant TVs (and even mobile devices with a ton of pixels). I came from 2x 24" screens (in the past I've also used 3x monitors), and the single ultrawide takes up about the same amount of space but is seamless and better oriented to the user no matter where you're looking. Its a huge upgrade but prices are huge too. Hopefully I get 6+ years out of it.

If you have a high end computer store near you (like Microcenter) it might be worth a look in person. Best Buy won't have anything in this category (at least here in Oregon they don't). I'm a Dell fanboy but I'm sure HP & LG units are also great if they hit the price/feature sweet spot for you.
 
If going ultrawide 38" 3840x1600 minimum. Every single 34 and 35" 3440x1440 I have regretted as its only 3 windows comfortably.
 
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