27in 1440p Gaming Monitor

homerdog

homerdog

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Currently what ~$300 27in 1440p flat (not curved) gaming monitors are good? I'd like at least 144Hz, VRR support with minimal flickering, and good motion clarity. HDR would be nice as well.

So far I'm leaning toward the $280 AOC Q27G3XMN. It gets the most attention and praise from reviewers.
 
Be aware some monitors claim HDR support but it's hdr ready which just means it can accept a hdr signal
a bit like those Hd ready monitors which could accept a hd signal but couldnt display it in hd
 
Probably going to depend on preference and local pricing to answer this.

The AOC Q27G3XMN you mention is going to be by far the cheapest availabe with local dimming. Just keep in mind it is a VA panel with the pros and cons that entails.
 
arandomguy said:
Probably going to depend on preference and local pricing to answer this.

The AOC Q27G3XMN you mention is going to be by far the cheapest availabe with local dimming. Just keep in mind it is a VA panel with the pros and cons that entails.
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I don't care that much about having local dimming but it is nice. Really I want something that handles motion and VRR well. My current monitor isn't great on motion blur unless I turn on ELMB (black frame insertion), but then VRR doesn't work and it gets pretty dim. I understand why having both at the same time would be challenging but I assume someone has figured it out by now.
 
Davros said:
Be aware some monitors claim HDR support but it's hdr ready which just means it can accept a hdr signal
a bit like those Hd ready monitors which could accept a hd signal but couldnt display it in hd
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What is the state of HDR on Windows? Last I checked it seemed like a pain in the ass but maybe it's gotten better?
 
homerdog said:
I don't care that much about having local dimming but it is nice. Really I want something that handles motion and VRR well. My current monitor isn't great on motion blur unless I turn on ELMB (black frame insertion), but then VRR doesn't work and it gets pretty dim. I understand why having both at the same time would be challenging but I assume someone has figured it out by now.
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I'm not sure if that will be the monitor for you. It's main selling point is local dimming and therefore very good HDR for that price point.

VA's are going to have issues with motion performance particularly with respect to certain transitions, especially darker ones (which along with typically worse black crush/dark gradient handling makes them a bit of a condorum in terms of darker content). It's on the faster side for a VA but I reportedly the dark transtions are still notceable in terms of what people would characterize as a "smearing." Secondly I believe that monitor is reported to have flickering issues with respect to it's VRR implementation when the frame rate heavily fluctuates.

If how it handles motion, especially consitently, is the main criteria I think you would still want an IPS.

There are some displays that allow BFI with VRR but I believe the implementations have some caveats (well maybe outside of the new Nvidia implementation that is likely rather pricey). Off hand I know Asus and Gigabyte have displays with this, generally marketed as ELMB(or equivalent) -Sync.
 
The monitor is great. Unfortunately in HDR mode it is blindingly bright and it's hard to figure out how to dim it while retaining the potential for bright highlights. What is the best way to go about this?
 
HDR10 supports a maximum of 10000 nits.

But I'm guessing that isn't what you are asking. HDR10 is a HDR format standard. It isn't a standard that says anything about the capabilties of the display in terms of displaying HDR content. An HDR10 display only has to be able to read and interpret HDR10 data.

VESA's DisplayHDR standard is something that governs what the displays are capable of and is completely separate.
 
So VESA's DisplayHDR 1000 is superior to HDR10 ?
Is HDR10 a bit like HD Ready ?
If I want a monitor that has the best HDR implementation what do I go for ?
 
Davros said:
So VESA's DisplayHDR 1000 is superior to HDR10 ?
Is HDR10 a bit like HD Ready ?
If I want a monitor that has the best HDR implementation what do I go for ?
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They are different things. HDR10 is a video format that uses 10 bits per color channel. Remember when games used to have modes for 16bit (4bits per channel) or 32bit (8bits per channel) color? This is an extension of that. 10 bits per channel which adds up to 40 bits if an alpha channel is used.

The VESA certifications specify that a display can reach a certain brightness, e.g. DisplayHDR 1000 can reach 1000 nits.

I assume OLEDs have the best HDR implementation, but I've never seen an OLED monitor to judge for myself.
 
Davros said:
So VESA's DisplayHDR 1000 is superior to HDR10 ?
Is HDR10 a bit like HD Ready ?
If I want a monitor that has the best HDR implementation what do I go for ?
Click to expand...
You generally want to go for VESA DisplayHDR standards, as they're currently the decent strict standards that are probably the best representation of what a display is capable of. You've mentioned in the past things like "HDR400" and "HDR1000" standards. You can google many articles on VESA vs these other "standards" that are more there for box marketing than anything else. IMO the best reference for HDR quality is DisplayHDR TrueBlack 400/500/600. You're really only going to achieve those on OLED displays.

The difference with VESA standards is that brightness has to be sustained for a certain length of time over a certain percentage of display area to be able to qualify. Which is why a DisplayHDR 400 TV will likely look significantly better than a "HDR1000" TV.

Performance Criteria 1.2 - VESA Certified DisplayHDR™

Summary of DisplayHDR Specs under CTS 1.2 The table below is a summary of the specifications for the VESA DisplayHDR and DisplayHDR True Black standards as they are updated by CTS 1.2 released on May 7th, 2024. A brief description of the new criteria follows the table. The complete description...
displayhdr.org displayhdr.org
 
homerdog said:
I ordered this:
AOC Q27G3XMN

At $250 it's unlikely to get better than this.
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I'm curious how do you find the motion performance involving higher contrast dark content?

I'm a bit surprised you ultimately ended up going with this over an IPS panel when you said you're main criteria was motion performance.

I'm wanting to give VA a try again as I find at close in viewing ranges with desktop monitors once you start to go bigger with 27in+ that off axis glow with IPS displays is rather noticeably for any darker content.
 
arandomguy said:
I'm curious how do you find the motion performance involving higher contrast dark content?

I'm a bit surprised you ultimately ended up going with this over an IPS panel when you said you're main criteria was motion performance.

I'm wanting to give VA a try again as I find at close in viewing ranges with desktop monitors once you start to go bigger with 27in+ that off axis glow with IPS displays is rather noticeably for any darker content.
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I really wanted to try HDR. Motion performance is fine to me with overdrive set to medium. But I don't have anything fancy to compare it to. Seems better than my old 144Hz 1080p one.

I have no complaints about the monitor. My only complaints are about how HDR is handled in games. It's confusing and when dealing with potentially painful levels of brightness you have to trust that the dev is going to respect that and not melt your eyeballs. 1000nits in a dark room really hurts. TBH I've been turning off HDR entirely in some games at night.

Also don't set the local dimming to high. It is too aggressive for the low number of dimming zones. Medium is perfect. Still get great highlights and super low black levels without any obvious blooming in the games I've tried.
 
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It might be more money (but not that much more) but you should have looked at the Cooler Master GP27Q, it's an IPS monitor with 576 zones and FALD.
 
homerdog said:
1000nits in a dark room really hurts. TBH I've been turning off HDR entirely in some games at night.
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I gamed nearly always at night and I know your pain, it's painful to look at a display chucking out 1000+nits some times.

That's why moving to an LG W-OLED monitor with 600nits wasn't actually all that bad, as it still offered good brightness for HDR but didn't melt my eyes at the same time.
 
davis.anthony said:
It might be more money (but not that much more) but you should have looked at the Cooler Master GP27Q, it's an IPS monitor with 576 zones and FALD.
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Looks good but that's more than double what I payed. Got the the q27g3xmn for $250, $280 after tax and shipping. The GP27Q would come out to over $600.
 
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