Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro 27" LCD Monitor
by Chris Heinonen on October 22, 2013 2:40 AM ESTComing off the cheaper Monoprice display I have to admit I wasn’t looking forward to the IPS-Glass Pro Panel version that much. With the issues that I found before I expected to find a low price that had a pair of serious flaws I would not be able to get past. So when I actually used the Monoprice for a while and ran the numbers on it, I came away very surprised.
Out of the box it really is nothing special. The pre-calibration data is okay but not excellent, and the on-screen display is the same one I used with Nixeus and never really loved. The stand is limited in adjustments as well, and the glossy plastic bezels are a design choice I wish companies would move away from.
Calibrate the Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro and it turns into something else entirely. The panel and electronics have enough quality to provide for an excellent image after calibration. You can even call it almost reference quality if you stick just to the center portions of the screen. Only a few colors that produce dE2000 levels above 2.0 keep it from being a true reference even if the overall average dE2000 is very low. The last thing to cause concern is the bright corners which will distract more if you play a lot of darker games or watch movies on it.
When the price of $475 is taken into account, the Monoprice becomes something of a steal. Yes, you can still get a Korean import model for less but it won’t have the HDMI or DisplayPort inputs, and it will lack the warranty that Monoprice offers. The overall performance comes in ahead of the Nixeus VUE 27 that I’ve usually recommended for a value 27” display as well. The main competition is the Dell U2713HM that offers two main benefits: a more adjustable, ergonomic stand and better pre-calibration results.
The Dell can now be found for around $540 so you’ll have to decide if those features are worth the extra $75 to you. The Monoprice does go on sale for $400 sometimes, but the Dell can be found refurbished for the same $400 making it a wash to me. I’m glad that Monoprice is able to offer a good performing, 27” display for a bargain price. If you’re after a 27” display and want good performance as well as a selection of inputs, the Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro is definitely worth checking out.
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jbm - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
ASUS PB278Q is $553 on amazon.com right now. I'd buy that for sure over the Monoprice (in fact I have bought it and I am very happy with it). The PB278Q has a matte screen, is calibrated well, has all the inputs you will ever need AND comes with all the cables in the box (VGA, HDMI, DVI, Displayport) - which also needs to be figured into the price difference.Nfarce - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Nice monitor. If you are lucky enough to get one with no dead pixels or massive light bleeding problems. I tried three of them and returned them all. Two had dead pixels that were towards the middle of the screen and noticeable, and the third a massive light bleed problem in the lower right and left, probably an assembly defect with the bezel not fitting correctly. I gave up and am now spending time researching other 1440p options.jabber - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Buy some carbon fibre vinyl sheeting (or whatever) and cover the bezel in that.l_d_allan - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
> Considering the color accuracy of this display after calibration, it seems like a cheap option for an image professional that wants color accuracy.I infer by "image professional" that you would include a serious Photoshop'er. At that level, I think they would expect closer to 100% coverage of the Adobe-98 gamut, rather than sRGB.
Or not?
foxalopex - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Last I recall Adobe-RGB is a wider colour space than standard sRGB which is closer to what most consumer monitors are tuned to. To display it usually requires a wide-spectrum backlight system which you are not going to find in a cheap monitor.From what I recall it depends on the application. Image Professionals who publish primarily to the Internet or to a consumer's computer will never need more than sRGB because that's what your customer's only capable of. Using Adobe-RGB would likely throw off the picture quite a bit because it won't look remotely correct in sRGB colorspace. I believe the Adobe-RGB users are probably printing images where there's a very wide colorspace or just archiving the pictures and trying to see as much as possible.
piroroadkill - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
I think he's inferring that someone who wants colour accuracy probably wouldn't be looking at a cheap ass monitor.JDG1980 - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
I'm hoping that Monoprice or one of the Korean vendors will soon release a 4K monitor that uses the inexpensive panel used on Seiki 4K TVs, but supports 60 Hz via DisplayPort. (The panel on the Seiki TVs can do that, it's just that they are limited to HDMI input, which only supports 30 Hz.)2560x1440 is OK, but surely we can do better now.
Nfarce - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Have you even looked at the performance hit on modern high end graphics cards that 4K monitors do? See Tom's review on Sept. 18 about it. At high graphics quality settings in games, a 4K monitor (2160p) brings a Titan GPU to its knees, barely making 30fps in games like BF3, and with Crysis 3, forget about it unless you go with two Titans. At some point, the law of diminishing returns steps in to what the eye can appreciate as resolutions move up anyway. But if you've got the money, sure, you *can* do better than 1440p - you just need to pony up for the GPU power to run it.iamlilysdad - Tuesday, October 22, 2013 - link
Not everybody is in it just for gaming.DanNeely - Wednesday, October 23, 2013 - link
The few games they benched with no AA gave good results on the single titan. I'd like to see more tests like that with a single 780. While 140DPI isn't enough to not benefit from AA; it's enough of an improvement over 100 that it's not as important.That said; my budgeting is assuming that when I jump on the 4k bandwagon that I'll need to add a second GPU to feed it at native resolution.