Acer XB280HK 4K G-SYNC Monitor Review
by Chris Heinonen & Jarred Walton on January 28, 2015 10:00 AM ESTAcer XB280HK: Display Uniformity
The backlighting of the Acer leaves a bit to be desired. As we see with the White uniformity, the left side of the display is much dimmer than the right. The right side has almost the same level of light as the center, but the left falls off by almost 25%.
Surprisingly the whole screen shows a drop in black level compared to the center of the screen. Every single measurement is 10% darker or more. I’d chalk this up to measurement error, but I redid the center measurement to be certain and it is correct. For whatever reason the center of the display is brightest, and the rest of the display will probably have better contrast ratios.
As expected, everywhere else on the screen has better contrast ratios than the center of the screen. While the center is only 728:1 the average is 807:1 and the median is 809:1. So our measured contrast ratios might be the worst case scenario for the Acer.
Color Uniformity on the Acer is not great. The right side, where we have the better white levels, is decent but the left side has larger errors due to the decrease in luminance. This large shift from left to right doesn’t reveal itself in gaming so much, but is more noticeable watching a movie or something else from a distance where you see the whole screen better.
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DigitalFreak - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
This is why I ended up with a 21:9, 3440x1440 monitor. It's more expensive, but you can run with 100% scaling, and use 1440p resolution for games that don't support 21:9. I can also hit 60fps easily with GTX 980 SLI with all options maxed. No G-Sync, but I don't like being locked into a GPU vendor when I only replace my monitor every 5 years or so.keatre - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Also looking into the 3440x1440 spectrum. Out of curiosity, which monitor did you go with?Mondozai - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Acer is coming out with a 34" 144 Hz ultra-wide 1440p monitor with G-Sync. So that could be an alternative.Mondozai - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Oh and LG have their 34UM67 model, a Freesync IPS 1440p ultrawide 34" monitor. It's going to cost about 500 dollars or so, so the prices are coming down fast.JarredWalton - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
$500 -- you have a source for that? If they get IPS 3440x1440 34" for that price, I'll be extremely surprised. After all, their non-FreeSync option currently costs over $900:http://www.amazon.com/LG-Electronics-34UM95-34-Inc...
jackstar7 - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Need to jump in and say there are zero confirmed 3440x1440 Freesync of Gsync monitors. There are rumors, but that is all.Right now, the best 3440x1440 appear to be the curved Dell and LG, but I'm also waiting to read more testing of the AOC non-curved and the Samsung curved.
JarredWalton - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
AMD had an LG at CES... however I think it may have been 2560x1080.jackstar7 - Wednesday, January 28, 2015 - link
Indeed it was only 1080.People are taking a couple "stories" about new models where the authors are writing that they "believe" the monitors will have 3440x1440 and running with that "belief". Facts are thus far not present.
Black Obsidian - Thursday, January 29, 2015 - link
Unless something's changed in the last few days, there's no official confirmation of the 34UM67 being 1440p.To the contrary, given that the 34UM65 is *1080p* (while the 34UM95 & 34UM97 are 1440p), unfortunately there's good reason to believe that the 34UM67 will be 1080p Freesync.
Black Obsidian - Thursday, January 29, 2015 - link
Oh, and if the 34UM67 is indeed 1080p, that would make a ~$500 price tag more reasonable. The 34UM9x 1440p parts are still north of $900, but the 1080p 34UM65 can regularly be found much closer to that $500 mark.