Well done Tim for calling out the hdr testing methodology and the loopholes in the method that manufacturers are using to be accredited with higher hdr certifications. Definitely needed after so many companies throw a hdr rating on their monitors and falsely advertise the true capability of the panel, ultimately leading to more consumers being misled into thinking that they are getting a hdr experience, when in fact they're being sold short of one.
I remember when the HDR specification required 1000 nits. Then monitor makers complained and they caved and made HDR400. There's an argument that OLED can reach HDR equivelent at lower nits if in a suffeciently dark enough theatre. However I don't use OLED on my PC nor is it a dark room. As far as I'm concerned, after experiencing true HDR in my home theatre, I wouldn't even call anything below 1000 nits HDR. I don't really need HDR in games though, they aren't movies, well I'd like to see better in the shadows sometimes but that doesn't require full HDR. Response is far more important that quality in games for me. Sure I'd love both, but just don't falsely advertise, it's not worth it. I hope every reviewer keeps up this pressure on false advertising. They've been doing the 1ms lie forever, governments did nothing, but maybe with enough awareness the problem of false advertising will go away.
@@Phayze101 Because politicians have no idea, those in the know always knew it was nonesense and weren't fooled by it and the general consumer just never knew the difference. Still I thought they argued government doesn't need to regulate business the market will, well that might of been true in the past when the TV schematic was inside the TV but as more and more businesses were bought out it doesn't work. It's been a slow slippery slope since the 50's.
To be fair all monitor's outside the Alienware QD-Oled do fake hdr...only a high end Oled TV will produce great hdr and that's generally below 1000 nits too
@@mrwalker6026 there was some real ones before they allowed HDR below 1000 nits on a monitor, which was stupid because they certain stopped trying since. I'm sure there's still a few but generally the HDR is their best feature and it's not really a good monitor in the end.
How is the new notebooks reviews going? I thought that after that MSI one the reviews would just come daily, now it appears that Intel and Nvidia just showed a super spec machine for the hype
I'm glad someone else noted. I was just semi-playfully saying how that list will kill HUB's monitor review monetization out of being so good! If this indeed becomes a problem though, something as simple as splitting the checkliss along the video may help. Would still be nice to get these elsewhere like a(an add-filled) static webpage for easy reference. As this grows it would also be amazing to have something like a weighed average score for monitors based on this list, which could then be used to compare monitors by their respective categories (something like Notebookcheck does for laptop categories, but with these monitor traits).
That Vesa testing method is absolutely insane, thanks for explaining that. Also it's highly dubious if screens recognize test patterns and adjust configurations only for these.
This shouldn't really be surprising to anyone, most "standards" organizations are purely looking out for manufacturers (they're *run* by them!!) and not consumers. Anyone who expected otherwise should perhaps learn a bit about capitalism; this is how it works.
every sticker factory is. almost every bigger certification like ufc, fairtrade, Vesa, 80+ and so on is. as soon as finances are involved it corrodes away the integrity
Seems like a problem with many standards groups, such as VESA, HDMI Forum and USB Forum. There's a conflict of interest because the members of the group are in the business of selling devices with DP/HDMI/USB so they cut corners and be sneaky/deceptive as much as they can
I feel like these were 2 videos in 1. Why not make the VESA HDR scam into a seperate video so it can reach more people? It deserves to be a topic on its own.
It's like an experiment and minimal effort hdr1000. How low can they go and still claim the hdr1000. Given its price comparison to other monitors in the range, this thing is overpriced.
It's a pretty good monitor for the price but not a good HDR Monitor but HDR rated monitors from named brands with far higher price tag are also guilty of the same HDR rating.
On top of that, it's a VA panel and we all know every VA monitor on the market is trash due to the level of black smearing, except Samsung's expensive G9
I have a Dell S3422DWG which meets or almost meets many of the Vesa600 requirements. It will do a peak brightness of 580 nits for example, even though it's a Vesa400 monitor. Maybe it was initially designed around Vesa600 and didn't meet the spec, but it's night and day compared to similarly priced Vesa400 monitors. Those ones tend to only just reach 400 nits unsustained and only meet contrast requirements in specific test cases.
Not just a great review, but also a detailed analysis of the VESA HDR spec, with examples. Fantastic work Tim! It would be great to put this analysis into a video about the state of HDR in general. Super useful info that would be relevant for a much wider audience than those who might click on a specific monitor review.
Dito these please make a video on this please as like you side the general consumers will likely be duped into this especially gamers and potential TV buyers
the worst thing is it isnt a 'bad' monitor for the price, there have been far worse display's recommended.. such as IPS gaming displays with such trash contrast and black levels it could barely beat a late 2000s lcd by those metrics.. It's the deception and how HDR cert is becoming a meme.
VESA wants money for stickers --> low requirements bring more monitors to their test labs --> VESA gets more sticker-money. Let's ignore the fact that these stickers were invented to help customers at the first place.
Tim, you have to convince Alienware that you’re the guy they need to send their new QD-OLED monitor to. I won’t be purchasing one until after you review it!
Miserably failing the checker-board test without using half of the test ias NOT checkerboard, is conscious deceiving. Read, scam. Buyers do not give a smallest fu.k if the certification is technically genuine, if the monitor is not capable of delivering advertised feature in real world use, and the manufacturer knows this
Those low-bar HDR "certifications" sorta killed the whole HDR promise. Most people that bought a "HDR" screen will either not even be running it in HDR mode, since they have the wrong cables, or the settings to enable are too hidden, or come with so many drawbacks that they rather not enable it. And if they still enable it, the performance is so poor that they'll see next to no difference and become even less willing to spend for a higher end HDR device. "Why spend so much on a feature that just looks the same".
This and Microsoft completely botching the way HDR works in Windows generally, and (most) games in particular. It's such a shame as HDR is really nice when it's working.
@@LeoDavidson Yeah, HDR under windows is just such a half-assed mess. So many glitches if you turn it on, so annoying to do if all you want to do is have it on for that ONE game you are playing that has it. Also most of their built in tools can't handle it either (i.e. Screengrab with Win-Shift-S), not to mention multi-monitor situations, which I can't believe is still wonky as fuck after they had decades to do it right. Like, try to set up a ultrawide monitor to portrait view. Better have a screen that turns off and on fast enough before the confirmation window goes away, otherwise you can't click it due to mouse movement boundaries (and there is no keybind to confirm)
@@MLWJ1993 After watching this video, I don't even care about VESA, I'm just going to watch monitor reviews from people like Tim to see if the HDR on that TV/monitor is actually good or not.
This reminds me of when VW got caught cheating the tests on diesel emissions. I know VESA have much of the responsibility here, but the manufacturer is hugely manipulating results.
Who do you think runs VESA? It's the manufacturers. They design specifications that seem useful but are actually very easy to circumvent because they themselves are the ones taking the tests they've created. VESA's responsibility is equal to the manufacturers, because they are one and the same.
Companies know what will sell a product. It what they sells that matters. Reminds me of the 1ms response time for high refresh monitors. The best Hdr displays are often Oled but they don't list the brightness as a feature. A few factors such as full screen/partial screen brightness and their relatively low overall brightness aren't selling features alone but keep this in mind when looking Hdr
Good on you for calling out BS marketing once again Tim. Loved watching this on my 34" LG 34GN850 :-) Thanks for the recommndationn Tim, truely an amazing monitor.
Nice job reviewing this display! I’ve had my eye on it for a while and was wondering if it truly delivered good HDR at its suspiciously low price. Now I know that I’m not missing out on anything.
I've been looking into it for a while as well not sure if I want to get it but I do want to get it I mainly play single player games not a lot of multiplayer games but play a little with friends this monitor be a huge upgrade over the 1080p 60 I'm using
No. More like the test method has the two factors that are used for calculating the contrast ratio (brightness and darkness) is to be calculated using two different backlight brightness level. For the brightness factor they have the screen set to max brightness and for the darkness factor they have the brightness set to 5 nits and then they read the black brightness level. By splitting the readings over two tests the different backlight brightness level it ignores any bleed and thus the range or brightness levels in the one frame is not high enough. (15000:1+)
Great reporting and methodology as usual. I'm consistently impressed by your technical knowledge, and you always make it easily understandable! Thanks for your work!
VESA cert = useless USB naming = useless HDMI naming = useless Does anyone else feel like we are buying tech based on Guessing? Good thing we have pur man Tim.
In Hindi we have a saying 'Daal main kuch kala nahi, pura daal hi kala hai'. Which literally means 'The lentil doesn't have a black spot, the entire lentil is black' (black indicates the food is rotten) This means that not one aspect of the system is fúçked. The entire system itself is fuçkéd
This video a perfect example of why this channel is a not only the most informative about new products and technologies, but also the most factual. Thank you for all your folks hard work & showing that good journalism doesn't mean compromising integrity. Is there a listing of all the different kinds of 'trickery' the industry uses to misrepresent products and their claims anywhere? I think that would be a really useful resource... Even if it's a faq
I had the Sceptre C30. It lasted about 2 months. Never again. Spend a few extra bucks and get something decent. Dell has a 34" UW 1440p that regularly goes on sale for $449.
Thanks so much, Tim, for giving a clear, conclusive exposure of the fact that DisplayHDR certification is not something potential buyers should just blindly rely on (at least not in its current implementation).
Thanks for breaking this down and highlighting the lack of clarity around the DisplayHDR certification requirements. I would be interested in a series about the caveats of the DisplayHDR testing methodologies.
Tech enthousiasts probably know, but you should be cautious with things labelled 'HDR' anyway. Like €400 TV's with 300 nits brightness and Dolby Vision. Looks nice on paper, doesn't do anything in practice.
Thanks you saved me from getting this monster. That bezel with an extra black bezel are horrendous. Lets hope we get decent sized oled monitors for not ridiculous prices soon.
Can we all just take a moment and recognize how Tim almost never falters with model numbers regardless how awkward they are? Great job all around, sir.
that looks exactly the same, as what you can buy in germany, branded as "LC-Power"! For example, the "LC-M34-UWQHD-144-C-K"(~500€), which looks like a twin of the model here, or LC-M27-QHD-165-C-K (~400€), or LC-M27-QHD-240-C-K (~550€), or LC-M32-QHD-165-C-K (~450€). They all have in Common, the 1000R Curve VA Panel with HDR1000, as well as the all white and rgb backlight- as well as stand- design with the Monitor in your Video.
As far as I know LC-Power and Sceptre monitors are the same. I also wanted to buy the ultra wide version from LC-Power but I think I will go with Dell or Gigabyte instead.
@@brutal_impaqt i wanted to go withthe 32 165hz 1000r hdr1000 LC-Poeer Model, intended of a Gigabyte M32Q which just offers HDR400 and no dimming zones, which would be even worse picture for the same price, wouldn't it? There is nothing more to get for this pricepoint, except for the LC-Power Model. They even offer a 40" 5ultrawide and a 39"WQHD Model, with just 400 Nils and Straight panel.. one of the Was an ips Display, I guess
I bought the 27 inch model with no expectation of a good picture but high Brightness to use as an audio control monitor for live sound rig when outdoors or close to bright stage lighting indoors, it works great for that but otherwise it’s not good. It’s cheap enough it can be replaced for very little money and in direct sunlight you can see it using MacOS. I wish they made a flat screen version of this monitor so I could slap a touch screen infrared frame to it. High refresh rate monitors are good for checking audio meters and plugin meters while giving a touchscreen a more natural feel. Because working with a mouse can be too slow in some situations. I paid $289 US for the 27 inch. It’s bright but besides that it’s just an average VA panel.
Thank you for creating these videos. I really appreciate the thoroughness of your explanation of standards and what monitors are actually capable of vs. whats stated in the manufacturer provided specs
Great review , your deconstructing of VESA Checker Board test is excellent , VESA get your act together . The panel in Question .. just wonder who the OEM manufacture is ??
Honestly, if this isn't one of the fairest shakes someone has given a product via normal (braniac) test vs standards (moronic) test I've seen yet. Thanks for being a dependable 3rd party whom we can all trust, and for explaining things in great depth!
I just bought one of these monitors. With the exception of a few things, like a poorly written manual and the plastic button used to set the monitors preferences, I really like it so far. I have had some issues getting the monitor settings set the way I want. Like you said, enabling one feature disables another. I could not enable overdrive at all unless I set the refresh rate to 120, which I do not want to do. As far as HDR goes, this is my first monitor that has that feature, even though it apparently is not true HDR. Other monitors I looked at also seemed to be this way. It looks good to me in the few games I have tried it on, but I do not have anything to really compare it to. I am not a die hard gamer and did not want to spend a ton of money on a monitor. I paid just under $450.00 for this and that was about $100.00 more than I wanted to spend, but it was the only one I looked at that had all the feature I wanted. It also had to be good for non-gaming use, like internet and videos. I really love the contrast on this thing and it has the best blacks I have ever seen on a monitor. The display is also very sharp and bright. Maybe a professional or die hard gamer will not like this device, but it should be great for somebody like myself. I also find a lot of gaming hardware on the market these days overpriced. Video cards are at a silly price these days and I saw several monitors over 2000 dollars. I am hoping this is a good compromise! I have 28 more days to test it and if it does end up being a bust, I will return it to Amazon!
I bought one of these 2 weeks ago. What I found is that there is a lot of color banding when HDR is enabled. Even with 8bit+dithering enabled. You'd need to run it at 100Hz to reduce the color banding, which negates the purpose of buying such a high refresh rate monitor. While I subjectively thought SDR content looked good on it, HDR content was just not very good, at least due to that color banding. It was much too distracting compared to a proper 10 bit panel that has proper local dimming. And on top of that, the on-screen adjustments were a bit buggy, as sometimes I'd toggle something and it would unexpectedly make things darker.
I had the same discovery about having to drop to 100Hz, but I personally found that HDR 600 looks better than SDR for some games like Sea of Thieves. In games like that I don't really care about hitting 165fps so I'm more than happy to drop Hz for better colors/contrast. Depends on the game though.
This is one of the best and most educational piece about monitor I have watched. You always put out great informations in your monitor reviews, but this one was very in dept and precise about HDR testing methodology. I very much appreciate.
Got the 35 inch curved ultra wide scepter monitor 1440p. It has only a 100htz display but I love the monitor. Personally hdr is not a make or break deal but sad to see them getting a certified sticker because of some janky testing
Thumbs up! This style of testing and questioning accreditation in your video follows a very high if not industry standard. That is beyond a simple consumer advice from some guys who make videos on youtube. Chapeau!
Kudos to Tim going into such a deep dive of why you should ignore any HDR claims by manufacturers and go by what reviewers (at least competent ones go). Why I've got such a respect for Hardware Unboxed for cutting through the bullshit and giving you a proper review of what the monitor does
3 notes: - HUB Essentials checklist is *chef's kiss* and your great, yet long videos have just lost most of my monetization as I will skip IMMEDIATELY to them (SORRY! Will try to resist!) - Great review, and despite the back and forth with HDR certification, I'm glad you were blunt in the end by not recommending and clearly certifying it as BAD - Seriosuly, f*ck VESA (at least in the HDR dept.). Please don't become USB-IF with their horrible, optional, confusing standards
Stellar stufff Tim, you really have become a world class authority on monitors. I flip PCs occasionally and these days when I am shopping for monitors I wouldn't make a decision until I've seen your opinion
Thank you for all of your hard work! Letting average consumers like myself know about these products is such a great thing. I always thought of Scepter as a budget or cheap monitor company anyway but this just verified my suspicions.
To be fair, with the Sceptre C34, you’re getting marginally hdr1000 specs, with mid-teir performance at those specs, for half the price of an actual HDR1000 monitor. And if you are happy with its other features, that may be just fine for some people. It may have slower refresh, more smear and blur, but it also offers much higher contrast and brightness compared to some of those top of the line monitors. Besides that, there arent many 1000R curved displays to choose from besides the Samsung Odyssey series, (which tends to be double in price) and even less if you want a white aesthetic. As a purely standard monitor for watching and streaming home movies, running office work, managing files, and consuming youtube content, it will all look and run perfectly adequate. Besides, for home cinema you only need 60-120Hz refresh rate anyway, and for the weekend gamer, even 144-165Hz is good enough. Yes it has some blur or smearing but all VA panels do. While it may not suit the competetive gamer or professional videographer or photographer etc, I think the value is at least on par with its performance. By comparison, there have been issues with Samsung tv’s and monitors over the years and I’ve have had both. Even the Samsung Odyssey monitors suffer from backlight bleed, screen separation, flickering, and dead pixels from time to time -and in my experience, I’ve never had a Sceptre tv or monitor go bad. My oldest is an OLED 19” Sceptre from 2015, and still works as new. Meanwhile, our family’s 4-year old Samsung OLED has dead pixels, colored banding, and outside of warranty is already showing its age. So that said, I would choose either Samsung or Sceptre again, just as long as you understand the tradeoffs. For my use, the Sceptre is just fine and even under-spec’d it still outshines my 720p and 1080p monitors of the past.
By far the best channel on TH-cam in terms of monitor reviews. This VESA HDR testing method is beyond laughable. Keep up the awesome content for us consumers!
I have this monitor for a lil over a year now I love it good color and sharp but I don’t use hdr at all due to it’s washed out colors I keep the brightness low for better contrast
Monitors like this and any HDR400 + 600 displays are giving HDR a bad name, most people think it's a gimmick when it's actually amazing when implemented correctly
I'm very much on team Display Port. That bend! Yeeoh! That could lead to signal degradation over time. Not a deal breaker, but, frankly, I just wonder about monitors these days. Thanks so much for these reviews! These help me make more informed purchasing decisions. This does look like a rather nice one. EDIT: Ugh! I don't like how they say stuff is on there, and, yet, it isn't! The nerve of some people!
Is there any monitor you do highly recommend for HDR? Or should we just keep waiting for OLED and other per-pixel lighting technology to come to gaming?
When I worked in the industry I remember the manufacturer backlash when they were informed of their initial tests and requirements... of course they caved... I assume money was involved... but I rolled my eyes when the specs and details finally came out...
Now i am Sceptric Also a perfect example of why i don't really trust certificates... They are good to indicate in which direction a profuct goes but they aren't reliable to say exactly if a product is good.
I don't know how much of a difference it would make but I feel that if companies want to continue using the Edge Lit format then they still need to compromise and add at least one row of zones in the middle, at three zones top to bottom you'd have MUCH more granularity, with such a low zone count every new row or column is a huge improvement so jumping from two rows to three would be a massive upgrade. That one middle row of zones would still break the overall simplicity of construction from Edge Lit only, but at least it is plausible they can continue using edge lighting in budget monitors, just not exclusively.
I feel like with a proper FALD backlight and a bit more firmware refinement (for like 300€ more or so and probably from a different manufacturer) this panel could be a good "entry" to HDR Displays even with a 850nits of brightness. I feel like HDMI 2.1 is overrated for PC gamers anyway (and would probably cost a lot more for very little improvement), who should use DP anyway. (Although I'd only use it in a 16:9 format at a reasonable large-ish size)
This be a big upgrade from my 1080p 60 monitor I am using I do want that hdr I mainly play single player games some multiplayer games sometimes with friends I like the monitor but I'm not sure now it just seems more budget cost to get as low as it is
Can you make review for the ROG Strix XG249CM monitor? I think it's the perfect balance for people who don't want large screens and don't have very powerful graphics cards. :)
IF you could limit how dark a monitor gets can you increase response times? (well because it's a va it can get waaay darker than an ips) if you could limit how dark it gets and get an ips level contrast ratio that means you've got a way faster panel at the cost of dark levels(maybe that's what Samsung did with their new panels since they got mediocre contrast compared to other VAs)
Windows says my Asus HDR Ultrawide is not certified, even though one of the selling points was HDR 600,. They now have it advertised as HDR400. Companies seem scared to test the waters or are just throwing HDR on without having proper certification.
So glad we're starting to see monitors with a very high sdr brightness. Personally for me, the brighter the better. I have the FV43U and I love it. It's made me install all my old favourite games so that I can experience them again which such great brightness, colors and contrast (and obviously 4k/144hz).
@UCSsPUaw_FUn-dKVZdb3kyaw I've tried F.E.A.R, Bioshock Infinite, Witcher 2, Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway, Max Payne 3, Shogun 2 and Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. All look and run amazing. Wish I had time to actually complete them all.
@@MrRechtSo Yeah. Well, more accurately the contrast stays the same but as you increase the brightness the black levels go up with it and the whole screen is just a one big flashlight aimed to your eyes
@@MaaZeus It still looks great to me. Yes, they're not OLED but still looks impressive. The FV43U has very high contrast, even for a VA panel. As per Tom's hardware: "The FV43U completes its sweep of the luminance and contrast tests with a win in the ANSI benchmark. It’s safe to say that among jumbo computer monitors, the Aorus offers the greatest dynamic range, best black levels and most image depth for SDR content"
The same screen is sold in europe by a company called LC power as the "LC-M34-UWQHD-144-C-K" and they also offer a 32 inch version"LC-M32-QHD-165-C-K".
It's almost if the VESA standards test were written by the manufacturers to the benefit of manufacturers over the costumer. Shocking really that the standards suck.
LOL. It's so funny. I have had two UW 34" monitors, one was 100Hz and basically a Scepter monitor (HKC), and the other that I am looking at right now is a 144Hz Lenovo monitor. Both are 3440 x 1440. Both of these monitors have suffered from brightness flicker when using Free Sync (G-Sync compatible) in games. This usually happens on cut scenes or when the refresh rate goes low and there is a static background or a slow pan. As I was watching this video, and this Scepter monitor was shown with some kind of nature scenery panning around, I could see the same flicker (and no, it wasn't my monitor since I was just sitting on the desktop and it was only showing up in the video). It was very obvious, yet I have never seen this mentioned in ANY review of ANY monitors, EVER. WTF? Is this some type of dirty secret no one wants to mention? I was getting better results using FastSync in the gforce driver, which eliminated tearing completely and did not flicker at all. Why are we paying extra for variable refresh monitors that flicker? I suppose true G-Sync monitors do not flicker, but it seems to me that freesync monitors that claim they are "g-sync compatible" really are not at all, unless you are willing to ignore the flicker. This hap been apparent using an ASUS 2070, a Gigabyte 3070 Vision and now a EVGA FTW3 RTX 3080 TI Elite. The 2070 was tested on both the HKC and the Lenovo, while the 3070 and 3080TI have only been tested on the Lenovo. EDIT OK, I watched to the end, and kudos for including the flickering issue. Personally, I think that flickering is almost a deal breaker for variable refresh rate monitors that have the issue. I would rather use fastsync in many cases over a flickery g-sync compatibility.
As usual, the ultimate go to channel for watching monitor reviews before deciding which one to buy. If HUB do reviews and recommend even about what underwear to buy, I'll certainly go with their recommendation.
With this methodology for 1000 HDR does this also apply to TVs too? If so that would mean potentially any budget TV could theoretically be displaying lower than advertised HDR say sub 800. And the contrast ratio will also be lower due to the methodology from the VESA group
Wow! Great video...again! Is there any reviews for the ROG Strix XG279Q-G Review (Gundam Edition)? Looking to upgrade for the all white set up, and a white monitor is hard to come by for gaming unless you want to try to paint or cover with sticking paper....plasticy things!
Great video thanks for highlighting this fake HDR issue, not too worried about the review for this model screen but this issue needs to be called out industry wide otherwise people will assume HDR isn't as big a difference as it could and should be
Steve/Tim if you have not already please can you at least consider putting the VESA methodology section of this video on the HUB Clips channel, owing to how informative it is. Would be far easier to find it that way
I have a 1000 hdr Samsung monitor and while it is very bright overall, I'm not sure if it gets to 1000 nits but I doubt it does in HDR. And HDR is a joke with edge lit LCD. Just get to watch a few rectangular zones get lit up whenever there is a single pixel active in the section.
Hi Hardware Unboxed! Are you working on a review for the HP X34 Gaming Monitor? There are basically no reviews on it yet and is one of the few non-curved gaming ultrawides out there at a competitive price. As someone playing isometric view games, the curve in most ultrawides is a major turnoff for me, let alone for productivity.
*TIM* ! ! ! . . . Question: of the monitors you have tested, which 32", Non-Curved, monitor for less than $500 usd would you recommend for 1080p, 120hz. freesync *&* g-sync capable, gaming? I live in the US. Thank you.
Awesome work. Just finished watching it. Good explainers and very educational. Happy to have somewhere I can forward those requests!
Could you review a blur busters monitor?
I used their reviews and best of list to decide on my new main monitor
Well done Tim for calling out the hdr testing methodology and the loopholes in the method that manufacturers are using to be accredited with higher hdr certifications. Definitely needed after so many companies throw a hdr rating on their monitors and falsely advertise the true capability of the panel, ultimately leading to more consumers being misled into thinking that they are getting a hdr experience, when in fact they're being sold short of one.
I remember when the HDR specification required 1000 nits. Then monitor makers complained and they caved and made HDR400.
There's an argument that OLED can reach HDR equivelent at lower nits if in a suffeciently dark enough theatre. However I don't use OLED on my PC nor is it a dark room.
As far as I'm concerned, after experiencing true HDR in my home theatre, I wouldn't even call anything below 1000 nits HDR.
I don't really need HDR in games though, they aren't movies, well I'd like to see better in the shadows sometimes but that doesn't require full HDR.
Response is far more important that quality in games for me. Sure I'd love both, but just don't falsely advertise, it's not worth it.
I hope every reviewer keeps up this pressure on false advertising. They've been doing the 1ms lie forever, governments did nothing, but maybe with enough awareness the problem of false advertising will go away.
@@Phayze101 Because politicians have no idea, those in the know always knew it was nonesense and weren't fooled by it and the general consumer just never knew the difference.
Still I thought they argued government doesn't need to regulate business the market will, well that might of been true in the past when the TV schematic was inside the TV but as more and more businesses were bought out it doesn't work.
It's been a slow slippery slope since the 50's.
To be fair all monitor's outside the Alienware QD-Oled do fake hdr...only a high end Oled TV will produce great hdr and that's generally below 1000 nits too
@@mrwalker6026 there was some real ones before they allowed HDR below 1000 nits on a monitor, which was stupid because they certain stopped trying since. I'm sure there's still a few but generally the HDR is their best feature and it's not really a good monitor in the end.
@@Commander_ZiN well the 'best' gaming TV the LG C1/C2 only reaches roughly 800 nits not 1000
Love the addition of the essentials checklist
How is the new notebooks reviews going? I thought that after that MSI one the reviews would just come daily, now it appears that Intel and Nvidia just showed a super spec machine for the hype
@@pedro4205 that's what CES is. ASUS as an example showed the PG32UQX for 3 years before releasing it. Release dates also don't mean anything to ASUS.
@@pedro4205 also Q1 has 2 months left.
same
I'm glad someone else noted. I was just semi-playfully saying how that list will kill HUB's monitor review monetization out of being so good! If this indeed becomes a problem though, something as simple as splitting the checkliss along the video may help.
Would still be nice to get these elsewhere like a(an add-filled) static webpage for easy reference. As this grows it would also be amazing to have something like a weighed average score for monitors based on this list, which could then be used to compare monitors by their respective categories (something like Notebookcheck does for laptop categories, but with these monitor traits).
That Vesa testing method is absolutely insane, thanks for explaining that. Also it's highly dubious if screens recognize test patterns and adjust configurations only for these.
wow I didn't know VESA was so utterly corrupt! that checkerboard test is outrageous.
Lobbyists
All standards made by manufacturers have issues that are related to making them too easy
This shouldn't really be surprising to anyone, most "standards" organizations are purely looking out for manufacturers (they're *run* by them!!) and not consumers. Anyone who expected otherwise should perhaps learn a bit about capitalism; this is how it works.
every sticker factory is. almost every bigger certification like ufc, fairtrade, Vesa, 80+ and so on is. as soon as finances are involved it corrodes away the integrity
Seems like a problem with many standards groups, such as VESA, HDMI Forum and USB Forum. There's a conflict of interest because the members of the group are in the business of selling devices with DP/HDMI/USB so they cut corners and be sneaky/deceptive as much as they can
I feel like these were 2 videos in 1. Why not make the VESA HDR scam into a seperate video so it can reach more people? It deserves to be a topic on its own.
I would love a separate in depth video calling out the HDR spec as it's sadly quite useless.
Half a video in I came to conclusion that this monitor is designed to pass a VESA's DisplayHDR 1000 certification, not to be a good monitor
It's like an experiment and minimal effort hdr1000. How low can they go and still claim the hdr1000. Given its price comparison to other monitors in the range, this thing is overpriced.
It's a pretty good monitor for the price but not a good HDR Monitor but HDR rated monitors from named brands with far higher price tag are also guilty of the same HDR rating.
On top of that, it's a VA panel and we all know every VA monitor on the market is trash due to the level of black smearing, except Samsung's expensive G9
@@HDJess MSI MPG341CQR is also a good low response times VA
I have a Dell S3422DWG which meets or almost meets many of the Vesa600 requirements. It will do a peak brightness of 580 nits for example, even though it's a Vesa400 monitor. Maybe it was initially designed around Vesa600 and didn't meet the spec, but it's night and day compared to similarly priced Vesa400 monitors. Those ones tend to only just reach 400 nits unsustained and only meet contrast requirements in specific test cases.
Not just a great review, but also a detailed analysis of the VESA HDR spec, with examples. Fantastic work Tim!
It would be great to put this analysis into a video about the state of HDR in general. Super useful info that would be relevant for a much wider audience than those who might click on a specific monitor review.
Dito these please make a video on this please as like you side the general consumers will likely be duped into this especially gamers and potential TV buyers
Tim, you should make your own certification: HU HDR Certificate ;)
YUP
He kind of already does.
HUHDR?
@@edwinooi9166 Hardware Unboxed High Dynamic Range ;)
Tim certification.
VESA has turned HDR as a feature into a mere formality. What a joke.
This is a very old story though and has been like this for more than 10 years.
it could have been so useful and good.
we all know it was a joke, when they allow 400nits and 8bit into the standard
the worst thing is it isnt a 'bad' monitor for the price, there have been far worse display's recommended.. such as IPS gaming displays with such trash contrast and black levels it could barely beat a late 2000s lcd by those metrics.. It's the deception and how HDR cert is becoming a meme.
VESA wants money for stickers --> low requirements bring more monitors to their test labs --> VESA gets more sticker-money.
Let's ignore the fact that these stickers were invented to help customers at the first place.
Tim, you have to convince Alienware that you’re the guy they need to send their new QD-OLED monitor to. I won’t be purchasing one until after you review it!
Bruh, Tim shouldn’t have to convince a company lol.
It will be out of stock. I'm very interested in that monitor. I hope it's not stupid expensive.
@@Apollo-Computers It will be, because I want one too. Except the samsung one without the lame nvidia module.
Eh didn't they drop 1600p ultrawide to go back to being one-in-a-million 1440p ultrawide. Not interested.
@@Vinterloft until they release an OLED version, not interested
Man, HDR might never go mainstream if this is the kind of "HDR" certifications being given out.
Yeah exactly, I am never going to bother with it in this state. SRGB 4ever
The monitor is not a scam, VESA testing is ! :)
Made to favor manufacturers, of course, not the consumer
Just like many other standards it's more about advertising to consumers and less about informing consumers.
maybe testing methodology was made long time ago, when full array local dimming was pricey as hell
Miserably failing the checker-board test without using half of the test ias NOT checkerboard, is conscious deceiving. Read, scam.
Buyers do not give a smallest fu.k if the certification is technically genuine, if the monitor is not capable of delivering advertised feature in real world use, and the manufacturer knows this
@@netiturtle It's an advertising spec, not an informative spec.
@@Z3rgatul Or maybe they just want maximum profit and don't care about consumers
Those low-bar HDR "certifications" sorta killed the whole HDR promise. Most people that bought a "HDR" screen will either not even be running it in HDR mode, since they have the wrong cables, or the settings to enable are too hidden, or come with so many drawbacks that they rather not enable it. And if they still enable it, the performance is so poor that they'll see next to no difference and become even less willing to spend for a higher end HDR device. "Why spend so much on a feature that just looks the same".
This and Microsoft completely botching the way HDR works in Windows generally, and (most) games in particular. It's such a shame as HDR is really nice when it's working.
@@LeoDavidson Yeah, HDR under windows is just such a half-assed mess. So many glitches if you turn it on, so annoying to do if all you want to do is have it on for that ONE game you are playing that has it.
Also most of their built in tools can't handle it either (i.e. Screengrab with Win-Shift-S), not to mention multi-monitor situations, which I can't believe is still wonky as fuck after they had decades to do it right.
Like, try to set up a ultrawide monitor to portrait view. Better have a screen that turns off and on fast enough before the confirmation window goes away, otherwise you can't click it due to mouse movement boundaries (and there is no keybind to confirm)
I don't even think OLEDs are Vesa certified because of how dim they are, but they are way better at HDR than most of the "VESA Certified" ones.
VESA has true black HDR certification for those... 😅
@@MLWJ1993 After watching this video, I don't even care about VESA, I'm just going to watch monitor reviews from people like Tim to see if the HDR on that TV/monitor is actually good or not.
This reminds me of when VW got caught cheating the tests on diesel emissions. I know VESA have much of the responsibility here, but the manufacturer is hugely manipulating results.
Who do you think runs VESA? It's the manufacturers. They design specifications that seem useful but are actually very easy to circumvent because they themselves are the ones taking the tests they've created. VESA's responsibility is equal to the manufacturers, because they are one and the same.
Companies know what will sell a product. It what they sells that matters. Reminds me of the 1ms response time for high refresh monitors. The best Hdr displays are often Oled but they don't list the brightness as a feature. A few factors such as full screen/partial screen brightness and their relatively low overall brightness aren't selling features alone but keep this in mind when looking Hdr
The word "reminds" implies that is a past practice. Unfortunately it's a staple of modern monitor marketing. :(
Good on you for calling out BS marketing once again Tim. Loved watching this on my 34" LG 34GN850 :-) Thanks for the recommndationn Tim, truely an amazing monitor.
Nice job reviewing this display! I’ve had my eye on it for a while and was wondering if it truly delivered good HDR at its suspiciously low price. Now I know that I’m not missing out on anything.
I've been looking into it for a while as well not sure if I want to get it but I do want to get it I mainly play single player games not a lot of multiplayer games but play a little with friends this monitor be a huge upgrade over the 1080p 60 I'm using
So the actual scam is VESA itself
Wait, so this monitor only hits its spec when it detects the VESA test pattern? Didn't know that the VW Diesel engineers got a new job.
Damn, you are right! This has VW written all over it.
definitely smells of dodgy diesel
@@mycosys Like my old diesel mercedes. A hybrid, consumed both fuel and engine oil.
No. More like the test method has the two factors that are used for calculating the contrast ratio (brightness and darkness) is to be calculated using two different backlight brightness level. For the brightness factor they have the screen set to max brightness and for the darkness factor they have the brightness set to 5 nits and then they read the black brightness level. By splitting the readings over two tests the different backlight brightness level it ignores any bleed and thus the range or brightness levels in the one frame is not high enough. (15000:1+)
Great reporting and methodology as usual. I'm consistently impressed by your technical knowledge, and you always make it easily understandable! Thanks for your work!
VESA cert = useless
USB naming = useless
HDMI naming = useless
Does anyone else feel like we are buying tech based on Guessing?
Good thing we have pur man Tim.
USB naming is fine if used correctly. It just never has been
@@mycosys it isnt fine when u keep changing it.
In Hindi we have a saying 'Daal main kuch kala nahi, pura daal hi kala hai'. Which literally means 'The lentil doesn't have a black spot, the entire lentil is black' (black indicates the food is rotten)
This means that not one aspect of the system is fúçked. The entire system itself is fuçkéd
We are fucked anyway. We do live in "kali juga"!
This video a perfect example of why this channel is a not only the most informative about new products and technologies, but also the most factual. Thank you for all your folks hard work & showing that good journalism doesn't mean compromising integrity. Is there a listing of all the different kinds of 'trickery' the industry uses to misrepresent products and their claims anywhere? I think that would be a really useful resource... Even if it's a faq
I had the Sceptre C30.
It lasted about 2 months. Never again. Spend a few extra bucks and get something decent. Dell has a 34" UW 1440p that regularly goes on sale for $449.
which model?
Thanks so much, Tim, for giving a clear, conclusive exposure of the fact that DisplayHDR certification is not something potential buyers should just blindly rely on (at least not in its current implementation).
Thanks for breaking this down and highlighting the lack of clarity around the DisplayHDR certification requirements. I would be interested in a series about the caveats of the DisplayHDR testing methodologies.
Tech enthousiasts probably know, but you should be cautious with things labelled 'HDR' anyway. Like €400 TV's with 300 nits brightness and Dolby Vision. Looks nice on paper, doesn't do anything in practice.
Thanks you saved me from getting this monster. That bezel with an extra black bezel are horrendous.
Lets hope we get decent sized oled monitors for not ridiculous prices soon.
Can we all just take a moment and recognize how Tim almost never falters with model numbers regardless how awkward they are? Great job all around, sir.
that looks exactly the same, as what you can buy in germany, branded as "LC-Power"! For example, the "LC-M34-UWQHD-144-C-K"(~500€), which looks like a twin of the model here, or LC-M27-QHD-165-C-K (~400€), or LC-M27-QHD-240-C-K (~550€), or LC-M32-QHD-165-C-K (~450€). They all have in Common, the 1000R Curve VA Panel with HDR1000, as well as the all white and rgb backlight- as well as stand- design with the Monitor in your Video.
yep
As far as I know LC-Power and Sceptre monitors are the same. I also wanted to buy the ultra wide version from LC-Power but I think I will go with Dell or Gigabyte instead.
@@brutal_impaqt i wanted to go withthe 32 165hz 1000r hdr1000 LC-Poeer Model, intended of a Gigabyte M32Q which just offers HDR400 and no dimming zones, which would be even worse picture for the same price, wouldn't it? There is nothing more to get for this pricepoint, except for the LC-Power Model. They even offer a 40" 5ultrawide and a 39"WQHD Model, with just 400 Nils and Straight panel.. one of the Was an ips Display, I guess
In China, the same monitor is called Titan army A34QG
Keep this up man, perfect review again! And this is an UW screen! You hear us! Best HW channel to date! Still!
Great content Tim! Companies need to be called out on poor practice, including vesa. An informative and enjoyable video, keep up the great work! 👍🏻
I bought the 27 inch model with no expectation of a good picture but high Brightness to use as an audio control monitor for live sound rig when outdoors or close to bright stage lighting indoors, it works great for that but otherwise it’s not good. It’s cheap enough it can be replaced for very little money and in direct sunlight you can see it using MacOS. I wish they made a flat screen version of this monitor so I could slap a touch screen infrared frame to it. High refresh rate monitors are good for checking audio meters and plugin meters while giving a touchscreen a more natural feel. Because working with a mouse can be too slow in some situations. I paid $289 US for the 27 inch. It’s bright but besides that it’s just an average VA panel.
Would love to see their 27 inch 1440p C275B-QWN168W get reviewed.
Thank you for creating these videos. I really appreciate the thoroughness of your explanation of standards and what monitors are actually capable of vs. whats stated in the manufacturer provided specs
Ive got a similar monitor to one of these from Electriq its white, got the same stand and everything
Great review , your deconstructing of VESA Checker Board test is excellent , VESA get your act together . The panel in Question .. just wonder who the OEM manufacture is ??
This review is so well timed, I've been seeing so many ads in the last few days and the price is certainly tempting.
Honestly, if this isn't one of the fairest shakes someone has given a product via normal (braniac) test vs standards (moronic) test I've seen yet. Thanks for being a dependable 3rd party whom we can all trust, and for explaining things in great depth!
I just bought one of these monitors. With the exception of a few things, like a poorly written manual and the plastic button used to set the monitors preferences, I really like it so far. I have had some issues getting the monitor settings set the way I want. Like you said, enabling one feature disables another. I could not enable overdrive at all unless I set the refresh rate to 120, which I do not want to do. As far as HDR goes, this is my first monitor that has that feature, even though it apparently is not true HDR. Other monitors I looked at also seemed to be this way. It looks good to me in the few games I have tried it on, but I do not have anything to really compare it to. I am not a die hard gamer and did not want to spend a ton of money on a monitor. I paid just under $450.00 for this and that was about $100.00 more than I wanted to spend, but it was the only one I looked at that had all the feature I wanted. It also had to be good for non-gaming use, like internet and videos. I really love the contrast on this thing and it has the best blacks I have ever seen on a monitor. The display is also very sharp and bright. Maybe a professional or die hard gamer will not like this device, but it should be great for somebody like myself. I also find a lot of gaming hardware on the market these days overpriced. Video cards are at a silly price these days and I saw several monitors over 2000 dollars. I am hoping this is a good compromise! I have 28 more days to test it and if it does end up being a bust, I will return it to Amazon!
Did you notice some black smearing? It catches my attention but I've seen things about VA panels that scare me
I bought one of these 2 weeks ago. What I found is that there is a lot of color banding when HDR is enabled. Even with 8bit+dithering enabled. You'd need to run it at 100Hz to reduce the color banding, which negates the purpose of buying such a high refresh rate monitor. While I subjectively thought SDR content looked good on it, HDR content was just not very good, at least due to that color banding. It was much too distracting compared to a proper 10 bit panel that has proper local dimming. And on top of that, the on-screen adjustments were a bit buggy, as sometimes I'd toggle something and it would unexpectedly make things darker.
I had the same discovery about having to drop to 100Hz, but I personally found that HDR 600 looks better than SDR for some games like Sea of Thieves. In games like that I don't really care about hitting 165fps so I'm more than happy to drop Hz for better colors/contrast. Depends on the game though.
This is one of the best and most educational piece about monitor I have watched. You always put out great informations in your monitor reviews, but this one was very in dept and precise about HDR testing methodology. I very much appreciate.
Got the 35 inch curved ultra wide scepter monitor 1440p. It has only a 100htz display but I love the monitor. Personally hdr is not a make or break deal but sad to see them getting a certified sticker because of some janky testing
Thumbs up! This style of testing and questioning accreditation in your video follows a very high if not industry standard.
That is beyond a simple consumer advice from some guys who make videos on youtube. Chapeau!
Seems that very similar monitors sell in europe under the brand "lc-power"
Kudos to Tim going into such a deep dive of why you should ignore any HDR claims by manufacturers and go by what reviewers (at least competent ones go). Why I've got such a respect for Hardware Unboxed for cutting through the bullshit and giving you a proper review of what the monitor does
3 notes:
- HUB Essentials checklist is *chef's kiss* and your great, yet long videos have just lost most of my monetization as I will skip IMMEDIATELY to them (SORRY! Will try to resist!)
- Great review, and despite the back and forth with HDR certification, I'm glad you were blunt in the end by not recommending and clearly certifying it as BAD
- Seriosuly, f*ck VESA (at least in the HDR dept.). Please don't become USB-IF with their horrible, optional, confusing standards
Wow amazing tests and job ! You guys are awesome! Finally a real hdr review with all it shades!
Nice. The vesa hdr certification means even less than I originally thought. Add it to the pile with hdmi 2.1 and usb standards.
Thank you for making all these good monitor reviews. Without these quality reviews it would be a nightmare trying to find a decent one.
Excellent journalism! Thank you!
Stellar stufff Tim, you really have become a world class authority on monitors. I flip PCs occasionally and these days when I am shopping for monitors I wouldn't make a decision until I've seen your opinion
Thank you for all of your hard work! Letting average consumers like myself know about these products is such a great thing. I always thought of Scepter as a budget or cheap monitor company anyway but this just verified my suspicions.
Awesome video. Im currently searching for a nice 34 21 by 9 1440 for gaming and your videos are great.
You should add something about the VESA test to the title. IMO that information is way more important than the monitor review itself.
To be fair, with the Sceptre C34, you’re getting marginally hdr1000 specs, with mid-teir performance at those specs, for half the price of an actual HDR1000 monitor. And if you are happy with its other features, that may be just fine for some people. It may have slower refresh, more smear and blur, but it also offers much higher contrast and brightness compared to some of those top of the line monitors. Besides that, there arent many 1000R curved displays to choose from besides the Samsung Odyssey series, (which tends to be double in price) and even less if you want a white aesthetic.
As a purely standard monitor for watching and streaming home movies, running office work, managing files, and consuming youtube content, it will all look and run perfectly adequate. Besides, for home cinema you only need 60-120Hz refresh rate anyway, and for the weekend gamer, even 144-165Hz is good enough. Yes it has some blur or smearing but all VA panels do.
While it may not suit the competetive gamer or professional videographer or photographer etc, I think the value is at least on par with its performance.
By comparison, there have been issues with Samsung tv’s and monitors over the years and I’ve have had both. Even the Samsung Odyssey monitors suffer from backlight bleed, screen separation, flickering, and dead pixels from time to time -and in my experience, I’ve never had a Sceptre tv or monitor go bad. My oldest is an OLED 19” Sceptre from 2015, and still works as new. Meanwhile, our family’s 4-year old Samsung OLED has dead pixels, colored banding, and outside of warranty is already showing its age.
So that said, I would choose either Samsung or Sceptre again, just as long as you understand the tradeoffs. For my use, the Sceptre is just fine and even under-spec’d it still outshines my 720p and 1080p monitors of the past.
By far the best channel on TH-cam in terms of monitor reviews. This VESA HDR testing method is beyond laughable. Keep up the awesome content for us consumers!
I have this monitor for a lil over a year now I love it good color and sharp but I don’t use hdr at all due to it’s washed out colors I keep the brightness low for better contrast
Monitors like this and any HDR400 + 600 displays are giving HDR a bad name, most people think it's a gimmick when it's actually amazing when implemented correctly
I'm very much on team Display Port. That bend! Yeeoh! That could lead to signal degradation over time. Not a deal breaker, but, frankly, I just wonder about monitors these days. Thanks so much for these reviews! These help me make more informed purchasing decisions. This does look like a rather nice one. EDIT: Ugh! I don't like how they say stuff is on there, and, yet, it isn't! The nerve of some people!
In that early introduction that flickering is maddening during the benchmark.
Great review, good on ya for clearing up that testing methodology. Now where do we send out complaints over this VESA BS?
Is there any monitor you do highly recommend for HDR? Or should we just keep waiting for OLED and other per-pixel lighting technology to come to gaming?
The only really good HDR implementation with LCDs are Apples iPad Pros and MacBooks
Its a shame
When I worked in the industry I remember the manufacturer backlash when they were informed of their initial tests and requirements... of course they caved... I assume money was involved... but I rolled my eyes when the specs and details finally came out...
I bought this monitor, It was big cheap decent refresh rate and it fit my all white build. Im happy with it, but I also didn't have high expectations.
Now i am Sceptric
Also a perfect example of why i don't really trust certificates...
They are good to indicate in which direction a profuct goes but they aren't reliable to say exactly if a product is good.
I don't know how much of a difference it would make but I feel that if companies want to continue using the Edge Lit format then they still need to compromise and add at least one row of zones in the middle, at three zones top to bottom you'd have MUCH more granularity, with such a low zone count every new row or column is a huge improvement so jumping from two rows to three would be a massive upgrade. That one middle row of zones would still break the overall simplicity of construction from Edge Lit only, but at least it is plausible they can continue using edge lighting in budget monitors, just not exclusively.
I feel like with a proper FALD backlight and a bit more firmware refinement (for like 300€ more or so and probably from a different manufacturer) this panel could be a good "entry" to HDR Displays even with a 850nits of brightness. I feel like HDMI 2.1 is overrated for PC gamers anyway (and would probably cost a lot more for very little improvement), who should use DP anyway.
(Although I'd only use it in a 16:9 format at a reasonable large-ish size)
This be a big upgrade from my 1080p 60 monitor I am using I do want that hdr I mainly play single player games some multiplayer games sometimes with friends I like the monitor but I'm not sure now it just seems more budget cost to get as low as it is
Can you make review for the ROG Strix XG249CM monitor? I think it's the perfect balance for people who don't want large screens and don't have very powerful graphics cards. :)
IF you could limit how dark a monitor gets can you increase response times? (well because it's a va it can get waaay darker than an ips) if you could limit how dark it gets and get an ips level contrast ratio that means you've got a way faster panel at the cost of dark levels(maybe that's what Samsung did with their new panels since they got mediocre contrast compared to other VAs)
Thank's for your Investigation and talk about VESA manipulation and "special test metodology".
Windows says my Asus HDR Ultrawide is not certified, even though one of the selling points was HDR 600,. They now have it advertised as HDR400. Companies seem scared to test the waters or are just throwing HDR on without having proper certification.
So glad we're starting to see monitors with a very high sdr brightness. Personally for me, the brighter the better. I have the FV43U and I love it. It's made me install all my old favourite games so that I can experience them again which such great brightness, colors and contrast (and obviously 4k/144hz).
@UCSsPUaw_FUn-dKVZdb3kyaw I've tried F.E.A.R, Bioshock Infinite, Witcher 2, Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway, Max Payne 3, Shogun 2 and Splinter Cell Chaos Theory. All look and run amazing. Wish I had time to actually complete them all.
higher brightness reduces the contrast in SDR. get your facts straight
@@MrRechtSo Yeah. Well, more accurately the contrast stays the same but as you increase the brightness the black levels go up with it and the whole screen is just a one big flashlight aimed to your eyes
@@MaaZeus It still looks great to me. Yes, they're not OLED but still looks impressive. The FV43U has very high contrast, even for a VA panel.
As per Tom's hardware:
"The FV43U completes its sweep of the luminance and contrast tests with a win in the ANSI benchmark. It’s safe to say that among jumbo computer monitors, the Aorus offers the greatest dynamic range, best black levels and most image depth for SDR content"
The same screen is sold in europe by a company called LC power as the "LC-M34-UWQHD-144-C-K" and they also offer a 32 inch version"LC-M32-QHD-165-C-K".
It's almost if the VESA standards test were written by the manufacturers to the benefit of manufacturers over the costumer. Shocking really that the standards suck.
In every industry this happens! Because the industries self are involved in determining the tests. Reviews are always needed!
LOL. It's so funny.
I have had two UW 34" monitors, one was 100Hz and basically a Scepter monitor (HKC), and the other that I am looking at right now is a 144Hz Lenovo monitor. Both are 3440 x 1440.
Both of these monitors have suffered from brightness flicker when using Free Sync (G-Sync compatible) in games. This usually happens on cut scenes or when the refresh rate goes low and there is a static background or a slow pan.
As I was watching this video, and this Scepter monitor was shown with some kind of nature scenery panning around, I could see the same flicker (and no, it wasn't my monitor since I was just sitting on the desktop and it was only showing up in the video). It was very obvious, yet I have never seen this mentioned in ANY review of ANY monitors, EVER.
WTF? Is this some type of dirty secret no one wants to mention? I was getting better results using FastSync in the gforce driver, which eliminated tearing completely and did not flicker at all. Why are we paying extra for variable refresh monitors that flicker?
I suppose true G-Sync monitors do not flicker, but it seems to me that freesync monitors that claim they are "g-sync compatible" really are not at all, unless you are willing to ignore the flicker.
This hap been apparent using an ASUS 2070, a Gigabyte 3070 Vision and now a EVGA FTW3 RTX 3080 TI Elite. The 2070 was tested on both the HKC and the Lenovo, while the 3070 and 3080TI have only been tested on the Lenovo.
EDIT
OK, I watched to the end, and kudos for including the flickering issue. Personally, I think that flickering is almost a deal breaker for variable refresh rate monitors that have the issue. I would rather use fastsync in many cases over a flickery g-sync compatibility.
As usual, the ultimate go to channel for watching monitor reviews before deciding which one to buy. If HUB do reviews and recommend even about what underwear to buy, I'll certainly go with their recommendation.
With this methodology for 1000 HDR does this also apply to TVs too? If so that would mean potentially any budget TV could theoretically be displaying lower than advertised HDR say sub 800. And the contrast ratio will also be lower due to the methodology from the VESA group
I’m still waiting to see a review on the Alienware 38inch. I’ve been using it for a year and love it.
Wow! Great video...again! Is there any reviews for the ROG Strix XG279Q-G Review (Gundam Edition)? Looking to upgrade for the all white set up, and a white monitor is hard to come by for gaming unless you want to try to paint or cover with sticking paper....plasticy things!
The people in charge of HDR, USB, and HDMI certification are all smoking crack.
There's another page on the VESA site HDR-1000 isnt a standard? This does't mean DisplayHDR 1000
VESA needs to overhaul their entire test methodology. If it was designed by mfgs, then it makes sense.
That is exactly what it is, a certifcation made by a consortium of manufacturers.
Great video thanks for highlighting this fake HDR issue, not too worried about the review for this model screen but this issue needs to be called out industry wide otherwise people will assume HDR isn't as big a difference as it could and should be
Wake up , have a coffee , watch Tim rip a monitor and testing methods to shreds . Good start to the day !!! Thanks Tim !!!
As always, amazing work, thank you so much for your reviews!
Can't wait for the upcoming Ultrawide QD-OLED monitors!
They going to charge on hell of a premium for them. Personally, I would go for the new LG 42" when they release it this year.
@@elite2themaxrr881 if the next LG C2 42" will cost less than 1k that will probably be the smartest choice
I have heard $1000 is the target price.
Mom: we have a DisplayHDR 1000 monitor at home
*the DisplayHDR 1000 monitor at home:*
Thank you so much for these videos! Shady manufacturers and standards need to be called out!
Steve/Tim if you have not already please can you at least consider putting the VESA methodology section of this video on the HUB Clips channel, owing to how informative it is. Would be far easier to find it that way
Definitely need more transparency in the tech world. It's stupid what OEMs get away way with in terms of marketing claims. Great video 🤙
Good review... Excellent work 👏❤️
I have a 1000 hdr Samsung monitor and while it is very bright overall, I'm not sure if it gets to 1000 nits but I doubt it does in HDR. And HDR is a joke with edge lit LCD. Just get to watch a few rectangular zones get lit up whenever there is a single pixel active in the section.
Hi Hardware Unboxed! Are you working on a review for the HP X34 Gaming Monitor? There are basically no reviews on it yet and is one of the few non-curved gaming ultrawides out there at a competitive price. As someone playing isometric view games, the curve in most ultrawides is a major turnoff for me, let alone for productivity.
*TIM* ! ! ! . . . Question: of the monitors you have tested, which 32", Non-Curved, monitor for less than $500 usd would you recommend for 1080p, 120hz. freesync *&* g-sync capable, gaming? I live in the US.
Thank you.
Hopefully soon also a m27q x test
This is why I love this channel. Always keeping it real!