Question I have 2 monitors, But trying to buy a better MAIN Monitor.

[PaPies]

Hello everybody, thanks for clicking here!

So currently I have 2 monitors.

1.ASUS PG279Q 27" AHVA IPS 2560x1440p

2.ASUS VG278QF 27" TN 1920x1080p

When I bought my PG279Q I paid around $650 back in the day, while it's a good monitor, it's not WOW factor.
The reason why I bought it is because I wanted better colors for gaming, and I mostly bought it for gaming with light video editing per week, I wanted more accuracy.

But many years have passed and I want to get a better monitor for the same price OR LOWER in 2022 if that is even possible?

Preferably minimum of 27" and minimum of 1440p. (I dislike curved monitors) but can go higher as I have an RTX 3080 OC.
------------
Budget is up to $650.

The new monitor has to have at least:
1440p+
27"+
2x+ Better Colors than PG279Q
120Hz+
1-5ms response time
10bit
HDR?
Great blacks

 

[Nephern]

how about this

https://www.newegg.com/p/0JC-0004-0...5hz-_-9SIAMRPGP09612-_-Product&quicklink=true

 

[hotaru.hino]

The tl;dr to my post is, you don't need a new monitor. Just adjust the one you have, save up your money, and wait for something better. Everything at that price point is not worth the upgrade.

In terms of color accuracy, when calibrated the PG279Q is already an accurate monitor, if we went by RTing's review of it. The white balance is pretty much spot on (6501K when 6500K is the target), the deltaE is at the point where you can't really tell any difference in color (0.48 when RTings sets their target at 0.5, but <1.0 is considered imperceptible), and the gamma is within spitting distance of the target gamma curve (2.18 vs the target 2.2 curve). And while they have the ICC profile you can use for your unit, they note that the ICC profile only applies to their unit: manufacturing variations can cause differences.

Of course, pre-calibration is another thing, and RTings does have a list of monitors that have a better pre-calibration result than the PG279Q (https://www.rtings.com/monitor/tests/picture-quality/color-accuracy). But to be honest with you, a requirement of "2x better colors than the PG279Q" is silly. If we assume RTing's numbers are typical after calibration, any other monitor on that list is going to have imperceptible differences.

Anyway, that aside, another thing of note is that panel technology and viewing environment makes a difference if you're just eyeballing "what looks good." IPS panels have okay contrast ratios, which is going to make dark scenes look meh in dark environments. VA panels have much better contrast ratios, but they suffer from okay viewing angels. OLEDs look great at every angle and have infinite contrast, but they're too expensive and their brightness only goes so high (then again, so do a lot of monitors).

I'd say as far as LCD monitor technology goes, you're pretty much at the top tier still. The only thing missing is HDR, but honestly, HDR isn't really that good unless the display can offer excellent static contrast ratios (if I were to pull a number out of my butt, at least 3000:1), high brightness (well over 400 nits), and at least for LCDs, a high amount of lighting zones (probably going to say > 1000 for this one to avoid haloing). The HDR400 spec (not to be confused with the HDR400 True Black spec) is a joke, and despite having an HDR600 monitor, it doesn't seem to "wow" me as much with HDR content than throwing it on my LG C9 TV.

 

[PaPies]

how about this

https://www.newegg.com/p/0JC-0004-00T62?Description=27" 4K 165hz&cm_re=27"4K 165hz--9SIAMRPGP09612-_-Product&quicklink=true

Thank you for the suggestion, I'll take a look at the monitor!

 

[PaPies]

The tl;dr to my post is, you don't need a new monitor. Just adjust the one you have, save up your money, and wait for something better. Everything at that price point is not worth the upgrade.

In terms of color accuracy, when calibrated the PG279Q is already an accurate monitor, if we went by RTing's review of it. The white balance is pretty much spot on (6501K when 6500K is the target), the deltaE is at the point where you can't really tell any difference in color (0.48 when RTings sets their target at 0.5, but <1.0 is considered imperceptible), and the gamma is within spitting distance of the target gamma curve (2.18 vs the target 2.2 curve). And while they have the ICC profile you can use for your unit, they note that the ICC profile only applies to their unit: manufacturing variations can cause differences.

Of course, pre-calibration is another thing, and RTings does have a list of monitors that have a better pre-calibration result than the PG279Q (https://www.rtings.com/monitor/tests/picture-quality/color-accuracy). But to be honest with you, a requirement of "2x better colors than the PG279Q" is silly. If we assume RTing's numbers are typical after calibration, any other monitor on that list is going to have imperceptible differences.

Anyway, that aside, another thing of note is that panel technology and viewing environment makes a difference if you're just eyeballing "what looks good." IPS panels have okay contrast ratios, which is going to make dark scenes look meh in dark environments. VA panels have much better contrast ratios, but they suffer from okay viewing angels. OLEDs look great at every angle and have infinite contrast, but they're too expensive and their brightness only goes so high (then again, so do a lot of monitors).

I'd say as far as LCD monitor technology goes, you're pretty much at the top tier still. The only thing missing is HDR, but honestly, HDR isn't really that good unless the display can offer excellent static contrast ratios (if I were to pull a number out of my butt, at least 3000:1), high brightness (well over 400 nits), and at least for LCDs, a high amount of lighting zones (probably going to say > 1000 for this one to avoid haloing). The HDR400 spec (not to be confused with the HDR400 True Black spec) is a joke, and despite having an HDR600 monitor, it doesn't seem to "wow" me as much with HDR content than throwing it on my LG C9 TV.

Hey, so I've read what you said and while I am happy with the performance of my monitor that I have, sometimes I feel like the colors are better on my TN secondary monitor.
I am using Racing Mode for my main monitor to even get close to what I think is accurate, reference being my TN monitor but mostly my Iphone actually, as I know the Iphone has decent colors so I really try to eye-ball it when I calibrate it via windows.
BUT I wish I had a calibration tool with me so I can just calibrate it how it should be, but sadly where I am from the stores don't sell Calibration tools for monitors and there is no such service for one either, so I can't do any of it but to just eye-ball what feels right.
The RED on the monitor really gets screwd over and sometimes shows as PINK So I try to calibrate it enough where the RED is RED and other colors also match to what they should be, again comparing to my Iphone for reference as well just to double check.

Thank you a lot for the answer though, I wish I had calibration tool to take advantage of my monitor even more!

 

[hotaru.hino]

Hey, so I've read what you said and while I am happy with the performance of my monitor that I have, sometimes I feel like the colors are better on my TN secondary monitor.
I am using Racing Mode for my main monitor to even get close to what I think is accurate, reference being my TN monitor but mostly my Iphone actually, as I know the Iphone has decent colors so I really try to eye-ball it when I calibrate it via windows.
BUT I wish I had a calibration tool with me so I can just calibrate it how it should be, but sadly where I am from the stores don't sell Calibration tools for monitors and there is no such service for one either, so I can't do any of it but to just eye-ball what feels right.
The RED on the monitor really gets screwd over and sometimes shows as PINK So I try to calibrate it enough where the RED is RED and other colors also match to what they should be, again comparing to my Iphone for reference as well just to double check.

Thank you a lot for the answer though, I wish I had calibration tool to take advantage of my monitor even more!

Amazon sells them. Can't speak for this product but it came up in my search: https://www.amazon.com/Datacolor-SpyderX-Pro-Calibration-Photographers/dp/B07M6KPJ9K/?th=1