Question My head is about to explode: can't decide between these 2 displays

[vwcrusher]

Based on excellent advice on this forum, I have narrowed my choice for a curved 27" p1440 144Hz display to be used for gaming (Star Citizen mostly) as well as photo editing (non professional).

They are: Dell S2722DGM and Asus VG27WQ1B

I have been going over reviews both professional and user, and I am stuck. They are both in the same price ball park. Comparing results from Rtings, PC Benchmark, Display Ninja and a few others, they stack up nearly identical.

I hope there is a characteristic that I missed or aren't aware of that you can point out to me to be the tie breaker.

Below is my system configuration:
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3700X 3.6 GHz 8-Core Processor
MB: Asus TUF GAMING X570-PLUS ATX AM4
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16
PSU: SeaSonic FOCUS Plus 650 Gold 650 W 80+ Gold Certified
GPU: EVGA FTW2 GAMING iCX GeForce GTX 1070 Ti 8 GB

Thanks very much.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

Feel free to look at the breakdown of each on RTINGS and decide which ultimately has the better pros vs cons for your needs

Dell S2722DGM Review

The Dell S2722DGM is a good 27 inch, 1440p monitor with a VA panel. It's a good monitor with very good contrast, excellent gray uniformity, and a superb SDR colo...

www.rtings.com

ASUS TUF Gaming VG27WQ1B Review

The ASUS TUF Gaming VG27WQ1B is a great gaming monitor. It's packed with features most gamers should enjoy, like FreeSync variable refresh rate (VRR) support and...

www.rtings.com

But comparing those two directly head to head I would ultimately say the Dell isn't worth it over the ASUS due to image quality issues with things like blacks and viewing angles.

I would greatly urge you to forget about curved. it literally does nothing for you that is positive. it's just a selling gimmick more than anything and will greatly limit the options you have for displays causing you to sacrifice a greater quality display that may even cost less just for the aesthetic of it being slightly curved.
Curved only matters practically on a much larger display such as a giant TV where you can sit closer to it and the curve helps to put the edges of the screen in your peripheral vision better, on a small display on a desk it's useless.
Makes slightly more sense on an ultrawide, but only if it's large enough in size
-
With that said though, if you don't care and want the aesthetic 100%, that's your choice, and I would at still say comparing those two against each other, the ASUS is better than the Dell overall.

 

[vwcrusher]

Feel free to look at the breakdown of each on RTINGS and decide which ultimately has the better pros vs cons for your needs

Dell S2722DGM Review

The Dell S2722DGM is a good 27 inch, 1440p monitor with a VA panel. It's a good monitor with very good contrast, excellent gray uniformity, and a superb SDR colo...

www.rtings.com

ASUS TUF Gaming VG27WQ1B Review

The ASUS TUF Gaming VG27WQ1B is a great gaming monitor. It's packed with features most gamers should enjoy, like FreeSync variable refresh rate (VRR) support and...

www.rtings.com

But comparing those two directly head to head I would ultimately say the Dell isn't worth it over the ASUS due to image quality issues with things like blacks and viewing angles.

I would greatly urge you to forget about curved. it literally does nothing for you that is positive. it's just a selling gimmick more than anything and will greatly limit the options you have for displays causing you to sacrifice a greater quality display that may even cost less just for the aesthetic of it being slightly curved.
Curved only matters practically on a much larger display such as a giant TV where you can sit closer to it and the curve helps to put the edges of the screen in your peripheral vision better, on a small display on a desk it's useless.
Makes slightly more sense on an ultrawide, but only if it's large enough in size
-
With that said though, if you don't care and want the aesthetic 100%, that's your choice, and I would at still say comparing those two against each other, the ASUS is better than the Dell overall.

Thank you for the reply...hmm. Ok, your logic does make sense. My original search actually included flat panel as well, but similar difficulties in deciding. If I may below are my top choices and I would appreciate your thoughts and perhaps guidance.

LG 27GL83A-B
Gigabyte M27Q
MSI G274QPF-QD
ASUS VG27AQ
And any that you feel I might have missed.

Again, I truly appreciate the help.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

Thank you for the reply...hmm. Ok, your logic does make sense. My original search actually included flat panel as well, but similar difficulties in deciding. If I may below are my top choices and I would appreciate your thoughts and perhaps guidance.

LG 27GL83A-B
Gigabyte M27Q
MSI G274QPF-QD
ASUS VG27AQ
And any that you feel I might have missed.

Again, I truly appreciate the help.

I can see you are attempting to stay around the $300 mark with these options.

I personally have an Acer model of my own as my current display and I love it.

Here's my exact model. It has great picture quality and doesn't break the bank.
Has the resolution and size you are looking for.
Has pretty good out of the box color accuracy which will help with your photo editing.

Acer Nitro XV272U KVbmiiprzx Review

The Acer Nitro XV272U KVbmiiprzx is an excellent 1440p gaming monitor. It uses an IPS panel with wide viewing angles, and it has excellent ergonomics, meaning yo...

www.rtings.com

Normally it's $300 but right now it's on sale for $250

Amazon.com

Some things to note about it, I recommend enabling the "HDR" mode in the OSD (it's not really an HDR monitor even though it says it is and it technically supports HDR, however it's the most basic of HDR like HDR400 which sucks lol, but it makes the blacks darker, the screen brighter for more contrast, and colors pop. great for content like games and movies etc.)
Is FreeSync, but is guaranteed G-Sync compatible.
It supposedly supports up to 170hz with an overclocking option but I don't recommend that. stick to the standard 144hz for better image and compatibility (for avoiding things like pixel overdrive/ghosting)
If you do buy it with the discount you could use the saved money to get a VESA mount for it if you don't already have one. VESA mounts for monitors are the way to go bro.
VIVO is a good option on Amazon for anywhere from $35 to $50 depending on the mount.

VIVO: Monitor Mounts

Monitor Mounts and Stands

www.amazon.com

 

[vwcrusher]

Thanks for the recommendation; is the monitor you suggested the Acer Nitro XV272U V or Acer Nitro XV272U KV? I believe the former is $250, while the latter is $336. Are any of the displays I listed a consideration?

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

Thanks for the recommendation; is the monitor you suggested the Acer Nitro XV272U V or Acer Nitro XV272U KV? I believe the former is $250, while the latter is $336. Are any of the displays I listed a consideration?

Sorry for the late reply, I looked up the specs of the KV model and don't see any difference. I would just stick with the cheaper one since it's cheaper and I can personally vouch for it.
I think it might just be that the KV is the older original model and the VB is it's newer replacement variant.
Specs are the same from what I can see.
I fixed the broken link to RTINGS for the monitor btw.

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

as for the other monitors you listed they are all basically the same deal. mediocre mid grade visuals across the board with honestly lesser quality panels for the sake of keeping things cheap while having high refresh rates but they also come with a very in your face "gamer" look to them which you may or may not care about.
In my opinion not worth spending the money on when the panel on the Acer is in general just better and is currently on discount for cheaper and the monitor itself doesn't force a specific visual gamer look from one of the brands on you so it can fit in better with any other peripherals you have.
If you want though, just look up those other models on RTINGS and see the overall scores in each category for them and see the breakdowns of the pros and cons to first determine quality/performance then let aesthetic be a secondary deciding factor.

 

[vwcrusher]

Sorry for the late reply, I looked up the specs of the KV model and don't see any difference. I would just stick with the cheaper one since it's cheaper and I can personally vouch for it.

Thanks for the reply.
After lots of hours researching, comparing, watching videos I think I have two strong finalist, but I would appreciate your perspective.

The Asus VG 27AQ and the LG 27GL83a-b.

I have considered the following given my requirements (gaming and some photo editing); I do have a very nice BenQ 2420-PT as a second monitor for editing if needed. Anyway here are the monitors that I considered for your review and comment:

LG 27GL850, Gigabyte G274QRF-QD, Gigabyte M27Q and M27Q-Pro, and AsusVG27AQ1B among others. I did research a few in the $350 range, and found they were not that much better than those lower in cost.

Again, thanks for getting back to me....

 

[vwcrusher]

Oh, so you feel that I will get the same performance from the Acer you recommended, including photo editing and gaming as any of the ones I researched and came up with? Unfortunately, Rtings does not seem to have a rating for the -V, just the -KV.

What do you mean by visual gamer look?

 

[QwerkyPengwen]

Oh, so you feel that I will get the same performance from the Acer you recommended, including photo editing and gaming as any of the ones I researched and came up with? Unfortunately, Rtings does not seem to have a rating for the -V, just the -KV.

What do you mean by visual gamer look?

The K variant is the same monitor and just has an extra letter.
My guess is it's just the original release model with a more predator looking bezel.
The "gamer" aesthetic comes from it's shapes, colors, angular designs of the monitor casing, bezels, logos, and stands.
Doesn't look like a generic office monitor, and instead tries to have a "high tech" or "futuristic" look to it.
i.e. the "gamer" look.
Things like sometimes having a chrome like accent on things that's just a cheap aluminum or sometimes a cheap plastic made to look like aluminum.
That's all I mean by the gamer look, and each monitor brand has their own styles they go for.

Just go with whatever you feel you want for the monitor.
I've given you my personal choice which is based entirely on my own personal experience with it as well as being 100% mindful of bang for the buck because what I get for my money means a lot to me, and I care more for function than form when it comes to my wallet.
If you would prefer to get a different monitor for your own reasons that is entirely your choice since it's your money. You buy what you want to buy.

All of these monitors in this price bracket are all basically the same with pros and cons/gives and takes in different areas but averaging overall to be the same as one another in terms of a more generalized "quality". I simply offered the Acer because I have experience with it and can vouch for it's quality, and it just so happens to be on sale so you save money which as I already stated means more to me personally.
So just pick whatever you personally "feel" is going to be the monitor for you whether it's because of brand loyalties, the way the base stand/bezels look, or some other reason.

Only thing that matters is that you just make a choice instead of wasting time wondering about all the what ifs so you can get to enjoying the upgrade sooner rather than later. You're going to make compromises for any one of these monitors in some way or another because of the budget so there's no point really fretting too much over any of it.