So I have made my decision. Wait for IPS overclockable Gsync

[whitespider]

So after testing out gsync on the vg248qe for three hours at a friends place. I finally know what gsync is like. Firstly, I cannot tolerate the vg248qe. I'll mention again that I developed neurological issues more than a year ago out of the blue that affect my eyesight. And that probably factors in. My ips screen, the original Catleap 2b. Overclocks to 132hz without color degradation or brightness sacrifice. And it's picture quality is a 7/10 for an ips screen. While my 2560x1440, dell u2711 screen has a 10/10 picture - however the responsiveness is terrible. Whereas the catleap 2b, feels only like a 5% responsiveness degradation when compared to the vg248qe. When comparing the vg248qe to the catleap 2b, resolution aside and gsync aside, I found that the picture quality of the vg248qe was a 1/10 in comparison - and a 4/10 compared to other TN monitors. It destroys much detail. For example, I could barely see the difference between medium and ultra in watch dogs or assassins creed black flag. This is mostly due to a lot of texture detail and color grading is obviously made on higher quality screen than a low end TN. Watch dogs always looked bleached, with fluorescent colors. The detail of the textures was significantly reduced. The depth of the scene was also significantly reduced. It looked like a previous generation game. Whereas on the IPS screen. It looked better with all settings set to low, at 1280x720p (Although it's a 2560x1440 monitor). The difference in picture quality is insane.

So my decision is NOT to get any kind of TN panel unless the ROG Swift (PG278Q) manages to have a 5 or 6/10 picture quality when compared with the Catleap 2b. In other words, if the ROG Swift looks like a poor mans IPS or PLS. Then i'll be getting that. However if it looks more like the vg248qe. Forget it. The vg248qe is the ugliest picture quality on a panel that I have ever seen in my life. Bar none. My black and white antique CRT tv from the 1970's sitting in the garage looks significantly better.

That means, I'll unfortunately probably be waiting for IPS. Because the chances of the ROG swift looking like a IPS with bad viewing angles is LOW.

Ok onto gsync.

Mixed impressions. Is the technology a revolution? Absolutely. However some of my favorite games require some serious tweaking in order to get gsync running well on them. Skyrim, my favorite game, actually does seem to benefit from gsync despite some people saying otherwise (just need to make sure ipresentinterval is turned off, and gsync is enabled). Sure, it still stutters. But it no longer microstutters. Fallout 3 and oblivion are the same way. In fact, no games that I tested had any kind of microstutter anymore. All that was left was engine stutter. Microstutter was completely gone.

50fps looked like 50fps, 100fps looked like 100fps. And so on. This is not the case with vsync_off + high refresh.

The downside falls in line with what others have been saying, engine stutters become more apparent, due to microstutter vanishing. Games like deus ex, skyrim, fallout, watch dogs, and many others have a lot of engine stutter. So you need to drop settings in order to avoid that. However in every case I was able to tweak back settings until engine stutter became either less of an issue or no issue.

However this to some people, that got gsync as a way of raising every graphics setting available, might be a downside. I have noticed that setting anti aliasing to the highest does not affect engine stutter. Whereas things like texture quality and HBAO, physx effects, and the like, often do. Except in borderlands 2, which seems to manage physx without stuttering at all. While many people seem to think that gsync is a perfect fit for 4k. There will be an issue with vram. Since vram running out on 3gb cards is very likely on the most modern games. And that causes severe engine stuttering that gsync cannot fix. 6gb cards would be recommended with that situation.

And if watch dogs is any indication of vram usage in 2015, then perhaps we will all be needing 12gb cards at 4k.

Honestly, in my biased opinion, I think that 2560x1440 overclockable ips monitors with gsync are pretty much the ideal thing to have for anyone into general gaming rather than competitive for the next 5 years.

[Edmond]

I dont blame you. I agree, and have mustered up the con ... onitor/630
Dont tell me you rather cut away the sides of those pics till their 16:9.

If its a 2560x1080 - good. If its 3440x1440 - awsome and its only 33% more pixels than a 1440p16:9, so u dont need double digit vram. 4k in my opinion is just a waste of time right now.

Oh, and that wider fov in fps games makes the game immersive for me instead of straining my eyes like the narrow fov does.


Regarding the engine stutter.

Much rather feel the engine loading something from time to time than live with microstutters in every second or whatever.

Also, since engine stutters will be visible now - it means that for the future game devs will need to do the proper work on their game before releasing it.. u know, something companies like Valve and ID have done always. No engine stutter in any of their games.

[PoWn3d_0704]

AH. 21:9 IPS that is 3440x1440 and GSync with 144hz is pretty much the holy grail isnt it?

Man.

[whitespider]

I would be happy with IPS + 2560x1440 + 120hz + Gsync

And i already have all of those besides gsync.

[omgBlur]

Hearing the opinion from one side of the fence is interesting, here's from the other.

I understand that those with neurological issues have a different opinion and view on this, but I wanted to give you a heads up before reading.


So the "holy grail" of sacred monitors seems to be (I could also be missing stuff so feel free to add your own details as this is a generalization from most of the comments)

• 1440p
• G-Sync/FreeSync
• IPS
• 21:9
• 144Hz
• Fast 1ms Response
• Strobing/Lightboost

(In my opinion)Given as this monitor will likely either never come out or once the technology catches up in who knows when, I decided I'm going to become an early adopter. Granted I do have the option to wait out a year more and see what'll happen when we actually have G-Sync and FreeSync monitors on the market, but I'm currently set up for the next best thing already.

My computer is using a 4670k, 8GB RAM, and a GTX 780 SC from EVGA. All this is running on a 23' Samsung SyncMaster from 2009. It's a 1080p, 1ms, 60Hz monitor and everything I've thrown at this rig (AAA titles and older games) runs beautiful on high/ultra settings. Prior to this computer I was using a 27' iMac from 2011 and those have a LG IPS Panel so I was spoiled by the high quality for a few years. Stepping down was uncomfortable at first, but I got use to it as I decided to wait it out for the PG278Q.

I have a buddy who has a VG248QE and after much discussion, decided to get the G-Sync kit. That was my first experience with G-Sync back in January and it was an amazing one. I appreciated the smooth visuals on my computer when I could turn V-Sync on and the graphics card could handle the constant 60 FPS, but this was buttery smooth. For a single gaming monitor set up, this display was great. I know it's nothing compared to an IPS panel, but having that added G-Sync benefit was spectacular.

I have withheld beating certain games (Metro: Last Light, Saints Row 4 just to name some) which I think is the most extreme thing I've ever done for my gaming hobby, but coming July-August I'm going to (hopefully) be a very happy gamer.

[flood]

• IPS
• Fast 1ms Response

pick one

[whitespider]

IPS

[Edmond]

• IPS
• Fast 1ms Response

pick one

1ms is a marketing gimmick. Its 1ms GTG for tn`s. And rest of the colors have slower times.
It doesnt even matter anymore imo. If its a quality panel the response time will be the lowest it can comfortably be for that type of panel. And if its not in double digits its high end level.

Given as this monitor will likely either never come out or once the technology catches up in who knows when

Ill just take a break till a 21:9 ips gsync comes out.
I aint waiting forever for the lolmonitor of the century, but i think i can do a reasonable wait to get something so comfortable that i can stay with it for the next 10 years.

Sidenote:
In the next few years we are supposed to start getting oled monitors. Only then we shall get ips colors with tn speed. Screw tn actually... oled`s response times are 0.01ms for all color shifts. and it can comfortably do refresh rates up to 1000hz. (that aint happening, but we could hope for 240hz)

[Chief Blur Buster]

1ms is a marketing gimmick. Its 1ms GTG for tn`s. And rest of the colors have slower times.
It doesnt even matter anymore imo.

It actually matters a lot during motion blur reduction strobing (e.g. LightBoost, Turbo240, ULMB, BENQ Blur Reduction). Faster pixel response = less strobe crosstalk. You're essentially trying to compress GtG into the time period of a blanking interval between refresh cycles. Everytime you turn off the backlight during strobe, you only have that much time to finish GtG in total darkness (to hide the GtG transitions from human eye), before the backlight turns back on after the next refresh cycle. So 1ms vs 2ms makes a hugely massive difference during strobing -- it means the difference between strong strobe crosstalk and faint strobe crosstalk.

Also, persistence (pixel static state) in milliseconds is different from GtG (pixel movement from grey to grey) in milliseconds, so 1ms persistence is always better than 1ms GtG, since persistence is the cause of motion blur, not GtG alone. I wish more manufacturers would measure monitors in persistence, rather than in GtG.

The GtG of IPS is too slow to be compressed in the time period of a blanking interval, that's why you still don't see any strobed IPS yet.

Mind you, during non-strobed situations, 1ms is usually a gimmick, though.

[RealNC]

Mind you, during non-strobed situations, 1ms is usually a gimmick, though.

I thought high GtG times result in too much ghosting.