AOC Q27G3XMN 27" 2K QHD Gaming Monitor, 2560x1440, Mini LED, 180Hz, HDMI 2.0 x 1, DisplayPort 1.4 x1, Adaptive Sync, Xbox/PS5/Switch Ready, 3-Year Zero-Bright-dot

Summary: Easily a 9.5/10 monitor for media consumption and gaming. After some time calibrating the colors through AMD's Adrenalin and in Windows' Color Management, I am wholly satisfied with the image quality, color accuracy, and sharpness... At least in the middle of the screen.I am likely going to return it because it just doesn't suit me well for content creation due to the frankly abysmal viewing angles. While I was aware that VA monitor panels had viewing angle issues, I hadn't expected it to be noticeable even from a straight-on view from 2 feet away. Still, I'll give it another week to decide and will edit this review accordingly. Edit: After an odyssey of shopping around and getting broken monitors and monitors with dead pixels out the box, I have decided to stick with this one.I will still give this five stars, however, because it really has been a vast improvement over my previous Asus PA278QV ProArt monitor in clarity and colors, and the bump up from 75hz to 180hz gaming has been quite the joy. My problems feel largely like a "me" problem rather than a fault of the monitor itself. I will be trying my luck with a Dell G2724D (assuming it's in still in stock in a few days) despite its significantly worse contrast ratios and lack of Mini LED backlighting.Detailed Review:From unboxing to using, this has been a fantastic monitor when disregarding the one caveat from earlier. The packaging is absolutely solid and there's almost zero chance to receive a damaged unit with how well it's been bundled up in styrofoam. The unit itself is a bit thicker than I'd like, making it impossible to mount my monitor light to the top, but overall that's a non-issue. The plastic shell of the monitor and stand feels sturdy, while the bezel is good enough.The base is a tad too large for my desk setup, so I mounted it on a VESA arm, a tremendously easy and pain-free process with its standard 100x100mm layout. From what I did see when I first tested that the monitor would turn on, the base/stand is a fantastic ergonomic setup, with good height adjustment, swivel, tilt, and rotation, and installation is made easy with a simple push button latch and thumb screw.The monitor's On Screen Display is an almost too simple affair, adjusting RGB and switching between various picture modes is easy enough. However, I sincerely wish image sharpness was adjustable, as the sharpness in the monitor's HDR mode is noticeably better than in its normal mode, but switching into HDR locks you out of any color or gamma adjustment. And, speaking of gamma adjustment, the monitor only has three presets, without a finer control. Notably also missing is the ability to adjust color temperature, which is fine since both nVidia and AMD graphics cards allow this to be easily adjusted. The OSD control buttons are on the bottom right of the screen and aren't anything to write home about as a positive or negative.Taking it for a spin in a few games, I earnestly have no complaints and nothing but praise here. The EXTREMELY good contrast ratios of the monitor prove to be quite a boon in the likes of R.E.P.O. and even on darker planets in Helldivers 2 or fighting in dark space in Elite: Dangerous, while the 180hz display, tremendously sharp image, and overdrive settings make motion buttery smooth in the likes of, Monster Hunter Wilds (Frame Gen to 144 fps), Elden Ring (played at an unlocked 120 fps), Strinova (180 fps), and Valorant (180 fps).Movies and TV shows are a similar joy. Great contrast ratios, very sharp images thanks to the mini LED backlighting, and excellent post-calibration color accuracy make the viewing experience fantastic.However... On to the part where I have difficulty sticking with this monitor.In my week and some days of using it I've found that I have to either physically move my head, tilt my neck, or even lean side to side, every now and then because I can't trust the color accuracy toward the edges. If it were a matter of me sitting too close to the monitor I'd chalk it up to user error, but even sitting about 60cm/2 feet away from the monitor, I find the color shifts red/yellow toward the corners.In gaming content and watching movies it's completely unnoticeable, but for static images it's frankly unacceptable for my use case. In office content or web browsing, or even looking at a Discord window sitting at the corner, it ends up color shifting. You can see the colors shift red in my included photos.I'm an artist, image editor, and 3D environment modeler, and while one could say to just move everything to the center of the screen, I find myself asking if having that excellent 4000+:1 contrast ratio and sharp mini-LED image are worth not always being able to trust if my eyes are seeing the right colors, double checking, then repeating that question every time I work with anything involving color. Frankly, it's even annoying at times when the contrast washes out at the edges of my screen just reading webpages.So, that's the bit. Excellent gaming monitor and generally great movie watching monitor, but a bit irksome for me.

I just built a new gaming PC and realized that to get the most out of my new RTS 5070 I would need an HDR monitor with at least a 120Hz refresh rate. I was delighted at first to find so many options in the $150-200 range that claimed to support HDR, however just because a TV or monitor can decode HDR it doesn't mean it can actually display it. This is likely the reason so many people dislike HDR, they're used to the cheapest HDR capable TV or monitor showing washed out grey images. This monitor is advertised as being 1000 nits, but in practice it's actually putting out 1100.I've never seen such gorgeous and breathtaking graphics as I have on this monitor. Sure you could spend a thousand and something even nicer, but for the price, this is a true HDR experience. The 180Hz FreeSync works beautifully too.As for how easy it is to setup, there is no setup aside from making sure you run the proper HDR calibration for your games or if you're using Windows Auto-HDR, make sure to install and run the Windows HDR calibration tool, otherwise you'll just get a dull grey washed out display.The 27" display is a great upgrade from my old 24" monitor, it scales well for pixel density as that old monitor was 1080p and this one is 1440p, so the pixels are much denser. The pixel pattern is a great cross hatched pattern, if you zoom in on my attached photo (yes that's a photo not a screenshot), you might be able to see it.As for durability, it has a pretty thick bezel, and if that's the only trade off for such an amazing price, so be it, it does mean that this thing is going to stand up to a bit of abuse.I was actually floored at the warranty info, firstly they offer advanced replacement, so you're not stick without a monitor, they send you a replacement first, the three year limited warranty also includes dead pixels which is something a lot of manufacturers won't cover. But the real jaw dropping coverage is 1 year replacements for accidental damage, drop it getting it out of the box, they'll send you a new one. Did your cat knock it over, new monitor. I'm sure you'll have to pay shipping but that's quite the coverage. I do highly recommend that you use a VESA mount arm for this thing, I use one that goes through the table and clamps from below, there's no way to knock this thing over.Overall, you can't get a better gaming monitor for this price, the next closest that's a little worse than this one is $600. There's a reason this is the RTINGS.com pick for best budget HDR monitor. Definitely go with this one if you want the absolute best bang for your buck.