ASRock Phantom Gaming PG34WQ15R3A

[Tahagomizer]

Could you expand on that a bit? What dark secret did you mean and why OLED is a bad and wasteful experience for those who work on them?

Burn-in. I had a Thinkpad X1 with an OLED screen a few years ago and after just two months of my typical usage (10+ hours a day of mostly static elements and no care given to turning the screen off when I do something else) I could see Spyder interface on everything. One might argue that those early screens were low quality since Lenovo quickly discontinued them, but I had a Thinkpad P1 in 2020 with an OLED screen and after just a few months it had the exact same problem. I get why manufacturers might like OLED as it has built-in planned obsolescence, but for me it's a hard pass. They also use a lot of power and get hot. And are very expensive.

 

[Od1sseas]

It is not 2015 anymore. My FV43U is VA and it fine at everything including Ghosting.

u probably never seen ips or oled

 

[Kapone33]

u probably never seen ips or oled

I see well my Qnix 27" was an IPS monitor. I am not interested in OLED due to power draw. The reason I got this monitor was the black levels and new VA panel.

 

[95Viper]

Please stay on topic.
The topic is about the "ASRock Phantom Gaming PG34WQ15R3A" monitor.

 

[Post Nut Clairvoyance]

Presumably "Phantom Gaming" is a high-end produce line of Acer in the same vein with ROG and AORUS?
Because I ain't seeing that in this product here. And mini-OLED decor is...inflammatory?

Wonder if Samsung uses some sesiously powerful chipset to achieve its VA tune, coz nobody else seem to have similar tech, or if VA remains relegated all this time. Seems that tuning for a larger (>24'') VA is a difficult task.
Shame as a tuned VA would have significantly better contrast whilst remaining RGB, and as durable as TN and IPS.
Had a 144hz GN24C, and it had geniuely good enough response time, just annoyed by the curvature given the aspect ratio and small size. I suppose when deal with sub 200$ products, IPS bloom/contrast is acceptable trade off and is an economical solution.

For non-gamers, it's not an issue. For gamers, depending on an exact panel and gaming scenario. Premium VA panels are still better than entry level IPS ones.
... ...

Now this argument is completely subjective and personal because due to head traumas, I see colours differently. VA colours are nicer for me than the IPS ones. Unrelatable to a normal person.

The first point seems invalid, more $ more better...

I'm not sure if the last point has anything to do with head trauma, typically VA produce higher contrast images v. IPS, you may prefer just this.

OLED's inherent issues seems unsolvable for scale production at this point, I await microLED marketisation breakthrough in 10 or 20 years time.
In the meantime, current monitors will have to do, even if my 6.7'' phone OLED screen produce better image than my 27'' IPS.

 

[Macro Device]

The first point seems invalid, more $ more better...

Equally priced, VA is worse in terms of speed, and is better in terms of contrast. And the difference is usually justifying IPS, yet not destroying VA completely. I'm not saying VA is on par or even superior, I'm telling it's not K.O.

I'm not sure if the last point has anything to do with head trauma

And I'm sure it has. I had way less allergy to IPS before hitting my head with a truck.

 

[S73fan]

I think there are few monitor reviews on the site. I would love to have more

 

[Wye]

If you can spend thousands of dollars on your PC, you care about network latency and speed, but you are unable to bring an ethernet cable to your PC, then you are a moron!

 

[Tek-Check]

Thanks for the review.
This is 8-bit panel, so it cannot do wide colour gamut properly and it's not as bright either. VESA's "DisplayHDR 400" certification is a completely fake HDR. In other words, no real HDR. It's a merketing gimmick and VESA should have scrapped it a long time ago....

When you see a monitor for ~€500 with "DisplayHDR 400" label, run away from it like Dracula from garlic. It's a waste of time and this price point requires monitor vendors to offer DisplayHDR 600 as bare minimum in 2023, if not 10-bit panel too.

If you can spend thousands of dollars on your PC, you care about network latency and speed, but you are unable to bring an ethernet cable to your PC, then you are a moron!

Dude, what is this about? Are you barking on stars?

 

[Kapone33]

I expect that this monitor (As rock) will be better than people expect as Samsung has advanced VA technology to rival IPS in colour depth. The price is also nice for what you get. The only thing for me to not recommend it would be the 3400x1440 resolution. I have a huge library and would worry about some older Games I like to play not supporting that resolution but it should be fine for modern Games. I am sure a 6700XT, 4070 would be the sweet spot for this. I would not go higher than a 6800/3080 though. The specs are not good enough to justify using with a GPU that costs more than the monitor.

 

[djbpresentz]

Ok for one this review is wrong on so many levels go read any other really, I just got this monitor it is awesome also have a ,C1. Hdr is very noticable and one best I've seen at this price point hitting 530isg nits def adds to the game

Seriously disregard this review go read tweak towns this monitor punches way above it's price point, no ghosting awesome hdr it's just great

 

[Chrispy_]

Ok for one this review is wrong on so many levels go read any other really, I just got this monitor it is awesome also have a ,C1. Hdr is very noticable and one best I've seen at this price point hitting 530isg nits def adds to the game

Seriously disregard this review go read tweak towns this monitor punches way above it's price point, no ghosting awesome hdr it's just great

It sounds like they've fixed the firmware if you get no ghosting - since that's a major and completely inexcusable flaw with the monitor reviewed here and would show as massive black smears on the default pursuit camera test (https://www.testufo.com/ghosting)

Since the firmware isn't user-flashable, this is a very important point - you could easily spend >$400 on something completely unusable for gaming with your only course of action to send it off to Asrock to get the firmware updated which is often difficult for such a large item since post offices and local courier drop-off locations usually have size restrictions - and even then you're without a monitor for 2-4 weeks.

A $430 1440p 165Hz ultrawide with decent motion response certainly is a bargain, but unless you can guarantee that you're getting one with smear-free updated firmware, returning it for firmware updates is a logistical and time-wasting nightmare easily avoided by simply buying a different model that's guaranteed to be decent out of the box. If you like to gamble and you have a backup monitor, then this definitely looks like a great offering - but most people do care about those caveats.