Gigabyte M34WQ Monitor

[Inle]

The Gigabyte M34WQ is a $500 34-inch ultrawide gaming monitor with advanced productivity-focused features. It tries to combine the best of both worlds, and in many ways, it does.

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[Chaitanya]

So overall a decent display and power consumption figures are quite promising.

 

[Chomiq]

Availability is extremely poor (to the point that some stores list it as discontinued), which in today's market means that when it's available its price is inflated (€608 in Poland vs €538 in Germany). If it wasn't for that I'd be all in it as a potential update from my 1080p screen.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Availability is extremely poor (to the point that some stores list it as discontinued), which in today's market means that when it's available its price is inflated (€608 in Poland vs €538 in Germany). If it wasn't for that I'd be all in it as a potential update from my 1080p screen.

Almost every computer shop in Taiwan has it in stock, for pretty much the US retail price plus VAT.
I know, it doesn't help you, but hey.

 

[Chomiq]

Almost every computer shop in Taiwan has it in stock, for pretty much the US retail price plus VAT.

Here it's in stock in 1 store. Germany - 9 stores within the €539 price range. UK - 639 GBP at amazon.

Funniest thing is that x-kom, Polish micro(more like nano)center, has M34WQ listed as discontinued, but their German branch has them in stock for €539 (but they don't ship to Poland, which is crazy since they are obviously paying taxes in Poland so VAT EU is not a problem).

Normally I wouldn't mind ordering something from Germany but I prefer to have hassle free returns for a display I purchase.

 

[Chrispy_]

I agree about the "too big to be flat" comments.

I used to use a 32" flat panel and at normal viewing distances, the change in viewing angle between the center and the corners was ridiculous. I personally don't have the issue, but many suffer from eye fatigue caused by constant focal depth changes when viewing a flat panel up close for this reason.

27-30" is about as big as I think is reasonable for a flat panel, and the 30.5" models are already sub-optimal unless you sit back a bit further than usual.

 

[Inle]

I agree about the "too big to be flat" comments.

I used to use a 32" flat panel and at normal viewing distances, the change in viewing angle between the center and the corners was ridiculous. I personally don't have the issue, but many suffer from eye fatigue caused by constant focal depth changes when viewing a flat panel up close for this reason.

27-30" is about as big as I think is reasonable for a flat panel, and the 30.5" models are already sub-optimal unless you sit back a bit further than usual.

I'm currently working on a 40" flat ultrawide (review coming soon). I'm loving the screen size but the flatness is... challenging. It still bothers me after two full weeks of using it as my daily driver. At this point I wonder if I'll ever get used to it.

 

[TheLostSwede]

Here it's in stock in 1 store. Germany - 9 stores within the €539 price range. UK - 639 GBP at amazon.

Funniest thing is that x-kom, Polish micro(more like nano)center, has M34WQ listed as discontinued, but their German branch has them in stock for €539 (but they don't ship to Poland, which is crazy since they are obviously paying taxes in Poland so VAT EU is not a problem).

Normally I wouldn't mind ordering something from Germany but I prefer to have hassle free returns for a display I purchase.

You aren't wrong.

GIGABYTE M34WQ ab € 411,00 (2024) | Preisvergleich Geizhals EU

✔ Preisvergleich für GIGABYTE M34WQ ✔ Bewertungen ✔ Produktinfo ⇒ Funktion: Monitor (stationär) • Diagonale: 34" (86.4cm), Klasse: 33"-34" • Auflösung: 3440x1440 (UWQHD), … ✔ Monitore ✔ Testberichte ✔ Günstig kaufen

geizhals.eu

 

[Makaveli]

Once you go Ultrawide its hard to go back I did this change myself last November.

this Gigabyte monitor is a good price I however prefer a 1900R curve display over flat at 34"

 

[Chrispy_]

I'm currently working on a 40" flat ultrawide (review coming soon). I'm loving the screen size but the flatness is... challenging. It still bothers me after two full weeks of using it as my daily driver. At this point I wonder if I'll ever get used to it.

You want to move it further away and dial up the UI scaling if you struggle for much longer. That obviously has the side effect of reducing effective real estate

People often think they can treat one large 4K screen the same as a 2x2 array of 1080p screens, but with the benefits of no bezels interrupting the image. The thing is, with a 2x2 array everyone, and I mean everyone will angle the screens towards themselves without even thinking about it. They do it because it's just obviously better, even if they don't understand the technical reasons about focal depth fatigue, viewing angle deviations etc. It's 100% instinctive.

Once a display fills up more than about 30-35% of your field of view - whether that's a 65" screen 6 feet away from you, or a 27" screen just behind your keyboard, you'll want it to be curved for the same reason that people want to sit in the middle of a row of seats when in a movie theatre rather than the far ends, or that when you're reading a book you tilt it towards your face. Not only is it extra effort constantly changing focal depth, it's also a distorted image. The wider the flat surface is in your FOV, the more the image is distorted and the harder your brain will find accepting it. If it's a VA panel you will also get colour shift at off-angle viewing and IPS "corner glow" starts on some panels at as little as 15 degrees.

In an ideal world, you'd be able to get a large monitors with an aggressive curve radius that matched the viewing distance, and games would come with spherical or cylindrical projection mapping. As it stands, we don't have that, and the more limited curve radius of gaming monitors coupled with flat projection in games is a good enough compromise for now.

 

[TheUn4seen]

I agree about the "too big to be flat" comments.

I used to use a 32" flat panel and at normal viewing distances, the change in viewing angle between the center and the corners was ridiculous. I personally don't have the issue, but many suffer from eye fatigue caused by constant focal depth changes when viewing a flat panel up close for this reason.

27-30" is about as big as I think is reasonable for a flat panel, and the 30.5" models are already sub-optimal unless you sit back a bit further than usual.

This seems like a very personal thing. I use a 43" flat display, sit very close to it (I just measured the distance at ~55cm) and I use it for at least 8-10 hours a day. My previous screen was 40" which replaced a 30". I never felt any kind of fatigue or eyestrain, and my time with a curved screen ended with a headache due to "weird" and unexpected geometry - surely an issue of getting accustomed to one, but I also did not notice any advantage of the curvature.

Once you go Ultrawide its hard to go back I did this change myself last November.

this Gigabyte monitor is a good price I however prefer a 1900R curve display over flat at 34"

I never understood the allure of ultrawide screens. It's just 16:9 with less pixels and therefore less working area. Personally I'd much rather use something like 3840x3200, if such a device was available.

 

[Chrispy_]

This seems like a very personal thing. I use a 43" flat display, sit very close to it (I just measured the distance at ~55cm) and I use it for at least 8-10 hours a day. My previous screen was 40" which replaced a 30". I never felt any kind of fatigue or eyestrain, and my time with a curved screen ended with a headache due to "weird" and unexpected geometry - surely an issue of getting accustomed to one, but I also did not notice any advantage of the curvature.

Like you I'm lucky enough to not suffer any kind of focal fatigue, but I'm very aware that others do. It's definitely something that degenerates with age but for the most part it's genetic luck.

Games in particular use a flat projection map which is wrong, but looks pretty reasonable on a flat display provided the FOV isn't too high. On an ultrawide 21:9 screen in games where the FOV is set vertically rather than horzontally, the amount of distortion at the far edges is horrendous.

There is no perfect solution for mapping a 3D environment onto multiple aspect ratios and multiple display curvatures. For the most part, I think FOV and projection mapping is optimised for 16:9 flat displays so the trick with geometry/perspective looking correct is to not go too far from 16:9 and not get something where the curvature is too aggressive.

I never understood the allure of ultrawide screens. It's just 16:9 with less pixels and therefore less working area. Personally I'd much rather use something like 3840x3200, if such a device was available.

Game and video content support for ultrawide is getting better, but I ditched it because I was annoyed at just how little stuff works properly in 21:9. So much stuff get cropped or black-barred it's unreal. Even if you think a game has great ultrawide support with good FOV and UI considerations to make full use of your wider screem there are still constant reminders like loading screen artwork, menus and maps that are obviously designed for a 16:9 screen. They're not that distracting but it just takes the polish off the experience unnecessarily.

16:9 may not be the best aspect ratio, but it's the one that gets the most QC and design attention, with other aspect ratios basically ignored or tacked on as a barely-tested afterthought.

 

[mb194dc]

Here it's in stock in 1 store. Germany - 9 stores within the €539 price range. UK - 639 GBP at amazon.

Funniest thing is that x-kom, Polish micro(more like nano)center, has M34WQ listed as discontinued, but their German branch has them in stock for €539 (but they don't ship to Poland, which is crazy since they are obviously paying taxes in Poland so VAT EU is not a problem).

Normally I wouldn't mind ordering something from Germany but I prefer to have hassle free returns for a display I purchase.

It's on Scan at £520 ?

 

[Chrispy_]

It's on Scan at £520 ?

Amazon UK is a shithole unregulated flea-market dominated by third-party scam artists.
I mean, I have no love for Bezos but since the disaster that is Brexit, Amazon UK seems to be worse than everywhere else in the world.
Source - I regularly use Amazon in two other countries.

 

[Makaveli]

This seems like a very personal thing. I use a 43" flat display, sit very close to it (I just measured the distance at ~55cm) and I use it for at least 8-10 hours a day. My previous screen was 40" which replaced a 30". I never felt any kind of fatigue or eyestrain, and my time with a curved screen ended with a headache due to "weird" and unexpected geometry - surely an issue of getting accustomed to one, but I also did not notice any advantage of the curvature.

I never understood the allure of ultrawide screens. It's just 16:9 with less pixels and therefore less working area. Personally I'd much rather use something like 3840x3200, if such a device was available.

For work and play 21:9 has been great for me and at the right price.

Going to a higher res will require more GPU. I purchased the monitor and gpu within a month's time frame and found it to be a good match performance wise. The price of my monitor has gone up I paid $800 for it in December and its now selling for $1099. The 38 inch model at 3840 x 1600 is $2000 right now so not worth $1000 plus to buy that. This replaced two 24" monitors on arms so I found it a good trade off.

But by the time i'm ready to replace this the next screen will probably be OLED and larger so all in due time

 

[BorisDG]

Once you go Ultrawide its hard to go back I did this change myself last November.

this Gigabyte monitor is a good price I however prefer a 1900R curve display over flat at 34"

Ultrawide is kinda yikers... for productivity prob it's alright, but otherwise - no thanks.

 

[Vayra86]

Looks like the same-tier version of my G34QWC. With marked differences, being an IPS with a very low static contrast (900:1 calibrated... ooff) and not faster on pixel response or input lag either.

Apart from the KVM switch I do wonder why you'd buy this at 34 inch over a curved UW with a pretty good VA inside. The advantages of IPS don't really stand out on this one... and I bought the G-version at 450 euro

Also yes, at this size the curve is a huge benefit, not having it isn't quite fit for this diagonal in a desktop setting. At that point you either have to go 'wall mounted' and huge (OLED TV sized) and use scaling, to still keep the panel flat with good ergonomics (and even that is questionable in terms of view height, as ergonomy also says you want top of screen at or just below eye height).

@Inle amazing review again. TFTCentral-level quality and its consistent too.

 

[BSim500]

I never understood the allure of ultrawide screens. It's just 16:9 with less pixels and therefore less working area. Personally I'd much rather use something like 3840x3200, if such a device was available.

For productivity yes an ultrawide will show less content vs a 16:9 for the same horizontal pixel area (assuming you don't have to resort to more UI scaling). For gaming however, it's not that simple due to how games FOV is rendered. Example, The Talos Principle:-

16:9 - 1920x1080 vs 2440x1440 vs 3840x2160
21:9 - 2560x1080 vs 3440x1440

As you can see, increasing the resolution within the same aspect ratio increases the sharpness of what's shown but doesn't actually show any more content no matter how big your screen. Increasing the aspect ratio for games with Hor+ FOV however, does render more content on-screen and even a 2560x1080 (21:9) will show more extra width content than a 3840x2160 or even 3840000x2160000 16:9 display.

Edit: As for flat vs curved, that's an entirely personal thing. I have no problem with flat through to 32" (16:9) or 34" (21:9) from 2.5ft away. The one and only curved display I ever bought got refunded though as I just could not get used to bendy horizontal "straight" lines especially in Excel and it was far more irritating than the weaknesses of flat (ever so slight colour shifting at the screen edges if you lean in really close).

 

[Space Lynx]

@Inle every monitor review you do from now on needs to include a single sentence disclaimer at the top "Save up for OLED monitor or OLED 4k TV, thank me later."

 

[Inle]

@Inle every monitor review you do from now on needs to include a single sentence disclaimer at the top "Save up for OLED monitor or OLED 4k TV, thank me later."

After using the Alienware AW3423DW for two weeks I have to admit I'm not quite there just yet

 

[Makaveli]

Ultrawide is kinda yikers... for productivity prob it's alright, but otherwise - no thanks.

To each his own.

I've been enjoying the heck of out if for the last 5 months.

 

[Inle]

To each his own.

I've been enjoying the heck of out if for the last 5 months.

Same. After switching to an ultrawide on my main PC some two years ago, I never thought for a second about going back to 16:9. Not only that, I ended up upgrading my other two PC workstations to 21:9 as well. For productivity and gaming alike, it's not even a close competition in my book.

 

[Vayra86]

I never understood the allure of ultrawide screens. It's just 16:9 with less pixels and therefore less working area. Personally I'd much rather use something like 3840x3200, if such a device was available.

The allure is really simple.

For gaming, you have a filled peripheral vision, which is massive boost to immersion. When I first started on an UW at home, I was actually flabbergasted of the effect. And then you 'unnotice' the fact and gaming just got a whole lot better, especially first person and third person. But it doesn't stop there - think DOTA 2 and having 50% extra real estate towards the edges. You have a competitive advantage. Shooters: your FOV is a lot wider without looking through a fishbowl. With a curved UW, you can even get FOV sweet spots that just match perfectly with the curve. What do you mean 'dude you hit enemies offscreen'? I can see them fine (People have said this to me online in games )

But here's the allure for productivity. I mean, what do you mean less working area?

And this is with 133% scaling in the browser, but Windows is still at 100%. Its nearly like having 2x 1440p on your desk - with no bezel. WIN+directional keys are my big friends now.

You don't really need more height than 1440; the extra horizontal you get, is literally extra real estate that 16:9 won't offer because you'll want scaling at 4K and 34 inch, for example. But at 3440x1440 you still have the ergonomics in place for desktop at 34 inch and a pixel density that is enough to never see pixels anyway. You're still effectively looking at a 27 inch 1440p, except a bit wider.

I'm really not sure I can or will go back to 16:9.

 

[Makaveli]

The allure is really simple.

For gaming, you have a filled peripheral vision, which is massive boost to immersion. When I first started on an UW at home, I was actually flabbergasted of the effect. And then you 'unnotice' the fact and gaming just got a whole lot better, especially first person and third person. But it doesn't stop there - think DOTA 2 and having 50% extra real estate towards the edges. You have a competitive advantage. Shooters: your FOV is a lot wider without looking through a fishbowl. With a curved UW, you can even get FOV sweet spots that just match perfectly with the curve. What do you mean 'dude you hit enemies offscreen'? I can see them fine (People have said this to me online in games )

But here's the allure for productivity. I mean, what do you mean less working area?

And this is with 133% scaling in the browser, but Windows is still at 100%. Its nearly like having 2x 1440p on your desk - with no bezel. WIN+directional keys are my big friends now.

You don't really need more height than 1440; the extra horizontal you get, is literally extra real estate that 16:9 won't offer because you'll want scaling at 4K and 34 inch, for example. But at 3440x1440 you still have the ergonomics in place for desktop at 34 inch and a pixel density that is enough to never see pixels anyway. You're still effectively looking at a 27 inch 1440p, except a bit wider.

I'm really not sure I can or will go back to 16:9.

View attachment 247794

Couldn't have explained it any better myself 1000% agreed.

Alot of the games I play support ultrawide.

FH5
GOW
Halo Infinite
Goldeneye Source
BFV
GTAV
HZW
Batman: Arkham Knight
L4D2*
Counterstrike*

*pretty much anything on the source engine.

And for work coming from dual 24" I enjoy no more bezel, Working with excel full screen is great and many other workflows.

And yes 16:9 content will have borders for games that don't support it but I got use to that and quickly ignored it after a few weeks.

Would I go 16:9 to 21:9 again for my workflow and games I played absolutely. However I recommend everything try it for a few days before you form an opinion.

And mild curve over aggressive my current screen is 1900R curve I wouldn't like one that is 1000R or even 1500R!

 

[Sithaer]

To each his own.

I've been enjoying the heck of out if for the last 5 months.

Same here, I've upgraded from a standard 1080p monitor to my current 29" 2560x1080 UW in 2019 and I love it, couldn't go back now.
Yes this is a baby entry level UW but it still made a big difference to me, I mainly play single player games and the immersion thing really does work for me. 'this is also my movie watching monitor cause I don't own a TV and its also fine for that'

I kept ditching Witcher 3 for years and now I'm glad that I ended up playing it on this monitor, it was a treat to my eyes with all that beautiful scenery.
Yes it can be gimmicky at times when even a new game wont support it properly out of the box but most of the times I can fix that with ~5 mins of googling and using a HEX editor or simply editing a config ini file to remove black bars and such. 'theres also flawless widescreen software that works with older games'

Some games like Lost Ark also borderline suggest you to play it on a UW monitor and even with a 16:9 you can enable forced UW so that you won't be in a disadvantage.
Its an outlier but still that does exist.

The only thing I wouldn't use a UW for is fighting games cause those don't really support it by design.

Its not for everyone for sure but for me it works great and if I ever upgrade my monitor its gotta be another UW.