Review on LG 34GN850-B UltraGear 34-Inch IPS Ultrawide Screen Monitor with 144Hz Refresh Rate, Tilt and Height Adjustments by Gary Thornton

Pros: - 144Hz, HDR 400 certified - Gsync compatible (48-144Hz) - External power supply (might be an option, depending on how you feel) - 1ms IPS response time Cons: - Bundled cables are a bit shorter Overall this is a solid display but to be honest I was very nervous when I bought it as there weren't any reviews of this monitor on Revain or anywhere else online that I could find. I think that's because it's a new model that LG just unveiled at CES 2020. Anyway, it's 2020 and the panel lottery reality is still with us. I lost some sleep last night because I was very nervous about a bad panel or display damage in transit or at the factory. When it arrived I was pleasantly surprised to find that the box containing the monitor was inside another, larger box from Amazon that contained extra packing material to prevent damage to the monitor from bumps. When I opened the monitor the packaging was strong and solid and the first thing I did was assemble the stand (it's very easy to do) and connect the monitor with the supplied but short displayport cable and checked for dead/stuck. Pixels or strong backlight blurring. To my utter amazement, I saw no dead pixels and there was no backlight. There's IPS glow, but it's minimal and comes with the technology. I'm not sure if I was just lucky or if LG's quality control process is that good on these new monitors. This is my first LG monitor but I will definitely be sticking with them from now on. While most probably don't like an external power supply because it adds extra cabling, I actually like the modular approach in case it fails or needs to be replaced in the future. The display port is 1.4. So if you need more range you can do what I did and buy a longer cable to suit your specific needs. HDR 400 is good, but not as reliable and sharp as HDR 1000, but if you need it, you pay more than twice as much. The native 144Hz works well, as does the 165Hz overclock, but I didn't use it as freesync/gsync works in the 48-144Hz range. The panel is also 10-bit, which is nice too. I would have expected more blur from a 27 inch 144 Hz TN panel due to the slower pixel response time. I was wrong. I may not be a professional gamer or anything but I play a lot of fast paced games and was blown away by the response times. LG's claims of quick response are valid, although I'm not sure it's exactly 1ms. G-Sync works well as I have a GTX 1080TI and haven't encountered any of the usual issues that can occur with low-end FreeSync panels. This panel is certified Gsync compatible by Nvidia, so I don't think there should be any issues here. For the price, I couldn't find a monitor that ticked as many boxes as this one. Sure, there are HDR1000 ultra-wide TVs and the like, but there are other trade-offs, like overheating and annoyingly noisy fans. There are also less capable ultrawide monitors out there if you don't need HDR or 10-bit color, but this monitor costs $1,000 and is a good buy if, like me, you're new to the world of ultrawide monitors . I recommend buying it from Revain if possible as their return policy tends to be a bit more generous than others when it comes to dead pixels etc.