Review on Review: Acer B276HUL Aymiidprz Widescreen Backlight 2560X1440 with Built-In Speakers and HD Quality by Scott Martin

This seemingly excellent monitor gets 3 stars from me for three reasons: terrible technical support and documentation, poor quality control, and worst of all for me, the inability to toggle the PiP input. Also: price. This is by far the cheapest monitor with 2560 x 1440 resolution and other features I've been looking for; PIP (Picture in Picture) and swivel stand. Really cool when I put it together (see below) - probably the best stand for any monitor I've seen. You can raise/lower the monitor about 6 inches, rotate/tilt about 60 degrees left or right, rotate 90 degrees for portrait use, and tilt the monitor up or down a few degrees for the best viewing angle. He also looks very well built. but time will tell I/O It features the latest technology: Displayport in and out, 2 x HDMI and Dual Link DVI, and 5 USB ports - 2 of them on the side for easy access and 3 on the bottom Access not so easy (if you don't rotate the screen, all ports are easily accessible) There is no VGA connection, but you still can't get the full resolution with VGA, so make sure your system is set to 2560 x 1440 can go spend money on this monitor Very bright, clear picture, although I'm not an expert in this field - I'm not a gamer and not about graphics. PIP at this price is great. And the PIP feature is quite flexible as you can choose from 2 "standard type" PIP window sizes (let's call them "medium" and "small") positioned in each of the 4 corner quadrants of the screen can become. Alternatively, you can choose a side-by-side version, which splits the screen in half, although half of the PIP doesn't completely fill its part of the screen (the right side). So far so good, but here's the problem. YOU CAN ONLY USE DISPLAYPORT AS PIP SOURCE! That's right, the only input you can select for PIP is Displayport. It looks like you should be able to select a different PIP input since the OSD has a "PIP Source" selection box, but it actually doesn't let you do anything other than "DP" ( Select display port). This is incredibly limiting and annoying to me as PIP is only really useful for background stuff like watching a small TV while working and pretty much any TV/video source will be HDMI. That means I have to get a $100 HDMI to Displayport converter to do what I want (you can't use a passive adapter cable to go from HDMI input to Displayport output). There is no indication of this limitation either on their website or in the reviews I could find. And as you will see below, there is no manual with this information. UPDATE: Another annoying thing, there is only one PIP related button on the monitor that allows you to enable PIP AND select the PIP location. So you have to press this button 8 times to turn on PIP and then don't turn it on because you have to go through all the locations to turn off this feature. My HP monitor (significantly more expensive) has a separate button to turn PIP on and off, which I really appreciate now that I've been using ACER for a while. Documentation/Technical Support: Basically the worst I've ever experienced. There is no user manual in the box, just a one-page "Quick Start Guide" with no useful information. So I'm trying to get tech support because I can't get the PIP input to switch to HDMI. To cut a really long story short, there is actually a phone number to call if you are the owner with a serial number to enter, but no one was available when I called. There doesn't seem to be any phone support for non-owners with pre-sales questions about BTW features. Of course I'm the owner now so I ended up using the online chat option which is also only available to owners with a serial number. I then called a guy who, after forcing me to log in a couple of times because he didn't want to wait for me to come back after trying this or that cable, was at least able to confirm (after consulting his " Manager".") that PIP can indeed only use Displayport. Each answer he gave took a few minutes, probably because they were using some kind of translation software to understand what I was talking about. He gave me a link, where I could download the manual but the manual is for a previous version of this monitor without PIP and without Displayport. He confirmed that this essentially useless manual is the only one available. In summary, there are currently no manuals in the world, that actually describe the features of this monitor (at least not in English) This fact is the main reason for the incoherent review; I thought this verst ecked information might be useful for someone. quality control. My unit was well packaged and the monitor appears to be fairly well assembled, however the 'locking screw' at the base of the stand had poor transverse threads and could not be removed with any size screwdriver without the screw head that was designed to be heavy to damage can be removed with a small coin. I ended up sharpening an old screwdriver to match the curve of the screw slot so I could apply enough torque to pull the screw out without damaging the head. I then re-threaded (this is a 6mm x 1.0 tap if you need to do the same) and finally I was able to assemble the base. The other issue I had was that the supplied HDMI cable was bad, so by the time I realized I was using the cable I already had to find out that I couldn't get an HDMI in the PIP box, which to a technical gamble led above. The DVI cable that came with it worked, and DVI is currently my primary video source anyway. FYI, if you have an old DVI cable, make sure you use the cable that came with it, or at least one that's rated for higher resolutions. I first tried using the Dual Link DVI cable that came with my 6 year old Mac Pro and it seemed to work fine as the Mac (still running Snow Leopard) immediately recognized the monitor model and the Resolution automatically set to the default 2560 x 1440 resolution. A no-brainer, only the picture looked awful! I couldn't read small text. When I switched to regular HD (1920x1080) the picture was good. At first I thought the monitor was just a piece of crap but decided to try the included cable as a last resort and bingo - great picture. Upon closer inspection it turns out that the new DVI cables have 3 more pins which are obviously needed for a decent 2560 x 1440 picture! Okay, finally ending the longest review so far. I've been using the monitor for about a week and I really like the high resolution so I think I'll keep it. I'm currently not aware of any monitor in this price range with this resolution or even close that also has a PIP and a swiveling stand for portrait format display. Basically, you have to spend twice as much money to get these features. So while I had to shell out another $100 for a converter to use HDMI with PIP, it was still slightly cheaper than the competition. I just hope it doesn't break soon because I don't think Acer will provide good customer service. The old adage "You get what you pay for" came true again and I decided I'd had enough. UPDATE: I've had the monitor for a few months now and it's running stable/no issues. Aside from the PIP button upgrade mentioned above, I really have nothing to complain about and the monitor remains a really good value for the money. It's worth it if you want 2560 x 1440 and can't or don't want to spend 3x the money on a more expensive HP or Apple or whatever. I can't understand the PIP input limit issue from a design/manufacturing perspective as I'd bet they can fix it, maybe for $2 a unit. Hence - just because of the imperfection of the final design details - my rating remains at 3 stars.