Review on Acer XV282K KVbmiipruzx: The Ultimate 4K FreeSync Backlit Monitor with Agile Splendor by Troy Shavers

First off, I'm more than happy with this monitor, especially when it's only $300 (or $255 when I bought it on Prime Day). It arrived the next day and is fully functional. It was easy to set up and the settings are very simple. This is my first monitor so I can't compare it to other monitors. I'm too used to 4K gaming to go back to 1080p, but I also wanted higher frame rates, so I decided 1440p was a good balance for me. There were no dead pixels and backlight bleeding on this monitor alone, but that's to be expected with IPS panels. 144Hz is smooth as silk, although there's a bit of ghosting, but I can't really notice until I check it out. HDR works well but not as well as my Vizio V series 4k HDR TV. It's still better than SDR. However, I always go for higher frame rates over slightly better HDR. Also, enabling HDR limits the frame rate to 120, but that's also barely noticeable. I haven't tested the input lag, but I can assure you that even with HDR enabled, it's very minimal. I noticed very little difference in response time with HDR on and off. The monitor has an "ultra-low latency mode" that sets it to 1 ms. One thing I wish this monitor had more picture options with HDR enabled. When I enable HDR, I can no longer adjust contrast, brightness, or color to my preferred settings. Again, HDR 400 works well, but could be a little better. Another weird issue I ran into was enabling HDR in some games. Especially Fallen Order and Shadow of War. For some reason, HDR looks bad for both games. I adjusted the picture settings in game and on my computer as best as I could and it still looks like SDR. I know it's not about PC or gaming because both games looked great on my 4k TV but not on this monitor. That being said, other games look amazing with HDR. Destiny 2, Metro: Exodus and more look just as great as they do on TV. I don't know why this problem occurs, but it should be considered when looking at this monitor. HDR on this monitor is not suitable for some games. If you're not an extremely competitive gamer who needs the fastest possible response times, or you're on a tight budget, or both, then this monitor is for you. Despite my HDR issues, I still think this monitor is great for gaming at 1440p. Sure, you could certainly get a better monitor for $400-$500, but that's a good balance for the weakly competitive gamer on a budget. So I give 4 stars for the quality and 5 for the price.