Monitors


Acer Announces A 200Hz Ultrawide Display

Acer Announces A 200Hz Ultrawide Display

Today at IFA Acer has announced a number of new products relating to gaming. Among the product launches was a new display aimed firmly at gamers. It’s a very large curved 35″ panel with a native refresh rate of 144Hz. BenQ has actually already released a gaming monitor with these specs. What makes the Acer Predator Z35 stand out is Acer’s claim that it can be overclocked to 200Hz. You can check out all of the Predator Z35’s known specs in the chart below.

Acer Predator Z35
Resolution 2560×1080
Refresh Rate 144Hz native, 200Hz overclock
Panel Size 35″
Panel Type AMVA
Response Time 12ms, 4ms (G2G)
Viewing Angle (H/V) 178° / 178°
Color Depth 16.7 million colors (8bit)

As 35″ with a resolution of 2560×1080, the Predator Z35 isn’t as sharp as the 34″ 3440×1440 curved displays on the market. Its refresh rate makes it clear that it’s first and foremost a monitor for gaming. Like I noted above, the native refresh rate of the panel is 144Hz, with Acer claiming it can be overclocked up to 200Hz. It’s not clear whether Acer expects a large number of panels to reach this figure, or if the overclocking procedure voids your warranty, but like most other overclocking I would assume that it does. As a gaming display, the Predator Z35 comes with support for NVIDIA’s G-SYNC adaptive refresh rate as well as NVIDIA’s Ultra low Motion Blur backlight strobing feature.

Something else worth noting is that this is an AMVA panel from AU Optronics. While the viewing angle for AMVA panels is still advertised as 178 x 178 degrees like an IPS panel, they’re still known to have a greater shift in contrast than modern IPS displays. For gamers this isn’t likely to pose an issue, but it would for any sort of color critical work. On that note, Acer advertises the Predator Z35 as covering 100% of the sRGB gamut. While this is probably true, it’s worth noting that covering sRGB doesn’t guarantee any level of accuracy when rendering the colors inside the gamut. All that being said, the AMVA panel is still going to be miles ahead of the TN panels that used to be inside essentially every single display with a native refresh rate above 60Hz.

The Acer Predator Z35 gaming monitor will be coming to North America in December with a price of 1199.99 USD. It will be launching in the EMEA region at the same time with a price starting at €1,099.

Acer Announces A 200Hz Ultrawide Display

Acer Announces A 200Hz Ultrawide Display

Today at IFA Acer has announced a number of new products relating to gaming. Among the product launches was a new display aimed firmly at gamers. It’s a very large curved 35″ panel with a native refresh rate of 144Hz. BenQ has actually already released a gaming monitor with these specs. What makes the Acer Predator Z35 stand out is Acer’s claim that it can be overclocked to 200Hz. You can check out all of the Predator Z35’s known specs in the chart below.

Acer Predator Z35
Resolution 2560×1080
Refresh Rate 144Hz native, 200Hz overclock
Panel Size 35″
Panel Type AMVA
Response Time 12ms, 4ms (G2G)
Viewing Angle (H/V) 178° / 178°
Color Depth 16.7 million colors (8bit)

As 35″ with a resolution of 2560×1080, the Predator Z35 isn’t as sharp as the 34″ 3440×1440 curved displays on the market. Its refresh rate makes it clear that it’s first and foremost a monitor for gaming. Like I noted above, the native refresh rate of the panel is 144Hz, with Acer claiming it can be overclocked up to 200Hz. It’s not clear whether Acer expects a large number of panels to reach this figure, or if the overclocking procedure voids your warranty, but like most other overclocking I would assume that it does. As a gaming display, the Predator Z35 comes with support for NVIDIA’s G-SYNC adaptive refresh rate as well as NVIDIA’s Ultra low Motion Blur backlight strobing feature.

Something else worth noting is that this is an AMVA panel from AU Optronics. While the viewing angle for AMVA panels is still advertised as 178 x 178 degrees like an IPS panel, they’re still known to have a greater shift in contrast than modern IPS displays. For gamers this isn’t likely to pose an issue, but it would for any sort of color critical work. On that note, Acer advertises the Predator Z35 as covering 100% of the sRGB gamut. While this is probably true, it’s worth noting that covering sRGB doesn’t guarantee any level of accuracy when rendering the colors inside the gamut. All that being said, the AMVA panel is still going to be miles ahead of the TN panels that used to be inside essentially every single display with a native refresh rate above 60Hz.

The Acer Predator Z35 gaming monitor will be coming to North America in December with a price of 1199.99 USD. It will be launching in the EMEA region at the same time with a price starting at €1,099.

Nixeus NX-VUE24A 144Hz FreeSync Monitor Set to Ship

Nixeus NX-VUE24A 144Hz FreeSync Monitor Set to Ship

We briefly covered the launch of the Nixeus NX-VUE24A FreeSync monitor as part of our write-up on AMD’s FreeSync demonstrations at Computex 2015. Nixeus today sent news that the monitor is available for pre-order and set to ship as early as next week.

As a recap, the Nixeus NX-VUE24A is a 24″ 1080p AMD FreeSync certified monitors with a minimum supported refresh rate of 30 Hz. The features of the NX-VUE24A include:

  • 24″ 1920 x 1080 TN panel
  • Adaptive sync with refresh rates between 30 – 144 Hz
  • 1ms response time
  • DP 1.2a, HDMI, DL-DVI and VGA inputs
  • Articulating stand for height adjustment (with tilt, pivot and swivel capabilities)
  • 3-year warranty

AMD-certified FreeSync monitors come with a wide range of specifications and prices. Wikipedia has a list. Selected FreeSync models of relevance here (24″ and 1080p resolution) include:

  • The 24″ 1920 x 1080 AOC G2460PF with a supposed refresh rate range of 30-160 Hz (availability outside Europe and pricing details are not known yet, and it appears that the maximum static refresh rate is only 144 Hz)
  • The 24″ 1920 x 1080 Samsung S24E370DL with a maximum refresh rate of 60 Hz (not yet available for sale in US, but a eBay listing puts a $400 price tag on it)

It appears that the Nixeus NX-VUE24A is the only 1920 x 1080 monitor currently available for purchase that comes with 30-144 Hz refresh rate support.

With a MSRP of $350 (and street price of around $330), the monitor seems to be priced right compared to other FreeSync monitors with similar feature sets. Pre-orders are being accepted at a number of e-tailers including Newegg, Amazon, and CouchPotato. CouchPotato seems to be offering free shipping and a new customer discount of 10%, while Newegg is charging $5 for shippping. Amazon seems to be selling at MSRP right now with free shipping.