This Is Still One of the Best Gaming Monitors You Can Buy - Gizmodo

There’s probably some sort of middle-ground monitor between “found in the clearance bin” and the Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ?

The Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ is a sleek yet sturdy 27-inch gaming monitor with a 4K UHD quantum-dot IPS display with full-array backlighting and a DCI-3P color gamut.

The PG27UQ has two digital display inputs, 1x DisplayPort 1.4 and 1x HDMI 2.0 (it also has 2x downstream USB 3.0, 1x upstream USB 3.0, and 1x 3.5mm audio jack; all ports are hidden under a removable plastic back panel).

Both of these inputs have undergone several revisions since their debut—the current revisions are DisplayPort 2.0 and HDMI 2.1—and each new standard brings increased transmission bandwidth.

DisplayPort 1.4 gives you a max data rate of about 25.92 Gbps—not quite as much as HDMI 2.1, but still quite a bit more than HDMI 2.0.

The Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ is a 4K UHD display with an aspect ratio of 16:9 and a 3840 x 2160 resolution.

The main menu, which you can navigate solely with the joystick, is where you’ll find options like overclocking, blue light filtering, and screen calibration, as well as options for controlling the many lights on the monitor and stand (and Aura Sync).

The Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ is built like a tank—a sleek, stylish tank, but a tank nonetheless.

It comes in a box larger than my TV (which is admittedly not that big at just 32 inches) and includes several accessories: a stand, input cables (HDMI, DisplayPort, USB), a pack of lenses for the stand’s built-in logo light, and instructions.

But it’s not so obnoxiously over-the-top that it could only be used as a gaming monitor, and you can turn off the ROG projection lights from the on-screen menu.

The stand does take up a little more room than I initially expected it would, but it is a pretty thick monitor.

While I don’t necessarily think I’d use the stand’s backward-facing logo light, I do like that this monitor has lights for both the user and the viewer.

It is a little disappointing to buy a cool gaming peripheral and then never get to admire the lights yourself.

You also need to connect via DisplayPort if you want that overclocked refresh rate, because the HDMI tops out at a refresh rate of 60Hz.

The Asus ROG Swift PG27UQ monitor is impressive, even after a couple of years on the market, but all that said: Is it worth $1,200.

After many years of trying many gaming monitors, high end, low end, I have to say, why.

Even the best $1000 plus gaming monitors have horrible contrast, and comparing between them seems mostly meaningless