LG 49 Curved UltraGear Gaming Monitor (49GR85DC-B) Overview

LG has its fingers in all types of merchandise, from residence items to TVs, however avid gamers might know the corporate finest because the maker of the UltraGear line of gaming displays. Promising excessive visible constancy with low enter lag, the UltraGear line has confirmed itself reliable, with the LG 45 UltraGear OLED Curved Gaming Monitor profitable an Editors’ Alternative award. The LG 49 Curved UltraGear ($1,299) reviewed here’s a little completely different than that OLED stunner, catering to fanatic avid gamers who worth widescreen gaming with as little enter lag as doable and are keen to forgo OLED expertise to avoid wasting money. The twin quad HD (5,120-by-1,440-pixel) curved monitor is a worthy purchase for many who need immersion on the extra inexpensive finish of the spectrum, as OLED variants just like the Samsung Odyssey OLED G9 can price virtually double the worth.

The Design: Deep Curve Forward

LG’s UltraGear units itself aside with its ultra-tight curve, bending to 1,000mm. Expressed as “1000R,” the quantity is the radius of a circle that will be created by a hypothetical ring of those displays positioned edge to edge. The smaller the quantity, the tighter the curve. It’s stated that decrease numbers higher mimic the pure curvature of the attention, and thus are extra accommodating to the pure depth of human eyesight. Although curved displays don’t typically dip beneath 1000mm, we have seen a couple of curve even additional, just like the bendable Corsair Xeneon Flex (which bends to 800R) and LG’s personal bendable 42-inch gaming show, the OLED Flex (which bends to 900R).

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

The advantage of a tighter curve, outdoors of the media-watching or gaming immersion issue, is improved picture high quality. LG’s ultrawide takes the pursuit of high quality even additional by choosing a VA panel as an alternative of an IPS one that’s most typical for gaming shows. On common, VA panels do provide higher distinction and deeper black ranges than their IPS cousins, however they sometimes falter on the subject of shade accuracy and enter lag (which we’ll look at later within the overview). However VA panels are for the immersion-seeking gamer, so it is smart for LG to go for that type of show to pair with the tighter curve.

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

In fact, each pale compared to a the standard of an OLED show. Whereas an OLED display screen would possibly blow the competitors out of the water by way of energy effectivity, shade gamut, and viewing angles, OLED’s price ticket weighs heavy. Even smaller, 27-inch OLEDs just like the Corsair Xeneon 27QHD240 OLED can price round $1,000, only a stone’s throw from the already-pricey $1,300 of the 49-inch UltraGear.

The just about borderless design lends this expansive monitor much more house to breathe, and the twin quad HD decision does present some glorious visuals, even when it doesn’t fairly contact that coveted 4K decision (at round 7.3 million general pixels, versus roughly 8.2 million for 4K). The decision pairs properly with midrange PC builds and may resonate with avid gamers who would reasonably get probably the most efficiency out of their video games and are completely high quality enjoying at 1080p or 1440p.

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

Show apart, the UltraGear is sort of chunky, particularly in contrast with the Samsung Odyssey OLED G9. The LG’s bulkier grey body measures 18.3 by 46.1 by 15.5 inches (HWD), whereas the Odyssey OLED G9 is 20.8 by 47.0 by 9.3 inches (HWD). By way of weight, you’re 32.5 kilos with the stand and 26.5 kilos with out, in case you really feel inclined to mount your monitor on a third-party stand or (very sturdy) arm. You may modify the peak by as much as 4.3 inches, tilt it from -5 to fifteen levels, and swivel the panel throughout a spread from -15 to fifteen levels.

Turning the monitor round, you’ll discover a cumbersome hexagon that homes the monitor’s ports. Right here you’ll discover two USB Kind-A ports, two HDMI 2.1 ports, one DisplayPort, and one USB Kind-B upstream port. The hefty protrusion again right here additionally contains some RGB lighting that displays nicely throughout the monitor’s wingspan. Simply beneath, you’ll discover an OSD management stick and a headphone port that helps DTS Headphone X. The latter spec claims to supply correct specialization and localization in video games with 3D audio over headphones. It additionally helps channel-based, scene-based, and object-based audio—however to take benefit, you’ll need headphones that help it, as nicely.

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

The display screen additionally helps picture-in-picture and picture-by-picture modes, welcome options in massive screens that ought to please multi-monitor customers trying to consolidate to at least one broad panel. Utilizing a number of enter sources, you possibly can play, watch, stream, and work on the identical time on one monitor, with separate home windows both facet by facet or nested inside each other.

Testing the LG 49 Curved UltraGear: An Extremely-Responsive Sweep

The ultrawide UltraGear desires to courtroom widescreen lovers, however does it have what it takes to face as much as the competitors? To see how the monitor fares, we pit it towards a couple of of its contemporaries in a benchmark gauntlet that measures shade gamut, brightness, shade accuracy, distinction ratio, and enter lag. Whereas we haven’t examined many different 32:9 screens, we’ve got seen loads of non-OLEDs and OLEDs with 21:9 ratios, so we broke out our massive display screen favorites, together with our Editors’ Alternative choose for the class, the Alienware 34 Curved QD-OLED Gaming Monitor (AW3423DWF), to see how they evaluate.

First, we examined the monitor in its default image mode with an SDR sign utilizing a Datacolor SpyderX colorimeter. The LG 49 UltraGear noticed a median brightness of 452 nits (candelas per sq. meter), which nearly precisely hits LG’s 450-nit ranking. That’s brighter than all of our comparability displays, except for the ViewSonic Elite XG341C-2K.

Hopping over to HDR mode, we used the VESA DisplayHDR compliance checks (accessible without cost on the Microsoft Retailer) to measure a peak HDR brightness of 769 nits, nicely underneath the monitor’s VESA DisplayHDR 1000 ranking. You can maybe get nearer to 1,000 nits of peak HDR brightness with some setting tweaks (consider, all of our testing is finished on default, out-of-the-box settings).

Subsequent, we look at the monitor’s color-gamut protection. The 49-inch UltraGear spanned 100% of the sRGB shade gamut, 87% of Adobe RGB, and 92% of DCI-P3. These are nice rankings, although they don’t seem to be excellent, being bested by the ViewSonic Elite XG341C-2K, one other VA panel, and all the OLED opponents. Nonetheless, the 49-inch UltraGear is not any slouch, and posted higher outcomes than the ASRock Phantom Gaming 34.

Relating to shade accuracy, the 49-inch UltraGear recorded a Delta E of 1.8. The upper the Delta E, the extra the colours are inclined to stray from their supposed hue. A price underneath 1 is right, although most gaming displays don’t actually get close to that quantity, particularly out of the field. So this can be a high quality displaying.

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

Subsequent up: the distinction ratio, which signifies the distinction in luminance between the brightest white and darkest black {that a} monitor can produce. It makes a distinction in image high quality, particularly throughout darkish scenes in gameplay. We measured a distinction ratio of 1,820:1 and a black degree of 0.25. That is a high quality displaying for a non-OLED, even when it falls simply in need of LG’s rated minimal distinction ratio of two,000:1. The reasonably low black degree is a testomony to the restrictions of the monitor’s VA panel.

Media and Gaming Efficiency

What about crucial metric for a gaming monitor: enter lag? To quantify that, we use an HDFury Diva HDMI matrix to take an enter lag measurement, and play a handful of video games from our library to see if there are any noticeable blemishes like display screen tearing.

The excellent news is that you just don’t have to fret about gaming efficiency right here. We measured lower than 1 millisecond (ms) of enter lag, a superb consequence, particularly in case you favor your video games to be aggressive. Followers of fast-paced first-person shooters will recognize this metric coupled with the 240Hz refresh fee. Help for AMD’s Freesync Premium Professional adaptive sync can be included, which ought to remove any potential display screen tearing. As well as, a couple of further gaming options come baked into the display screen, like a Black Stabilizer and an FPS Counter.

(Credit score: Joseph Maldonado)

Further testing included enjoying bouts of Cyberpunk 2077 and Returnal. A phrase of warning to these keen on widescreen gaming: Not each new PC launch helps it, and video games that do help a 21:9 facet ratio might not stretch to 32:9 (like Diablo IV). To get probably the most out of your ultrawide gaming expertise, make sure that your video games modify to your monitor accordingly.

Verdict: Ultrawide Gaming for the Aggressive Gamer

LG’s 49-inch Curved UltraGear Gaming Monitor strikes a high quality steadiness between glorious gaming efficiency and shade vary, and its tight curve is bound to impress avid gamers preferring their video games to be ultrawide. Its cupboard is bulkier than we’d like, however the panel delivers the place it issues probably the most.

At $1,299, it’s costly, however it’s simpler to abdomen the worth when put next with OLED options just like the Samsung Odyssey OLED G9, and even different non-OLED ultrawide displays like ViewSonic’s Elite XG341C-2K. In the event you’re on the hunt for the widest wingspan for the smallest greenback quantity, the LG 49 Curved UltraGear Gaming Monitor greater than will get the job finished.