What a scorcher this deal is. I was just about to give up on 4K gaming monitors this morning when I noticed not only one but all three of our top Black Friday 4K monitor deals had gone kaput. But, this MSI has rescued the day. It ticks most of the boxes for me: 4K, 144 Hz, dual mode (more on this in a moment) and an IPS panel.
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It's a great fit for high-res gaming with a resolution of 3840 x 2160. That's a little squished into the 27-inch panel size here—you'll need to use scaling in Windows to browse the desktop—but it offers a high pixel density for the smaller size. I have a 28-inch 4K monitor at home and it's super crisp.
The 144 Hz refresh rate is a good fit for 4K. Most graphics cards will struggle to go much beyond that with this many pixels to deal with without judicious upscaling or an extremely easygoing game. But you do have options for greater fluidity if you're playing a competitive game: this is a dual mode monitor, meaning it offers both 4K/144 and 1080p/288.
The 1 ms MPRT response time is good—a little off the pace with an OLED gaming monitor but a 4K OLED panel will cost you three times as much. You're getting an IPS panel here, at least, which is the best of the rest for panel technologies. Vivid colors aplenty.
My one major complaint with this monitor—there just had to be something at $200—is its rated brightness. Just a paltry 250 cd/m2. That's really rather low for a monitor these days, with even OLEDs managing to muster a little more, and they're not known for being too bright. You tend to see IPS panels around the 300-350 mark these days. I don't see this as a complete dealbreaker, but it's something to consider especially if you're gaming somewhere extremely bright.
On the rear, there's one DisplayPort 1.4 connection for your PC, and two HDMI 2.1 connections for a console or some such. Though you'll only get 120 Hz out of a console with the screen set to console mode.
Otherwise, it's a very well rounded gaming monitor for the money. I mean, considering it was only a few years back when a 4K monitor would cost you as much as a 4K-capable graphics card, we're well into affordable territory here. There is still that frustration with graphics card pricing, however. You'll have to spend a pretty penny on a GPU to drive this monitor. But what can you do, eh? Eh, Nvidia? AMD? Intel? Anyone?!
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1. Best overall / 4K:
MSI MPG 321URX
2. Best budget 4K:
Asus ROG Strix XG27UCG
3. Best 1440p:
MSI MPG 271QRX
4. Best budget 1440p:
KTC H27T22C-3
5. Best 1080p:
AOC Gaming C27G4ZXE
6. Best Ultrawide:
Gigabyte MO34WQC2
7. Best budget ultrawide:
Xiaomi G34WQi
8. Best 32:9:
Samsung Odyssey OLED G9
9. Best dual-mode:
Alienware AW2725QF
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