Everyday usability
Anyone who has undergone the transition from a TN to an IPS monitor in the past will appreciate just how much the gaming experience is enhanced by the additional colour vibrancy, more-dynamic lighting and enhanced viewing angles. The ASUS PB279Q is no exception and the gaming experience it delivers is top-draw.
A 5ms GtG response time doesn’t make it the snappiest gaming monitor on the market but, we feel from using this display in a variety of games, that it is plenty fast for any genre of gaming, even FPS and racing. A concern of greater magnitude is whether the system the PB279Q is powered by is capable of pushing 60 frames-per-second at UHD. Having the frame-rate falling significantly below that level will impact the fluidity more than the 6ms response time.
The gaming experience of the PB279Q cannot match the smoothness of the ROG Swift, with its 1ms response time, 144Hz refresh rate and full G-Sync support, but the experience is certainly nothing to be dismissive of. In fact, the additional clarity and detail presented by the UHD resolution in gaming does a lot to compensate for the lack of G-Sync and the ‘average’ 60Hz refresh rate. It should also be noted that the panel’s 27-in size strikes a nice balance between viewable-space and pixel density while the highly-adjustable stand enables the display to be used in the most desirable way.
The majority of films and online content are sadly not available in native UHD resolutions, despite that a pleasing cinematic experience is still obtainable with the PB279Q thanks to the way Windows scales content for UHD. The viewing experience can be further enhanced with the pre-configured ASUS ‘Splendid’ profiles in the OSD.
There are eight profiles to choose from but the ‘Scenery Mode’ is among the best as it brings content to life with a brighter, warmer and more vibrant configuration. The ‘Game Mode’ is similar but exaggerates colour vibrancy slightly more while the ‘Night View’ mode is one of the more interesting options. It lowers the overall brightness and raises the colour temperature towards that of indoor lighting, making it similar to the popular software f.lux. The overall effect is that night time usage of the monitor is much easier on the eyes.
With the right graphics hardware the ASUS PB279Q is a jack of all trades; delivering immersive and vibrant gaming experiences, productive general usage and pleasing cinematic experiences. One final surprise was the fact that the integrated stereo speakers aren’t bad; the audio quality is satisfactory for gaming and media watching while the maximum volume is loud enough to immerse at close range, even if bass is lacking.
The only potential ‘issues’ some users may have are largely limitations of UHD itself, for instance, Windows scaling isn’t perfect. Not all applications are ready for UHD-scaling just yet, resulting in some miniscule user interfaces or other undesirable results. On the gaming front the middling 60Hz refresh-rate is no match for silky-smooth 120 and 140Hz monitors but there are no UHD monitors out there that are capable of more than 60Hz at this present time.