Super Ultra-Wide Monitor – Dank or Dumb?
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2018-05-06
·
1,374 words · ~6 min read
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You just got your beautiful new 34-inch ultra-wide monitor
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Welcome to the absolute cream of the crop of gaming
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productivity and cinema
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experiences my friend
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is what I would have said if Samsung hadn't just grabbed the bar and
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re-
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stretched it
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with their brand new
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$1,300
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9-inch
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32x9 high refresh rate super ultra wide gaming monitor
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But is this thing like totally worth it man, or just like
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totally stupid man
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Speaking of stupid today's sponsor isn't
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The Thermaltake Core P90 tempered glass case features 5 millimeter thick glass and angled open frame design
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different layout options vertical GPU mounting with riser cable included
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And more check it out at the link below
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The CHG90 is an absolute
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behemoth its 49 inch diagonal
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Quantum dot panel is nearly 4 feet wide and all together it weighs
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33 pounds and yet it still manages to look light and streamlined
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With thin bezels and a slender yet robust stand with a charcoal and titanium finish that hits that sweet spot between
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gamery and
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Boring the 1800r curved screen can swivel up to 15 degrees in either direction tilt between minus 2 and 15 degrees and elevate about 5 inches
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So not nearly as high as it would have to be to support rotating into portrait mode
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Sorry reddit fanatics, but that is more than a little silly
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Flipping around to the back we find the integrated cable management hook standard power cable no brick required and a cover that pops off
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Revealing two HDMI 2.0 ports two DisplayPort 1.3s one of which is of the mini me variety and
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Audio in and out so all that is actually pretty darn good
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But we do wish that the USB hub was a little more
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2018 with more ports and maybe a type-c in there
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Oh, right, and they also threw in this secret headphone hanger that I'm betting exactly no one will use the awkward position aside
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most people are unlikely to have a
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Desk that is deep enough to spare the extra three inches that you would need given that the monitors legs
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Already jut out in front of the screen and the screen itself is so wide that you literally
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Cannot see all of it at once if you sit too close
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28 inches is the minimum that you would need to use this thing comfortably and even then you will end up turning your head a
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Little bit to see the start menu and the system tray
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Which I guess brings us to the experience of actually using it in a word
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Pretty dank
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Okay, that's two words, but you could basically think of the 32 by 9 aspect ratio as kind of like having two
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27 inch 16 by 9 monitors side by side but without any bezels harshing your vibe
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kind of in practice though a
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34 inch ultra wide already feels about as
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productive as two monitors this
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This lets you comfortably have three or maybe even four things open side by side if you stretch a bit
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It is so wide that it will actually require a little bit of
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Creative thinking to make efficient use of it even your 21 by 9 cinema scope movies will have black bars on the side
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So I mean one of the ideas we had was to run a 16 by 9 game in the middle with streaming and
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Social media Windows surrounding it cool, right?
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speaking of gaming
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Yes
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Just like with a regular ultra wide support for this resolution can be a little hit or miss with some games giving you black bars
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Some zooming in and some of them working correctly other than that the HUD ends up so far to the side
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That's more like a herd
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With that said when it's good. It's really good
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You can have so much of your field of view filled up?
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With screen that it's not that dissimilar to VR goggles
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but without the screen door or any controller dongle itch and
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the girthy screen isn't the only perk for gamers the CHD 90 rocks a
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144 Hertz refresh rate backlight strobing and
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FreeSync 2 although it should be noted that strobing can't be used with FreeSync running at the same time
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The upside is that Samsung included some shortcut buttons to make toggling between custom displays?
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modes easy
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So we made one each for FreeSync versus fast response time and then another with I saver for working
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Now let's have a little chat about one of the other features on the box
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HDR this display claims to support HDR
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but as far as we're concerned it only kind of does to really give you the HDR effect any
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display technology with a backlight needs full array local dimming and a
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peak brightness of a thousand nits
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This puppy can hit peaks of 600 nits with typical brightness in the 250 to 350 range
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Which will enhance the look of the few games out there that support HDR?
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But buyer beware because these HD aren't monitors are on the rise
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Leading us then to the CHG 90s biggest weak point the resolution. It's 3840 by 1080
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So compared to 16 by 9 4k it is half as many pixels
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Making it easier to drive for your graphics card
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but also
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It's huge and only half the number of pixels
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So at this size you're only getting about 80 pixels per inch the same as a
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34 inch
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2560 by 1080 ultra wide at a third of this one's price now to be clear
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It's not a the complete amazing turning dentro show method
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unusable it just hurts the otherwise futuristic experience it's like it's
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like being in a self-driving electric car and going to roll down the window
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and being like really really Windows that go like this not like this but I'm
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not blaming Samsung for any of that because they're limited by what can be
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done today with the HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort 1.3 or 1.4 standards over a
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single cable so then there are two questions that we have to answer in our
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conclusion one is super ultra wide something that deserves to exist well I
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would say as long as your desk and the stand are sturdy enough we're giving it
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the thumbs up and number two should you buy this monitor that one's a little
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tougher it's got a high quality VA panel that's color calibrated right out of the
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box and offers a gaming and productivity experience that's unlike anything else
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available to you
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today but the HDMI 2.1 spec is already out so unless the timing and the price
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of the CHD 90 lineup perfectly with your upgrade cycle and your budget and you
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really need something today it might be worth waiting to see how Samsung's
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competitors super ultra widen the selection in the coming months
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Master Ops back with another simple deal
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on a complicatedly named product this is the mass drop x thx
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achromatic audio amplifier 789 linear amplifier it's a linear bipolar
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amplifier with feed forward error correction design for those who can
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appreciate a clean transparent amp it features THX AAA and feed forward
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topology which reduces distortion by 20 to 40 decibels for a realistic
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fatigue-free listening the chassis is high-grade CNC milled aluminum with a bead blasted stenciled masters shouldn't say much in the past this monitor does sayиша
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And you can learn more and pick it up on Mastrop today at the link in the video description
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Assuming you're a big baller
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So thanks for watching guys you can dislike or like you can check out
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Where to buy the stuff that we featured at the links in the video description. You can also get subscribed
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You can buy stuff at our merch store. I kind of lost track of how I was doing this outro
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