Samsung U28D590D 28" Affordable 4K Monitor
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2014-05-07
·
2,130 words · ~10 min read
0:06
Hotspot Shield service makes your internet browsing safer more secure and
0:10
fully private click now to learn more is Samsung's 28d 590d 28 in Ultra HD 4k
0:18
monitor too good to be true I mean it's
0:21
literally 1 the price of what you would
0:24
have been expected to pay six short months ago if you wanted a 4K display
0:29
for your PC so let's get to it shall we
0:32
kicking things off on the product page we find this little tidbit unlike other
0:37
value 4K monitors notably the Dell p2815q
0:41
Samsung's value 4k monitor runs at 60 HZ
0:45
and boasts 1 millisecond gr to grade response times and unlike other 4K
0:50
monitors in general it does it as a single stream no multistream sidebyside
0:56
display Tom Foolery huge thanks to Ryan shro at PC per for helping me test this
0:59
by the way since Samsung doesn't document the feature and none of this
1:03
Cop Out 30 HZ nonsense that may be suitable for watching movies but is a
1:08
huge step backwards for gaming or even General computer use where we've become
1:12
accustomed to 60 HZ or higher refresh rates over the last couple of decades
1:17
please note however that you will need a DisplayPort 1.2 output to run at 4K 60
1:23
HZ with a single cable otherwise you can run 4K 30 HZ with a single HDMI input or
1:29
another cool option is that you could use an HDMI cable and a DVI to HDMI
1:34
cable to both of the HDMI inputs with Samsung's picture by picture mode and a
1:39
display spanning technology like AMD ifinity or NVIDIA surround except that
1:44
AMD and their Infinite Wisdom doesn't allow custom resolutions in their driver
1:47
and I can't get the DVI adapter output to run at 1920 x 2160 and NVIDIA in
1:52
their equally Infinite Wisdom doesn't allow two monitor surround
1:55
configurations thanks guys this solution
1:58
works pretty well though and does help AMD users stuck with DisplayPort 1.1
2:03
outputs but if you've got DisplayPort 1.2 then just run that by itself the
2:07
next spec of note is that while Samsung specifically calls out that the panel
2:11
technology is TN they're also claiming support for 1 billion colors so what
2:16
does that mean 1 billion color support versus 16.7 million on a typical 8bit
2:21
display implies that we're dealing with a 10bit display PCM monitors. info
2:27
believes that Samsung is achieving their results with a true 8 bit panel and 2
2:31
bit frame rate control dithering pretty unexpected for a TN monitor but the even
2:36
more unexpected thing about this is that it actually appears to work pretty well
2:40
obviously this footage of the screens is being captured by a camera encoded and
2:44
compressed in editing and then compressed Again by YouTube so if you
2:47
can't see a clear difference in these grayscale gradients you'll have to
2:51
believe me when I say that our 590d looks a lot more similar to our ASUS Pro
2:55
art 246 q a true 10bit IPS display with
2:59
a 12- bit lookup table than it does to our 25 tww an 8bit native display very
3:05
impressive so far but a monitor product
3:08
page wouldn't be complete without some pure horse plop and Samsung's Mega
3:13
Infinity seriously Dynamic contrast ratio is the stupidest thing I've seen
3:17
in quite some time fortunately they list a static contrast ratio as well and it's
3:22
1,000 to1 which is both fairly respectable and much more believable
3:25
from having used the product let's move on physically the monitor is a mixed bag
3:29
for me the slim bezel and thin overall design is great the semi matat screen is
3:34
just the right mix of anti-glare and vibrant colors and the rearm mounted
3:38
joystick for the onscreen controls works really really well but I sure wish they
3:42
hadn't gone with a glossy bezel and the stands features are very unexceptional
3:46
with tilt only and no support for Swivel
3:50
pivot or even hide adjust which I could have forgiven if they'd included a four-
3:54
screw vase amount on the back so it could be replaced but they didn't
3:58
however I guess I can see why that would have been difficult with how thin the
4:02
monitor is overall at the back of the monitor we find two HDMI inputs and a
4:07
DisplayPort input and along with the power brick Samsung does include cables
4:10
for each of those in the Box a nice touch these can be used one at a time or
4:14
in a couple of unique ways with Samsung touting their unscaled 1080p picture in
4:19
picture mode and their 1920 by 2160
4:23
picture by picture modes as content enjoyment and productivity boosters of
4:28
course you can also scale SC the 1080p picture and picture and move it around
4:32
if you want as well all right so specs are fun but who is this product for
4:37
exactly there aren't really any native 4K movies or TV shows now and there's
4:41
plenty of time for better display options to become available before that
4:45
really happens so while the 590d is a crazy value for a 4k monitor it's still
4:50
pretty pricey and other than high refresh rate gaming grade LCDs you'd be
4:55
hard pressed to find a more expensive TN monitor something that may be a turnoff
5:00
for media Buffs and general consumers but the price really wouldn't be that
5:04
scary to a prosumer user or an entry-level creative professional and 4K
5:09
is a very tempting feature so could it take the place of a value 1440p 27 in
5:15
like the ASUS pb278q which features a PLS panel or even an entry-level
5:20
professional display like the 24in pa49
5:23
Q which comes with a factory calibrated 10bit ah IPS panel wide gamut support
5:28
and some other handy features albeit at a 24in size well short answer no long
5:34
answer the pitfalls of TN are still here
5:38
in spite of the 1 billion color rating side to side viewing angles were strong
5:43
with minimal color shift so from a normal sitting position the screen looks
5:47
quite uniform but vertical viewing
5:51
angles are not good enough for any kind of serious professional work where color
5:56
consistency is needed with color saturation being noticeably High at the
6:00
top of the monitor versus the bottom from a fixed viewing position but
6:05
creative Pros the news isn't all bad from a workflow perspective the extra
6:09
pixels are well I'll put it in the words of my editor edzel I want one and he's
6:14
got a point if you view your new 4k display as an additional piece of
6:18
equipment rather than as a replacement for your existing monitor I think you'll
6:22
be much happier with your purchase check out this Premier layout that is enough
6:26
screen real estate for an unscaled 1080p program plenty of room for Source clips
6:31
and timeline as well as all the little tools you need then when you're done
6:35
with that you just drag it over to a smaller color calibrated display for any
6:39
serious color work and for a little over $1,000 you've got a Super Value
6:44
optimized dual monitor setup for your work and if your work doesn't depend on
6:48
color then there are lots of ways that other professionals might use the extra
6:51
pixels online poker players can leverage the extra space by spreading everything
6:55
out manually or day Traders might use a program like display Fusion to divide it
6:59
up into four virtual 1080p workspaces the sky is the limit the caveat here
7:04
though is that unless your eyes are very very good using it in this manner will
7:08
be difficult and while you can scale up UI elements in Windows so that they're
7:12
larger but just sharper due to the higher pixel density not all programs
7:16
scale text correctly and some will look downright awful but what about games if
7:22
your graphics card can take the heat PC Gamers have had 4K content for years now
7:28
Samsung claims that due to its 1 millisecond grade to grade response
7:31
times you will not notice any lag so this might be a fantastic gaming monitor
7:35
but is it true unfortunately we don't have the gear to test it empirically but
7:39
to give us some idea of what we're working with we pulled out the fairly well regged pb278q and took some high
7:45
speed footage of our two monitors running Far Cry 3 side by side we opted
7:50
to use Samsung's gaming mode for our tests this is a welcome feature that's
7:53
found on many TVs that does slightly reduce image quality but promises less
7:57
lag from the image source and our results are pretty impressive the two
8:01
displays were nearly impossible to distinguish from each other playing back
8:05
even frame by frame at 240 FPS so that's about 4 milliseconds per frame in
8:10
gameplay but when entering and exiting menus we got some interesting Insight
8:14
while the input latency on the PB might be slightly less because the 590 D's
8:19
pixel switch so much faster the image actually reaches the eyes of the gamer
8:24
at the same time or even slightly faster this information combined with this
8:28
monitor's wicked pixel density that all but eliminates the need for
8:31
anti-aliasing translates into a very satisfying gaming experience with very
8:36
little noticeable delay and motion blur the 28d 590d is a solid recommendation
8:42
for gamers just make sure you've got the graphics card muscle and frame buffer to
8:46
back it up which leads us to our conclusion now the same goes Save The
8:51
Best For Last but in this case I actually saved the worst for last I know
8:54
your finger has been itching on that buy button for the last 8 minutes or so and
8:58
if you do Buy buy one please use our affiliate links in the video description
9:02
but only do so if you fully understand the drawbacks of this monitor it may be
9:06
the best value 4K display on the market but it's still pretty expensive and some
9:10
Corners did get cut first up the high quality metal construction of the stand
9:15
is a selling point that seems to be missing on samsung.com and rightfully so
9:19
but can be found on retailer websites including Amazon and NCI the stand is
9:23
indeed made of metal but I wouldn't drive my car over a bridge made of it
9:26
the second big drawback is the uneven appearance of the panel when certain
9:30
uniform colors are displayed thankfully full white and full black are not
9:35
affected but some colors such as dull blue and any shade of gray are affected
9:40
to capture this on camera we did have to shoot from an angle but the effect the
9:44
modeled effect is very noticeable in person even looking at it straight on it
9:48
was actually the first thing I noticed about the monitor when I powered it up for the first time the last thing that
9:53
would delay the purchase for me personally is that the monitor uses
9:56
DisplayPort 1.2 not the upcoming 1.2a
10:00
which is rumored to contain support for AMD's g-sync competitor free sync a
10:04
feature that I would really like to see on any monitor that I spend over $500 on
10:08
for gaming although I mean it's no fault of the monitors it's not available yet
10:12
so with all that out of the way no it's not perfect but if you're okay with all
10:18
that stuff if you want a 4K display on a budget will you be happy with your
10:22
purchase is this worth the asking price compared to other products available in
10:26
the market right now the answer is yes all the yes go buy it now yes it is a
10:32
phenomenally good value anyway guys thank you for watching my team and I
10:36
worked really hard on this video and we hope you enjoyed it if you did please
10:40
like it please share it and if you didn't please dislike it and let us know
10:43
what we can do to make it better in the comments below or on the Forum Linked In
10:47
the video description we do take your constructive criticism very seriously
10:50
also linked in the video description is a support link to buy T-shirts give us a
10:54
monthly contribution or use our affiliate code when you buy random stuff
10:57
on Amazon again guys thanks for watching and as always don't forget to subscribe