Asus VG248QE 24-inch Full HD Ergonomic Back-lit LED Gaming Monitor

I bought this monitor off Newegg, I’m just going to past my review here from there. […]

Pros: This monitor is a godsend for people who hate screen tearing, but also hate vsync. Being able to play up to 144fps with neither one is utterly fantastic. The 1ms response time and (roughly) 7ms latency (basing that number off a review of the older brother to this monitor, the VG278HE) means you are getting one of the fastest and most responsive monitors on the market.

If you search around on a few forums you can find talk of a “hack” to the nvidia lightboost that this monitor supports. Normally lightboost is for 3D, but when playing in 2D you can “hack” it to enable the strobing backlight, which ends up eliminating almost every bit of motion blur and other such flaws of your typical LCD. I haven’t tried it myself as I do not use an nvidia card, but people who have used it all rave about it being “like a CRT!” I can tell you that this monitor is more than worthy of gaming without the hack, but it’s something to consider.

Cons: As to be expected of a TN panel, the colors are a bit lacking. I’ve seen far worse, but if you’ve used an IPS panel then you’ve also seen better. After hardware calibration (monitor menu settings) it is plenty suitable for games, and after software calibration (via device like a Spyder4 or similar) then it would be suitable for non-professional color work on images and video. It has a bit of banding towards the darker shades of black, but it’s not a huge deal. Dropping an egg for it though.

If you are like me, and currently can only afford to calibrate via the monitor settings and not a Spyder4, I’ll save you some time and tell you how I have calibrated mine using a variety of free calibration tools on the internet:

First, make sure you are using “Standard” mode. DO NOT use any of the other modes unless you really need access to any of the locked-out settings (you shouldn’t). “Night View Mode” in particular is VERY BAD and will destroy your black levels completely.

Brightness: 55 (feel free to adjust this one up or down based on preference)
Contrast: 88
Color Temp.: User Mode – Red 90/Green 90/Blue 90 (this monitor is wonderfully neutral, I was surprised)
Smart View: Off
TraceFree: 60 (40 is also good, and might be more desirable for non-gaming instances of motion on-screen)

Other Thoughts: I had previously purchased the VG278HE, but it had a really unfortunate problem with the pixel inversion pattern. Specifically, any time there was fast motion on the screen, these vertical, black, interweaving lines would appear on the screen, and from a subjective point of view it would feel almost as if your resolution had been cut in half. Sill images were unaffected.

I returned that monitor after I had discovered the newly released VG248QE, which was much cheaper due to the smaller size and does not suffer the same pixel inversion pattern issue as the older brother. To be fair, I can still see the inversion pattern on this monitor if I am a few inches away and trying hard to see it, but when viewed from a normal usage distance you can not see it at all. Every monitor has this pixel inversion pattern, some are just more prone to it being visible than others.

1080p is more fitting of this 24 inch panel anyway, 27 inches starts to beg for 1440p at least.

I won’t make a huge review. It’s a great “gaming” monitor. If you want an outstanding picture stick to an IPS monitor. This one is designed for response time. You can tweak the colors and get it close to a regular monitor, but the colors will always seem a little washed out. The 144hz is for the DISPLAY PORT and DVI ONLY. The HDMI port is only HDMI 1.4 and cannot handle 1080p over 60hz. I tried with an HDMI 1.4b 4K stream box. The HDMI port will not go over 60hz, as it is not fast enough. You are not dead in the water though. IF, you have an HDMI device that needs more banwidth you can buy a DVI-D to HDMI 1.4b adapter. This worked for what I needed. I made sure the cable and adapter with both 1.4b and it worked at 120hz. I just bought a DVI-D to Display Port adapter for my PC, and it runs at 144hz fine.

Such an awesome monitor after you change the color profile.

I used a thread I found on Reddit, and this monitor looks GREAT now.

http://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace/comments/1wxse9/just_bought_a_glorious_asus_vg248qe_gaming/cf6c6gv