We have always maintained that a gaming monitor is the final piece of the puzzle when you put together a gaming set-up. A good portion of your budget, when building your rig, should always go to a good gaming monitor. A good gaming monitor can make or break your gaming experience, it is that important.
For gaming, you want something immersive, and fast. You want something that looks good as well in that sense. If you have something that does colours well, you might be able to rely on it for content work too, if you are into that kind of stuff. But finding a good balance in those areas are quite difficult. Not with the Predator X38 S.
The Predator X38 S
Predator’s latest high-end gaming monitor followed a rather similar strategy as before. Pack the best of everything in an ultrawide form factor. For that, you get a rather vivid IPS panel that is curved to 2300R.
That IPS panel boasts UWQHD+ (3,840 by 1,600 pixels) resolution, just slightly more the regular ultra-wide QHD panels. It is also a higher resolution than before, this 37.5-inch curved panel. Still, IPS panels boasts up to 178o in viewing angles, so you would not be getting any sort of distortion anywhere you turn to anyway.
Predator has tuned the display to be as colour accurate as possible. It covers up to 98% of DCI-P3 colour gamut. It even has a Delta E<2 as well for colours so accurate you might have mistaken the images on your screen as the real thing. At DisplayHDR 600 and a maximum of 600 nits in brightness, images really come to live.
Of course, a gaming display must be a fast one. The NVIDIDA G-SYNC ULTIMATE display can be overclocked up to 175Hz refresh rate to not only ensure that images are tear free, but also silky smooth. It boasts a G-to-G response rate as low as 0.3 ms for almost instant responses between mouse clicks and action. There is even the NVIDIA G-SYNC Esports Mode that is designed to lower latency and improves details in dark scenes.
Of course, Acer’s most premium technologies to protect the eyes of its users are packed in with the Predator X38 S. LightSense and ColourSense automatically adjusts the screen’s brightness and colour temperature depending on the conditions around the display.
The Acer Nitro XZ342CUP
If you feel like the Predator X38 S is a little too premium for your tastes, you can strain a little and go for Acer’s Nitro XZ342CUP 34-inch display. It features a QHD resolution at a regular 16:9 aspect ratio, which is still rather respectable. It is still quite a fast display at 144Hz refresh rate and 1ms VRB response time.
To ensure you get a tear-free gaming experience, the 34-incher offers AMD’s FreeSync technology. At the same time, Acer’s Flicker-less technology should keep images crisp and flicker free in any sort of conditions. There is also the Acer BluelightShield and ComfyView technologies to keep your eyes healthy.
Price and Availability
The Predator X38 S is now available for MYR 5,999. You can get your hands on one from Acer’s eStore, authorized retail partners nationwide, or official online stores on Shopee and Lazada. There are no colour options here, but at least the X38 S looks good in black.
The Nitro XZ342CUP is also now available in Malaysia. It will set you back MYR 1,799. You can find it in Acer’s eStore as well as official online stores on Shopee and Lazada. If you still prefer a physical buying experience, you can visit Acer’s authorized retailers nationwide for that. Again, there are no colour options here, just a regular black display with red coloured support pillar.