Anyone has 27” 4k?

[theluggage]

Edit If you ever read this article, yes it's correct. But even though I am a designer and do professionally UI/UX work, I would never ever get bothered with the issue that's mentioned on the article.

Yeah - if you need to enlarge the image to see the problem then it's probably not a problem unless you plan on climbing on the desk and doing A/B display comparisons with a jeweller's loupe.

...and, anyway, switching screen mode to suit whatever task you're doing takes seconds, GPU load is a minor issue on an M1 or a discrete GPU and battery consumption is irrelevant unless you're plan on powering your 27" display with foot pedals...

 

[Christopher Kim]

You've gotten some great advice in this thread. I've used a 27 LG 4K monitor (UD68) for 5+ years now, running scaled at "Looks like 2560 x 1440" the entire time. First with my 2016 13" MBP, and recently with the new 14" M1 Pro MBP.

Both look fantastic with scaled 1440p (which as others have mentioned, renders a 5K image that's downsampled to 4K, and looks much better than a 27" native 1440p monitor). Text is not blurry at all. And honestly, I can barely tell the difference in crispness vs when I run it at "Looks like 1920 x 1080", which would be true pixel-doubling.

And as others mentioned, I think "Looks like 1920 x 1080" on a 27" monitor, icons and text is just too large, not worth the loss in real estate.

Now that Apple has released the new Studio Display 27" 5K monitor, you have a better alternative to the LG 5K Ultrafine. Still a huge difference in price as there are a ton of 27" 4K monitors <$500, so up to you. But in my opinion, if you're on a budget, 27" 4K off your 14" MBP run at "Looks like 1440p" looks really good and you wouldn't be disappointed.

 

[Danfango]

That studio display wants me. If it was 250 GBP cheaper I'd buy it. But no.

 

[torontomax]

I think studio display is a decent monitor but you can also get high end low ms, %97 p3, 120 hz lg monitor for 700 gbp. Plus it has an hdmi port. Still too expensive for an extra webcam?

 

[czerney]

Ok, but did you try them with looks like 1440p as they above are with 4K?

Yep, but because I want more usable realestate I'm scaling to 3008x1692p. I'm running off a mbp 2018 6 core and I'm getting poor performance - especially on the second connected screen massive mouse cursor/window drag lag. Issues I'm also having it fans running almost at full non-stop. I'm still waiting for my 38" screen to arrive.

To be fair the screens are great, and highly reccommended if 4k x 27" is what you want.

 

[sb in ak]

I went for a higher quality 2k vs lower quality 4k for photo editing and not disappointed with my choice. Text seems totally fine to me.

 

[Danfango]

That studio display wants me. If it was 250 GBP cheaper I'd buy it. But no.

Replying to my own post. Got drunk, bought it. Doh!

 

[TechRunner]

But in my opinion, if you're on a budget, 27" 4K off your 14" MBP run at "Looks like 1440p" looks really good and you wouldn't be disappointed.

I'm shopping this scenario right now myself. My 24" 2K monitor has met my needs fine, but I'm looking forward to larger screen real estate and crisper text. Thanks for sharing your experience!

 

[rugbylad28]

Just wanted to chime in and say that I use two 27" 4K displays at "looks like 2560x1440" and I am very happy.

Ideally, I would also like to have a 5K display so that the 2560p would look retina-crisp --- too bad there aren't any affordable 5K displays in the market yet. My father uses a 5K iMac and it looks amazing.

How do you connect to two external monitors. I'm currently doing it using DisplayLink driver and a Dell6000 with 2x display port.
1x 27" 4k Phillips using BetterDummy as find 4k Res too small UI.
1x 27" 1080p LG.

Happy to hear your setup

 

[ignatius345]

Knoll Sapper single arm VESA mount (£30 off ebay - didn't buy a new one!)

Nice looking. And it sounds like you got quite a deal on it. Is it pretty stable? My big hesitation with clamp-on arms like that is that the monitor would bounce around.

 

[mcnuggetswithcheese]

How do you connect to two external monitors. I'm currently doing it using DisplayLink driver and a Dell6000 with 2x display port.
1x 27" 4k Phillips using BetterDummy as find 4k Res too small UI.
1x 27" 1080p LG.

Happy to hear your setup

I'm using a 2019 MBP 16" where a
- 27" Dell U2720QM is connected via USB-C, and a
- 27" LG 27UD68-P is connected via a USB-C to DP adapter

 

[badsimian]

I have an LG 5K and a Hauwei Mateview 28.2 which is 4K+ (3840x2560)...the 4kish one is slightly blurrier than the 5K and noticeable side by side but not worth bothering about. No way would I ever go back to low DPI 1440 monitors now though. It's like the ultrawides people keep espousing - they are basically 2 low res 1440p monitors stitched together - awful.
Previously I had a 32" 4K and it was blurrier than my current mateview one, I would stick at 4K at 27" to keep the DPI up.

 

[jov23]

I have an Asus ProArt PA279CV 4k 27inch and it's scaled it to 2560x1440. No blurry text and everything is crystal clear and very sharp. My boyfriend has the same monitor, same model but 2k, and definitively you can see the blurry text and the blurry icons. So, based on my objective review using 2 same monitors (one is 4k and the other 2k) its better the 4k even if you scale it to 2k. I have actually M1 16gb Mac mini.

Edit: my boyfriend has it native 2k and I have it scaled to 2k. So, is a direct comparison.

Finally, someone that might be able to answer my question! I have two PA278QV for work, one on Windows and one on a Mac. The windows fonts look great, the mac fonts look terrible and my eyes are shot by the end of the day. When I try to scale the display, I don't get the nicer scaling (Larger Text...Smaller Size) options, just the specific resolutions. I'm not sure what causes that, is it the 2K vs 4K resolution?

I'll buy the 4K version if it makes the fonts look better and saves my eyes, but I wanted to make sure that it looks good and the fonts look nice on the PA279CV.

Thanks!

 

[elmarjazz]

I went for a higher quality 2k vs lower quality 4k for photo editing and not disappointed with my choice. Text seems totally fine to me.

Wish the APPLE Studio Display was more affordable and made this an easy decision. I ended up going in the opposite direction and bought a used [like new and in the box] 2015 Thunderbolt Display For $200. I thought I'd be missing something but was very surprised by how good it is for photography and video viewing and editing. No, the text is not the sharpest I'd like, but I'm working a couple of feet away from the screen and not pixel peeping.

 

[cababah]

I have a 32" LG Ultrafine 4k and it looks great at normal viewing distance, text is very sharp and clear. I got it 25% off so it was a good grab!

 

[ctjack]

It is quite surprising how the similar spec displays do so differently in real life. I have 2 1080P displays(one dell another LG) and both have the same technology and so on. But Dell is much better image and better for eyes, while LG is probably 2-3 times worse. Lg at home and dell in the office.

 

[Fishrrman]

sb wrote in #56 above:
"I went for a higher quality 2k vs lower quality 4k for photo editing and not disappointed with my choice. Text seems totally fine to me."

Which display did you buy?

 

[pshufd]

I have 2xDell U2718Q, 1xDell U2720Q, a 5k iMac and a QHD iMac. The first three are 4k and these are all 27 inch displays. I run the 4k monitors at native resolution, the 5k at 2800x1800, and the QHD at native resolution. The 4k monitors are for displaying graphics, not really text and my application works well on it. I personally think that 2K @ 27 inches is fine for what most people do and I've run into many that are happy with it, particularly folks with Intel Macs as 4k monitors can get the fans spinning.

What you're doing on the monitor makes a big difference.

 

[Christopher Kim]

I have two PA278QV for work, one on Windows and one on a Mac. The windows fonts look great, the mac fonts look terrible and my eyes are shot by the end of the day. When I try to scale the display, I don't get the nicer scaling (Larger Text...Smaller Size) options, just the specific resolutions. I'm not sure what causes that, is it the 2K vs 4K resolution?

I'll buy the 4K version if it makes the fonts look better and saves my eyes, but I wanted to make sure that it looks good and the fonts look nice on the PA279CV.

Looks like the PA278QV is a 2K / 2560x1440 monitor. So on macOS you will not get access to HiDPI resolutions. macOS only allows that if you have a high-resolution 4k or higher monitor.

To be clear, what macOS does is pixel-doubles the resolution (so 2560 x 1440 becomes 5120 x 2880), uses that to do certain smoothing (as now every original pixel now has 4 pixels to work with), and then downscales that 5K image down to the 4K screen. Wouldn’t do anything on a 2K screen as it would just be 2560 x 1440 doubled to 5120 x 2880, then downscaled back to the original 2560 x 1440.

 

[AstroRexaur]

Finally, someone that might be able to answer my question! I have two PA278QV for work, one on Windows and one on a Mac. The windows fonts look great, the mac fonts look terrible and my eyes are shot by the end of the day. When I try to scale the display, I don't get the nicer scaling (Larger Text...Smaller Size) options, just the specific resolutions. I'm not sure what causes that, is it the 2K vs 4K resolution?

I'll buy the 4K version if it makes the fonts look better and saves my eyes, but I wanted to make sure that it looks good and the fonts look nice on the PA279CV.

Thanks!

Yeah, it is that, 2k resolution makes text blurry vs 4k resolution. Initially i bought the 2k and the blurry text/icons was driving me crazy, then exchanged it to the 4k one, problem solved!

 

[Dutch60]

I went for a higher quality 2k vs lower quality 4k for photo editing and not disappointed with my choice. Text seems totally fine to me.

That’s exactly what I’m thinking about. Also photography. I have used iMacs (27” 5k), for years now. At the moment I’m thinking about getting an Eizo CG2700S which is their new 2k monitor. Together with a Mac Studio, this could be a nice combination. I was (and still am a little) im doubt about going 4k Eizo or 2k Eizo. The more and more I read, the more convinced I get. It feels like a step back (4k to 2k), but it probably isn’t at all; 2k could very well be better than 4k for photography
Interesting thread!