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Yes, it's a 400 dollar 34" monitor. Expecting anything more for this price is just silly.
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I wouldn't say it's a silly expectation. While an expectation of an IPS at this price is silly, there are higher refresh rate options at $400.
At $400, there are other gaming ultrawide options:
- Acer ED347CKR 34" w/ a native refresh rate of 100 hz goes on sale for $350-400 a lot, I see it on SD all the time, pretty sure even last week.
- Monoprice Zero-G 35" or the Massdrop Vast 35". Both go on sale for $400 regularly, are native 100 hz w/ Freesync, capable of OC'ing to 120 hz w/o Freesync, and they use the exact same panel, AU Optronics M350QVR01.1, as the HP Omen X35 (OOS on Amazon, $1000 on HP website lol), BenQ EX3501R ($600 on Amazon), Asus ROG Strix XG35VQ ($750 on Amazon). I have owned the Monoprice 35" previously. While the colors weren't the best, some backlight bleeding, the blacks looked great and I loved gaming on it. I believe I got more than my money's worth before I accidentally broke it when I was moving, hence my knowledge on this specific panel lol.
Refer to this for a comparison between some of the monitors I listed:
https://www.displayspecifications...41f8120ff6
This monitor specifically has 10 bit color which is it's best selling point I'd say, but it is also flat, unlike all of the monitors I listed above, and the curve actually makes a difference once you start getting up to a 34" ultrawides unlike the 23-24" 1080p monitors you see a lot that are curved. Especially with a VA panel, colors really start suffering if you're not looking straight at it due to it's horrid viewing angles which is where the curve helps on such a wide screen. So you may get 10 bit color, you'd get worse viewing angles + lower refresh rate versus other gaming ultrawides you can get at this price, and colors will look worse on the left/right edges of your screen if you're sitting facing the middle of the screen due to the lack of curve. This monitor also has a peak brightness of 350 nits - the Vesa DisplayHDR standard minimum is 400 nits so while it can process HDR, how well it does it is another question.
With all that being said, I haven't used a 10 bit color monitor so I do not know how much of a difference there is, but I do know jumping from 60 to 75 to 120 to 144 to 240 hz (just got the AW2521HF few days ago) throughout my years of gaming that the jump from 75 to 120 hz or even just 100 hz is massive. If I'm on a budget, I would personally prioritize higher refresh rate way higher than better color accuracy, at least up to 120-144hz, but to each their own. This monitor should be marketed as a budget productivity ultrawide rather than as a gaming monitor in my opinion.
Sorry for rambling, but I hope this info was helpful for anyone who's looking for a budget gaming 1440p ultrawide.
EDIT: And wow, didn't even know about the AOC 144hz, that's a steal. The monitors I listed are a little bit more outdated I think.