JABO

Loved this review, as it helped me pick this monitor for my 2024 MacMini M4Pro. I wanted good refresh rates for my son’s games, clear text for his homework & my computer use, but also a 4K for the best video playback quality off a Mac. I am nervous moving out of the Apple ecosystem to an LG, but all Apple displays seem to be fixed at 60hrz refresh, so they’re not as useful to our current needs.

I’m a total nube at all these settings, so this helped a ton. I have 3 quick questions, apologies if they are far too basic. I returned a display and picked up a new one so these comments are about both New and Previous.

1. New Display: Using the LG HDMI 2.1 cable, the image quality being high has what appears to be a layer or film-like element over the video when playing on a streaming service (Disney+, etc.) Adjusting the macOS Display to full 4K, changing the refresh from 120 to 240, HDR on or off, seems to make a difference, but i wonder why? I do also looked at the LG software to adjust the Brightness, Black, etc. If you have any idea what this could be, that would be helpful. (I did see your comments to a Nov 3 question)

2. New Display: Same streaming service playback, there appears to be some distortion above & below the letterbox video window. I’m not sure if this occurred on the Previous display, but i’m hyper sensitive now (this is an expensive display, so i’m now more attentive). When watching in QuickTime video player, nothing, my son’s games, nothing. Just seems to be in a web browser (I use both Opera & Safari)

3. Previous Display: I read comments (below: Sept 17 comment) about some vertical lines below a video playback which is helpful, but i returned this display because of a single green pixel that appears dead centre. 2 weeks in, there it was. After my son played some games, it was gone. I did some stuck pixel software run & the “gentle rubbing screen”, etc, which had no effect. Was this a signal of a serious problem to come? In addition, my son plays games at 240. On his account, half the screen was lighter than the other half. he said it was there day 1 then gone, but came back around the time this stuck green pixel appeared. My question; was this a “good” reason to return the display? If it appears in my new one, any suggestions?

BTW, i didn’t do the calibration you recommended above, but i would like too. It seems quite expensive to find the equipment, is it common for some companies to do this as a service? (no, you don’t have to answer that one! LOL!) Sincerely, RD67

Nov 18, 2024 04:55 PM By yawnny

5

Thanks for the reply! Two questions:

1. Do you put your ear up to the front of the monitor initially and leave it at that, or do you put your ear near the back vent first to see if there’s a noise, then gauge if it’s audible from a listening position?
2. Is the room you test in a separate room from the larger warehouse like room that contains all the other monitors on test benches. Would you describe the room as even somewhat echo-ey? Keep up the great work

We listen to the monitors from the back, even putting our ears up to the vents to see if there’s any noticeable noise. Our testing rooms are separate from our lab inventory, and are pretty standard rooms in terms of echo. You can see some examples of our testing rooms here.

Nov 18, 2024 04:05 PM By  Nicholas Di Giovanni

Hey! Right now we test for fan or coil whine noise by putting our ear up to the monitor to see if there’s any noticeable sound. We don’t have a soundproof room like yours, but it’s still fairly quiet. We don’t have any plans to come up with an official test for it right now, but we could consider it in the future, thanks for sharing!

Thanks for the reply! Two questions:

1. Do you put your ear up to the front of the monitor initially and leave it at that, or do you put your ear near the back vent first to see if there’s a noise, then gauge if it’s audible from a listening position?
2. Is the room you test in a separate room from the larger warehouse like room that contains all the other monitors on test benches. Would you describe the room as even somewhat echo-ey?

Keep up the great work

Nov 18, 2024 12:14 PM By yawnny

5

Hey Rtings! I’d like to know more about your testing methodology for fan or coil whine noise. This is yet another monitor where I hear a noise from the back of it, this time it’s the fan itself (as opposed to the coil whine I heard on the Gigabyte M32U). Small laptop fans are usually used for monitors (when they put a fan in the monitor) an they almost always make noise. I find it hard to believe that you genuinely don’t hear any noise and it made me curious as to the environment you’re in and testing you do to validate noise. I have a widely acoustically treated room – 2x4’ sound baffles packed with rock-wool safe and sound, all around my listening area – it’s a dead sounding room. When there is no other noise (e.g. no AC unit, Computer fan, furnace, washing machine, etc…) the fan is certainly audible. It doesn’t change in pitch ,it’s just the sound of a small fan whirring. It’s not even that loud, but if one is irritable that day and chooses to focus on it then the buyers remorse kicks in, and resentment of lack of proper testing done by reviewers in this area. If I’m feeling especially accepting of hardware limitations on a morning with a cup of coffee then I can choose to ignore it, but it’s there. This is not a knock on your methodologies – this is simply a feature request for enhancing and further rising above other reviewers – which you’re doing great thus far) I think your testing should be in a very silent, acoustically treated room (doesn’t have to be overboard in an anechoic chamber or something – just some panels from GIK Acoustics or similar), and show a video from your phone (or some other speaker) that includes the speaker, and showing the speaker then move to the back or top of the monitor (wherever the vent and fan placement is) to really prove there is no noise. This would take the subjective and simple statement of “didn’t hear noise” to a more objective area that other people can heard for themselves. Most of the people that state they don’t hear a noise I believe fall into one of several camps.

1. They have environment noise (higher noise floor room) that cancels out or masks the fan noise (or coil whine if applicable)
2. Their hearing is such that they don’t hear the specific frequency of the monitor (imperfect hearing)
3. They’ve never not had music or headphones on and really sat in any form of silence to hear the noise
4. Tolerance from some folks who genuinely don’t care (this is not a bad thing),or figure that ‘stuff makes noise’ and it simply doesn’t bother them (again, not a bad thing) I went through 4 Gigabyte M32U’s and they all had identical coil whine, but it was never mentioned in the review. Now with the LG 32GS95UE you mention no fan noise, and I’d like to see proof of testing to validate. Thanks for taking the time to read!

Hey! Right now we test for fan or coil whine noise by putting our ear up to the monitor to see if there’s any noticeable sound. We don’t have a soundproof room like yours, but it’s still fairly quiet. We don’t have any plans to come up with an official test for it right now, but we could consider it in the future, thanks for sharing!

Nov 03, 2024 09:14 AM By SharpEars

8

Just out of curiosity, how are OLED owners dealing with the inability of Windows ClearType to cope with RGWB sub-pixel layouts in order to get Windows to produce text that is comparable in sharpness to RGB layouts on VA panels? I am considering an upgrade to an OLED from multiple IPS and VA panels, but will use them dual purpose and for me text legibility for small font sizes at 4k (UHD) as well as color gamut (DCI-P3) and color accuracy are top ticket items. I couldn’t care less about refresh rates above 60 Hz.

Hi! I wanted to give my 2 cents towards the text sharpness on OLEDs discussion. I have a 27" 1440P Asus PG27AQDM and indeed the color fringing and text sharpness is not great and was a big point of disappointment as I also used it for work and for gaming. I even found that after a couple hours it would be increasing eye fatigue because the text was so sub-par. I had the same issue with my LG B6 (2016 OLED), and LG C1 (2021 OLED).

All this being said, with the new WOLED subpixel layout of the LG 32GS95UE the aforementioned fringing and sub-par text quality is nearly completely remedied About 98% of the way towards being as good as the IPS panels I’m familiar with. No more eye fatigue, and obvious color fringing – e.g. yellow folders in Windows explorer, or anything yellow really – where you would clearly see a red line on the left border – are gone.

The RTINGS review seems to back this up as well in their ‘text clarity’ section noting that color fringing is nearly gone and imperceptible to most.

Now if the LG 32GS95UE could just be built without a fan and implement passive cooling I would be a very happy camper. As it stands right now I’m on the fence about returning it due to the subtle but still apparent fan noise. Likely keeping it due to the fan noise not being noticeable when any audio is going (ie: brown noise, or anything else).

Hey Rtings! I’d like to know more about your testing methodology for fan or coil whine noise. This is yet another monitor where I hear a noise from the back of it, this time it’s the fan itself (as opposed to the coil whine I heard on the Gigabyte M32U). Small laptop fans are usually used for monitors (when they put a fan in the monitor) an they almost always make noise.

I find it hard to believe that you genuinely don’t hear any noise and it made me curious as to the environment you’re in and testing you do to validate noise. I have a widely acoustically treated room – 2x4’ sound baffles packed with rock-wool safe and sound, all around my listening area – it’s a dead sounding room. When there is no other noise (e.g. no AC unit, Computer fan, furnace, washing machine, etc…) the fan is certainly audible. It doesn’t change in pitch ,it’s just the sound of a small fan whirring. It’s not even that loud, but if one is irritable that day and chooses to focus on it then the buyers remorse kicks in, and resentment of lack of proper testing done by reviewers in this area.

If I’m feeling especially accepting of hardware limitations on a morning with a cup of coffee then I can choose to ignore it, but it’s there.

This is not a knock on your methodologies – this is simply a feature request for enhancing and further rising above other reviewers – which you’re doing great thus far)

I think your testing should be in a very silent, acoustically treated room (doesn’t have to be overboard in an anechoic chamber or something – just some panels from GIK Acoustics or similar), and show a video from your phone (or some other speaker) that includes the speaker, and showing the speaker then move to the back or top of the monitor (wherever the vent and fan placement is) to really prove there is no noise. This would take the subjective and simple statement of “didn’t hear noise” to a more objective area that other people can heard for themselves.

Most of the people that state they don’t hear a noise I believe fall into one of several camps.

1. They have environment noise (higher noise floor room) that cancels out or masks the fan noise (or coil whine if applicable)
2. Their hearing is such that they don’t hear the specific frequency of the monitor (imperfect hearing)
3. They’ve never not had music or headphones on and really sat in any form of silence to hear the noise
4. Tolerance from some folks who genuinely don’t care (this is not a bad thing),or figure that ‘stuff makes noise’ and it simply doesn’t bother them (again, not a bad thing)

I went through 4 Gigabyte M32U’s and they all had identical coil whine, but it was never mentioned in the review. Now with the LG 32GS95UE you mention no fan noise, and I’d like to see proof of testing to validate.

Thanks for taking the time to read!