ASUS CG32UQ

Interlace pattern artifacts

On some monitors, particularly but not exclusively those with high refresh rates, interlace patterns can be seen during certain transitions. We refer to these as ‘interlace pattern artifacts’ but some users refer to them as ‘inversion artifacts’ and others as ‘scan lines’. They may appear as an interference pattern, mesh or interlaced lines which break up a given shade into a darker and lighter version of what is intended. They often catch the eye due to their dynamic nature, on models where they manifest themselves in this way. Alternatively, static interlace patterns may be seen with some shades appearing as faint horizontal or vertical bands of a slightly lighter and slightly darker version of the intended shade. We did not observe either artifact type on this monitor.

Responsiveness

Input lag

A small utility called SMTT 2.0 was used alongside a sensitive camera compare the latency of the CG32UQ with a screen of known latency. To help maximise accuracy, over 30 repeat readings were taken. Using this method, we calculated 8.71ms (a bit over 1/2 a frame at 60Hz) of input lag. Adaptive-Sync being active or not made no measurable difference – we also tested briefly using HDMI and observed similar results. Note that we do not have a way to accurately measure input lag with FreeSync active in a variable refresh rate environment nor with HDR active in an HDR environment. This input lag value reflects both the element of input lag you ‘feel’ (signal delay) and that which you see (pixel responsiveness). It indicates a reasonably low signal delay, significantly below that of many TVs, which most users should be fine with.

Perceived blur (pursuit photography)

In our article on responsiveness, we explore key concepts surrounding monitor responsiveness. A particularly important content is explored in this article; ‘perceived blur’. This is contributed to by both eye movement as you track motion on the screen and by pixel responsiveness. On modern monitors eye movement is the dominant cause of perceived blur, although pixel responsiveness also plays an important role. A photography method called ‘pursuit photography’ is also explored, using a moving rather than stationary camera to capture motion on a monitor in a way that reflects both key elements of perceived blur. This contrasts with static photography or videos, which only reflect pixel responsiveness.

The images below are pursuit photographs taken using the UFO Motion Test for ghosting, with the test running at 960 pixels per second. This is a good practical speed for capturing such photographs and highlights both elements of perceived blur nicely. The UFOs move across the screen from left to right at a frame rate matching the refresh rate of the display. All background shade levels (dark, medium and light) were used with the monitor set to all 6 of its ‘OD’ settings. The final two columns are references. The first shows the similar Philips 326M6VJRMB, set to its optimal response time setting. The second shows the ViewSonic XG240R, a fast TN model set to its optimal response time setting. This monitor shows how things look where pixel responsiveness isn’t really a limiting factor, particularly for the dark background (top row).



The UFO appears soft without clear internal detailing, reflecting a moderate amount of perceived blur due to eye (camera) movement. Varying levels of trailing can be seen behind the object. This includes some ‘heavy powdery’ trailing, most noticeable on the dark background. And some instances of ‘light powdery trailing’. This ‘powdery’ trailing is reduced by increasing the ‘OD’ (overdrive) setting, although it is replaced with overshoot (inverse ghosting). Looking at this testing but also more broadly, we settled on ‘OD’ at ‘Level 2’. This sped up the pixel responses compared to slower settings, reducing the trailing without introducing too much overshoot. There was still a fair amount of ‘powdery’ trailing for the dark background and to some extent the medium background (middle row) with this setting. But ‘Level 3’ provided some unsightly overshoot in practice without massively cutting down on this ‘powdery’ trailing. In this test you can see a dark ‘shadowy’ overshoot trail behind the UFO for the medium background using ‘Level 3’ and an increase in the bright ‘halo trail’ behind the UFO for the light background (bottom row). This halo trail is quite faint in this example – but considering a broader range of transitions there were some more obvious examples of this. ‘Level 4’ increased the overshoot, particularly strengthening the ‘dirty trailing’. ‘Level 5’ introduced extremely obvious and colourful overshoot trailing, with eye-catching inky blue and bright cyan components behind the UFO. At ‘Level 2’, which we consider optimal, things are quite close to on the Philips reference screen if a little more responsive in the transitions shown here.

Note that we will not be including a section on overclocking, as the monitor refused to run above 60Hz at its native resolution or indeed lower resolutions such as Full HD.

Responsiveness in games and movies

On Battlefield V (BFV) the monitor provided a moderate level of perceived blur. This was mainly tied to eye movement and as expected within the constraints of the 60Hz refresh rate. There were some weaknesses beyond this related to pixel responsiveness, though. Most transitions were performed fast enough for a good 60Hz performance, without significant trailing. For most transitions, involving medium and lighter shades, there was either no noticeable trailing or just a little faint ‘powdery’ trailing in places. There were more pronounced weaknesses where darker shades were involved, however. There were examples of ‘heavy powdery trailing’ which sometimes took on a ‘smeary’ appearance. For example observing a dark tree trunk with a moonlit sky in the background. Or heavily saturated shades with a lighter background, such as a vibrant orange paint against a much lighter wooden background. There was a little ‘break-up’ trailing in places as well, where some hues from the very dark shade (or the lighter background) appeared to separate out during motion. A bit like wetting a page with water soluble ink on it. This was quite constrained on this model, less widespread and noticeable than on some VA models.

If you compare to some of the weaker ~60Hz VA performers (such as the Philips BDM4037UW and AOC Q3279VWF), the weaknesses were much less dramatic. Slightly weaker pixel response performance overall than on the Philips 328E1CA, although not massively so. And comparable to the Philips 326M6VJRMB using optimal settings if not a little stronger. The video review section below runs through some of the strengths and weaknesses of the monitor’s response performance, using BFV as an example.

On Shadow of the Tomb Raider we made similar observations. Darker shades are common on this title as there are plenty of dimly lit and shaded areas. This brought out some of the more distinct weaknesses, such as the ‘smeary’ appearance to some of the trailing. This was not as extended (‘smoke-like’) or widespread as on some VA models, though, and we didn’t really find it detracted from the gameplay on this title. It is, as with many things when it comes to monitors, very subjective. Transitions involving brighter and medium shades were handled rapidly. On this title and indeed BFV we noticed a little overshoot in places, such as some ‘halo’ trailing that is slightly brighter than the object or background shades. And some ‘dirty trailing’ that was slightly darker. But this was not eye-catching using our preferred ‘OD’ setting at 60Hz. It’s worth noting, too, that weaknesses in pixel responsiveness don’t always exhibit themselves as a distinct trailing on VA models such as this. Where there is a fine mixture of dark and medium shades, such as thatched rooftops or certain areas of vegetation, there are perceived brightness changes during motion that can appear as a flickering during gradual movement of the character. This won’t bother everyone, but it worth noting – it’s more eye-catching during HDR due to the higher luminance levels.

We also observed a range of video content, including ~24-30fps content (Netflix etc.) and 60fps content (YouTube). The higher refresh rate content showcased similar weaknesses to our in-game testing, whereas for the lower frame rate content the pixel responses were fast enough to avoid any noteworthy issues. We didn’t really feel the weaknesses detracted from our enjoyment of watching said video content on this model, the strong static contrast and vibrant colour output will be more noticeable to most users. This will apply to the gaming experience for many users, too.

FreeSync – the technology and activating it

AMD FreeSync is a variable refresh rate technology, an AMD-specific alternative to Nvidia G-SYNC. Where possible, the monitor dynamically adjusts its refresh rate so that it matches the frame rate being outputted by the GPU. Both our responsiveness article and the G-SYNC article linked to explore the importance of these two elements being synchronised. At a basic level, a mismatch between the frame rate and refresh rate can cause stuttering (VSync on) or tearing and juddering (VSync off). FreeSync also boasts reduced latency compared to running with VSync enabled, in the variable frame rate environment in which it operates.

FreeSync requires a compatible AMD GPU such as the Radeon RX 580 used in our test system. There is a list of GPUs which support the technology here, with the expectation that future AMD GPUs will support the feature too. The monitor itself must support ‘VESA Adaptive-Sync’ for at least one of its display connectors, as this is the protocol that FreeSync uses. The CG32UQ supports FreeSync via DP and HDMI on compatible GPUs and systems. Note that HDR can be activated (at the same time as FreeSync) on GPUs and systems with DP 1.4 or HDMI 2.0. If fully installed, AMD drivers feature Radeon Settings, which makes activation of the technology very simple and something that usually occurs automatically. First make sure that you have ‘FreeSync’ set to ‘ON’ in the ’Gaming section of the OSD. You should then make sure the GPU driver is setup correctly to use FreeSync, so open ‘AMD Radeon Settings’ and click on ‘Display’. You should then ensure that the first slider, ‘AMD FreeSync’, is set to ‘On’. If you hover over this, it will also report the variable refresh rate display supported by the display.



The ASUS supports a variable refresh rate range of 40 – 60Hz. That means that if the game is running between 40fps and 60fps, the monitor will adjust its refresh rate to match. When the frame rate rises above 60fps, the monitor will stay at 60Hz and the GPU will respect your selection of ‘VSync on’ or ‘VSync off’ in the graphics driver. With ‘VSync on’ the frame rate will not be allowed to rise above 60fps, at which point VSync activates and imposes the usual associated latency penalty. With ‘VSync off’ the frame rate is free to climb as high as the GPU will output (potentially >60fps). LFC (Low Frame Rate Compensation) is not supported by this monitor, as that requires the upper limit (ceiling) to be at least 2x the lower limit (floor) of FreeSync operation. FreeSync is therefore deactivated if the frame rate falls below 40fps, with the monitor then respecting your choice of VSync and presenting you with either stuttering (VSync on) or juddering and tearing (VSync off).

VSync is configured in the ‘Gaming’ section of ‘Radeon Settings’, where it is referred to as ‘Wait for Vertical Refresh’. You can either configure this globally under ‘Global Settings’ or for each game individually. The default is ‘Off, unless application specifies’ which means that VSync will only be active if you enable it within the game itself, if there is such an option. Such an option does usually exist – it may be called ‘sync every frame’ or something along those lines rather than simply ‘VSync’. Most users will probably wish to enable VSync when using FreeSync to ensure that they don’t get any tearing. You’d therefore select either the third or fourth option in the list, shown in the image below. The final option, ‘Enhanced Sync’, is a relatively new addition to the driver. This is an alternative to VSync which allows the frame rate to rise above the refresh rate (no VSync latency penalty) whilst potentially keeping the experience free from tearing or juddering. This requires that the frame rate comfortably exceeds the refresh rate, not just peaks slightly above it. We won’t be going into this in detail as it’s a GPU feature than a monitor feature.



Some users prefer to leave VSync enabled but use a frame rate limiter set a few frames below the maximum supported (e.g. 57fps) instead, avoiding any VSync latency penalty at frame rates near the ceiling of operation or tearing from frame rates rising above the refresh rate. If you go to ‘System Setup’ – ‘GamePlus’ – ‘FPS Counter’ in the OSD, you can activate the ‘Refresh Rate’ or ‘Frame Counter’ feature. Both of these display the refresh rate of the monitor, which changes in real time alongside the frame rate of the content if Adaptive-Sync is being used. Provided, that is, the frame rate is within the variable refresh rate range of the display. Finally, it’s worth noting that FreeSync only removes stuttering or juddering related to mismatches between frame rate and refresh rate. It can’t compensate for other interruptions to smooth game play, for example network latency or insufficient system memory. Some game engines will also show stuttering (or ‘hitching’) for various other reasons which won’t be eliminated by the technology.

FreeSync – the experience

We used FreeSync with a range of game titles on the monitor and found the technology worked in much the same way on all of them. Any issues identified on one title but not another would suggest an issue with the game or GPU driver rather than the monitor, too. We’ll therefore simply focus on a single title for this section; Battlefield V. This offers a good range of flexibility with its graphics options, allowing the full variable refresh rate monitor of the monitor to be tested. The Radeon RX 580 used in our test system to test the feature isn’t particularly powerful, so it’s difficult to maintain a solid 60fps. Even with fairly low graphics settings, some dips below this were common on this title. Even if the dips were only of a couple of FPS, having the technology disabled produced obvious tearing (VSync off) or stuttering (VSync enabled). Obvious to us, at least, although sensitivity to tearing and stuttering varies. Enabling FreeSync cleared these issues away, so we appreciated having it enabled.

With further drops in frame rate, either due to graphics settings being increased or action intensifying, the technology again did its thing to remove bothersome tearing or stuttering from frame and refresh rate mismatches. We observed a drop in ‘connected feel’ and increase in perceived blur as frame rate dropped – something that occurs regardless of FreeSync and purely tied to a reduction in frame rate. Unlike on monitors with a G-SYNC module, monitors supporting Adaptive-Sync don’t use variable overdrive. They’re generally tuned to work best at their native refresh rate (60Hz in this case). As the refresh rate drops, due to frame rate dipping and Adaptive-Sync being active, the slight overshoot at 60Hz becomes more pronounced. There was a bit of bright ‘halo trailing’ and some darker ‘dirty trailing’ (overshoot forms) that was very subtle at 60Hz but more noticeable as frame rate dropped. Particularly as it approached 40fps. This was not what we’d consider extreme overshoot using our preferred ‘OD’ setting, however. And we wouldn’t advise most users drop this further due to the increase in perceived blur and slower pixel responses you’ll introduce.

We observed some flickering with Adaptive-Sync active as the frame rate approached or crossed the boundary of operation (<44fps or so). This was rather subtle in our view, except if HDR was active which gave a more pronounced effect. With HDR active we observed intense flickering if the frame rate dropped below the floor of operation for Adaptive-Sync, too. This didn't seem to occur all the time when the frame rate fell this low, so perhaps it's also triggered by certain shades being displayed. It's related to voltage control sensitivities and is something we've observed on the similar Philips models we've tested as well.

Nvidia Adaptive-Sync (‘G-SYNC Compatible’)

As noted earlier, AMD FreeSync makes use of Adaptive-Sync technology on a compatible monitor. As of driver version 417.71, users with Nvidia GPUs (GTX 10 series and newer) and Windows 10 can also make use of this Variable Refresh Rate (VRR) technology. When a monitor is used in this way, it is something which Nvidia refers to as ‘G-SYNC Compatible’. Some models are specifically validated as G-SYNC compatible, which means they have been specifically tested by Nvidia and pass specific quality checks such as the inclusion of effective variable overdrive. With the CG32UQ, you need to connect the monitor up via DisplayPort and enable ‘FreeSync’ in the ‘Image’ section of the OSD. When you open up Nvidia Control Panel, you should then see ‘Set up G-SYNC’ listed in the ‘Display’ section. Ensure the ‘Enable G-SYNC, G-SYNC Compatible’ checkbox as well as ‘Enable settings for the selected display model’ is enabled as shown below. Press OK – the monitor should briefly flick off then on again and the technology should be active.



You will also see in the image above that it states: “Selected Display in not validated as G-SYNC Compatible.” This means Nvidia hasn’t specifically tested and validated the display, not that it doesn’t work. The technology did work, delivering a very similar experience to FreeSync. Not only in terms of removing tearing and stuttering as the frame rate fluctuated between 40fps and 60fps, but also granting use of HDR at the same time. The flickering we observed using FreeSync towards the floor of operation (<44fps or so) and when crossing the activation boundary (40fps) was also observed on our Nvidia GPU whilst using Adaptive-Sync. If anything it seemed more widespread or common on our Nvidia GPU. We didn't find this overly bothersome (unless HDR was active), but then again when were usually well above this problematic frame rate zone during gameplay. Either way, it was different to the experience on the Philips alternative we tested which gave obvious flickering even slightly below 60Hz with Adaptive-Sync and HDR active at the same time on an Nvidia GPU.

Note again that if you go to ‘System Setup’ – ‘GamePlus’ – ‘FPS Counter’ in the OSD, you can activate the ‘Refresh Rate’ or ‘Frame Counter’ feature. With Adaptive-Sync active you will see the refresh rate listed there change in real time alongside the frame rate of the content, if it’s within the variable refresh rate range of the display. Our suggestions regarding use of VSync also apply, but obviously you’re using Nvidia Control Panel rather than Radeon Settings to control this. The setting is found in ‘Manage 3D settings’ under ‘Vertical sync’, where the final option (‘Fast’) is equivalent to AMD’s ‘Enhanced Sync’ setting. You’ll also notice ‘G-SYNC Compatible’ listed under ‘Monitor Technology’ in this section, as shown below. Make sure this is selected (it should be if you’ve set everything up correctly in ‘Set up G-SYNC’).

HDR (High Dynamic Range)

On an ideal monitor, HDR (High Dynamic Range) encompasses the simultaneous display of very bright light shades and very deep dark shades. Plus the ability to display an excellent range of shades between these extremes, including a range of muted shades and highly vivid saturated shades. Ideally the monitor would allow per-pixel illumination (OLED etc.), or failing that offer many dimming zones controlled with excellent precision. An FALD (Full Array Local Dimming) solution, in other words. This allows some areas of the image to remain very dim whilst others are very bright. Colour reproduction is also an important aspect of the HDR experience. The ultimate goal is support for a massive colour gamut, Rec. 2020, whilst a more achievable near-term goal is for a monitor to offer coverage of at least 90% DCI-P3 (Digital Cinema Initiatives standard colour space). Finally, HDR makes use of at least 10-bit precision per colour channel, so its desirable that the monitor supports at least 10-bits per subpixel.

Monitors most commonly support the HDR10 pipeline, the most ubiquitous HDR standard used in HDR games and movies. For most games and other full screen applications that support HDR, the ASUS CG32UQ automatically switches into its HDR operating mode. As of the latest Windows 10 update, relevant HDR settings in Windows are found in ‘Windows HD Color settings’ which can be accessed via ‘Display settings’ (right click the desktop). Most game titles will activate HDR correctly when the appropriate in-game setting is selected. A minority of game titles that support HDR will only run in HDR if the setting is active in Windows as well. Specifically, the toggle which says ‘Play HDR games and apps’. If you want to view HDR movies on a compatible web browser, for example, you’d also need to activate the ‘Stream HDR Video’ setting. These settings are shown below. Also note that there’s a slider that allows you to adjust the overall balance of SDR content if HDR is active in Windows. This simply acts as a digital brightness slider, so you lose but never gain contrast by adjusting it. Most users will find the image too bright for normal viewing when leaving this at the neutral position (‘50’), which also offers optimal contrast. Whilst the colours and overall image looked better than on some models when activating HDR and viewing SDR content, it still looked bleached in places and overly sharp. Coupled with the brightness restrictions and inability to adjust that without loss of contrast, this isn’t a setting that you’ll want to routinely use when viewing SDR content. We’d recommend only activating HDR in Windows if you’re about to specifically use an HDR application that requires it, and have it deactivated when viewing normal SDR content on the monitor.

The ASUS CG32UQ is VESA DisplayHDR 600 certified. This level of certification is something of a ‘mid-range’ HDR solution, offering some significant improvement over the more basic DisplayHDR 400 certification standard. A particularly important aspect of the VESA DisplayHDR 600 certification that’s lacking with DisplayHDR 400 is that it necessitates local dimming on the backlight. We explore this and other attractive features for this level of HDR support shortly. For this section we’ll be focusing on observations using two titles; Battlefield V and Shadow of the Tomb Raider. We’ve tested these and similar titles on a wide range of monitors under HDR and know they offer a solid HDR experience if the monitor itself also does. Although our testing is focused on HDR PC gaming using these titles, the observations apply more broadly to other HDR10 content including HDR movies and running HDR on compatible games consoles. The experience is largely limited by the capability of the screen itself. The screen offers two separate HDR modes, found under ‘HDR’ in the ‘Image’ section of the OSD with HDR active; ‘ASUS Cinema HDR’ and ‘ASUS Gaming HDR’. The ‘Cinema’ setting modifies the gamma curve, bringing out some extra detail and accentuating the greater nuanced variety of dark shades we discuss in this section. In our view it takes things a bit far and gives unnatural visibility in dark areas, so we prefer the default ‘Gaming’ setting and will be using that for our testing. Both settings apply a slight sharpness filter which can’t be adjusted or disabled. It’s not extreme and is commonly seen under HDR, helping to slightly accentuate the improved contrast and bit depth.

We recorded 96% DCI-P3 coverage on this monitor, exceeding the requirements for VESA DisplayHDR 600 (90%). Under SDR we observed some notable examples of shades which appeared more saturated than intended by the developers. Some wooden and earthy brown tones had a red hue which was a bit too strong in places, whilst some vibrant green shades of certain vegetation had yellow hues coming across too strongly. Under HDR10, the target gamut is DCI-P3 rather than the far more restrictive sRGB colour gamut. With the colour space of this model coinciding closely to this more generous gamut, shades were outputted in a more appropriate way. Whilst the saturation was toned down in places, ASUS tuned things under HDR so a bit of extra saturation was still maintained. The extra ‘unintended’ saturation was still reduced a fair bit compared to under SDR, giving a more natural appearance to environments. It’s also an appropriately handled saturation boost, maintaining good spacing on the gamut rather than destroying shade variety like a digital saturation enhancement. This slight saturation boost actually worked nicely to counteract some of the weakening saturation near the sides and bottom of the screen, as observed from a normal seated viewing position. The Philips 326M6VJRMB adhered more strictly to preferred developer saturation levels centrally, but those same shades appear more muted than intended peripherally due to the perceived saturation losses.

Plenty of extra vibrancy was injected where it made sense, or where the developers intended it to appear. On both titles, roaring fires showcased an excellent range of vibrant yellow, orange and red shades – some of which are far beyond the confines of the sRGB gamut. Brightly painted artifacts on Tomb Raider and deep red flowers on BFV were some additional examples of stand-out shades with a rather vibrant look. There were some good lush green shades as well, particularly when observed centrally (keeping in mind the saturation losses peripherally, as explored earlier). As a reminder, the colour gamut of the monitor (red triangle) offers good extension beyond sRGB (green triangle) and offers good DCI-P3 colour space coverage (blue triangle), as required for HDR content such as this.

Colour gamut 'Test Settings'

The monitor natively supports 10-bit colour reproduction via DP. Via HDMI, it doesn’t natively support 10-bit colour reproduction even though the HDR10 pipeline makes use of 10-bits per channel colour output. The monitor supports an 8-bit signal over HDMI, with an additional 2-bit dithering stage is offloaded to the GPU under HDR. This is common practice for HDR monitors which don’t support 10-bit colour, either at all (via HDMI, in this case) or when running at certain resolutions or refresh rates. We’ve carefully observed a broad range of content on a range of monitors, including fine gradients, where the 10-bit signal is supported by the monitor itself or where the monitor is 8-bit and the GPU applies dithering. The end result is essentially very similar, even when observing subtle shade variations and fine gradients. A side by side comparison of certain content may potentially reveal slight differences, but we stress the slight – it isn’t something users should worry about. However it’s achieved, the precision under HDR enhances the nuanced variety of dark shades that are displayed. This gives shaded regions a more believable look, lifting out subtle details. This is done in a very natural-looking way rather than the image simply appearing ‘flooded’ due to gamma enhancement. It also made the ‘black crush’ less noticeable, due to some shades being lifted up in a natural way. Brighter shades share this more nuanced variety, too, with weather effects, smoke and suchlike appearing exceptionally smooth. The fine gradients there are free from the sort of abrupt transitions or relative lack of subtle shade variety observed on screens under SDR. The image below shows a typical HDR scenes in Battlefield V. It’s purely to set the scene and help illustrate certain points, in no way does it reflect what the monitor looks like first-hand.



In the scene above, it wasn’t just the enhanced precision and generous colour gamut that was put to good use under HDR. This certainly helped give a nuanced variety of bright shades (in the sky, for example) plus a pleasing array of and dimmer shades (vehicle undercarriages, shaded areas of forest etc.) But also key to the experience is that the CG32UQ supports local dimming, using an edge-lit arrangement with 8 LED clusters running down both side edges of the screen. This is combined with light guides to split the screen into 16 separate zones, with independent luminance control. The monitor doesn’t offer any local dimming support under SDR, however. As explored in the contrast section earlier in the review, the local dimming capability allowed for slightly increased contrast. As noted there, the boost would be more noticeable in some scenarios as well, depending on the content being displayed and its relative position on the screen. The monitor was also able to a peak luminance of 696 cd/m², exceeding the VESA DisplayHDR 600 specifications. The bright daylight sky had a very natural quality and ‘glow’ to it, a brightness beyond what you’d observed under SDR. Whilst the glint of this sunlight on the puddle made use of strong localised luminance as well. Meanwhile, dimming zones covering the darker content were able to dim to much lower luminance levels to keep this looking in-place as well. This sort of pleasing ‘bright scene’ HDR performance was also reflected in Shadow of the Tomb Raider. The scene below is one of our favourites for showcasing HDR performance and really works well on monitors with decent HDR performance.



The shaded areas of vegetation again remained fairly dimly lit, whilst the bright light streaming in from above was very bright. There was a nuanced variety of bright shades visible here as well, rather than just the big ball of light you can see in the image. Again, a nod to the excellent shade precision. Glints of light on the surface of the water and waxy leaves were also quite impressive, certainly much more eye-catching than under SDR. Although somewhat less impressive than on models with even higher peak luminance (VESA DisplayHDR 1000 level and above). Naturally, though, 16 dimming zones with an edge-lit arrangement spread across a 31.5” screen doesn’t give you great precision with the illumination. Intricate mixtures of light and dark cause some of the darker areas of the screen to become brighter than ideal, due to dimming zones needing to ramp up their luminance for the brighter content. In daylight scenes this isn’t such an issue, but for scenes that are meant to be deep and atmospheric it can certainly detract from the intended appearance. You can sometimes see a spotlighting effect from some of the LED clusters, particularly towards the bottom of the screen. This is most noticeable in dimmer lighting conditions but can be observed to an extent in moderately well-lit rooms as well. Even with this, we enjoyed using HDR on this monitor and it’s certainly one of the more impressive HDR performers we’ve seen. Giving a much more dynamic experience than models without local dimming, delivering good standout bright elements and a more believable and natural look to bright daylight scenes. We enjoyed using the technology where possible, not just on games but also when viewing Netflix content that supported it. The section of the video review below focuses on HDR and runs through some more examples showcasing its strengths and weaknesses.

The ‘4K’ UHD experience

We’ve got an article looking at the 3840 x 2160 ‘4K’ UHD resolution and the experience it delivers on the desktop, in games and movies. This article is written from the perspective of a ~28” screen. With its 31.5” screen, the ASUS delivers a pixel density to ~139.87 PPI (Pixels Per Inch). Not quite as high as a 27-28” ‘4K’ screen, but still very high and sufficient to give a distinctly ‘UHD’ appearance to suitable high-resolution content. Compared to smaller UHD screens, the 31.5” size is one that more users will find practical without relying on high levels of scaling or application-specific zoom – or in fact any at all. We found the screen very usable, with readable text and UI elements, from our preferred distance of 70 – 80cm without any scaling. Some users may prefer a bit of scaling or will want to use application-specific zoom. Used in this way, the monitor provides an excellent level of ‘desktop real-estate’ – lots of useful space for work purposes and multi-tasking, with strong text clarity. The images below give an idea of the sort of work space you’ve got at your disposal, but are purely for illustrative purposes and do not reflect how the monitor appears in person.

The high pixel density and 31.5” screen work nicely for gaming, which is really a key focus of this model. Screen size preferences are a very individual thing. But we quickly adapted to the screen size and found it delivered a good level of immersion without feeling overwhelming, even sitting at the desk using the monitor from ~70cm. The large screen size also lends itself well to sitting a bit further back, if that’s what you want to do. Appropriate for console gaming from a more relaxed posture, for example. The pixel density also delivered a crisp and well-defined look that’s simply lacking at lower resolutions, when gaming at the native resolution of the display. This is noticeable even with graphics settings set to low levels. Naturally, things look very inviting indeed with extra eye candy turned up. The lighting effects, particle effects and shadow detailing is all enhanced by the high pixel density. Having the content spread out across a large screen area made it easy to appreciate some of the finer details that were brought out by the high pixel density. Particularly suitably high-resolution textures which were given a detailed and realistic look that’s simply lacking at lower pixel densities. The overall detailed and clear appearance was similar to what we explored in our article, but having the content spread out across a larger screen area was a nice addition. The images below show the monitor running various PC game titles. They’re purely for illustrative purposes and in no way indicate how the monitor appears in person. Allow them to fire up your imagination, though, and keep in mind what was said above – which applies to ‘4K’ UHD game content on both the PC and games consoles.

Interpolation and upscaling

The 3840 x 2160 (‘4K’ UHD) resolution is graphically demanding, and not all systems (e.g. some game consoles) actually support it. Because of this, it may be desirable or necessary to run the monitor at a lower resolution. The monitor offers an interpolation (scaling) process to map lower resolutions such as 1920 x 1080 (‘1080p’ or Full HD) onto all 3840 x 2160 pixels of the display. You need to ensure, as a PC user, that the GPU isn’t trying to take over scaling duties. For AMD GPU users the monitor will handle the scaling by default, when gaming at non-native resolutions. Nvidia users should open the Nvidia Control Panel and navigate to ‘Display – Adjust desktop size and position’. They should ensure that ‘No Scaling’ is selected and ‘Perform scaling on:’ is set to ‘Display’ as shown below.

The monitor includes three scaling modes in the OSD (‘Image’ – ‘Aspect Control’) – ‘Full’, ‘4:3’ and ‘1:1’. The monitor must be running at a non-native resolution with FreeSync disabled in the OSD, otherwise these settings are greyed out. Otherwise the ‘Full’ setting will automatically be used, which is the only scaling method supported with Adaptive-Sync – that isn’t just a limitation with this model. With the ‘Full’ setting the monitor uses an interpolation process to spread the image across all its pixels. ‘4:3’ will keep to the 4:3 aspect ratio (only available as an option for relevant resolutions). Finally, 1:1 is a pixel mapping feature which will only use the pixels called for in the source resolution, showing an non-interpolated image in the centre of the screen with a black border around for the remaining unused pixels. Observing the Full HD (1920 x 1080) and WQHD (2560 x 1440) resolutions on this monitor, using the ‘Full’ setting, we observed moderate softening compared to the same resolutions running natively on a screen of this size. This was improved by setting ‘VividPixel’ to ‘25, The image looks fairly natural with decent but not completely overblown sharpness. Provided you’re sitting a reasonable distance away (70cm+ should be fine for most users), the oversharpened look you might see when close to the screen isn’t too obvious and things look quite good. The result is one of the better and more usable interpolation processes we’ve seen.

As usual, if you’re running the monitor at 3840 x 2160 and viewing 1920 x 1080 content (for example a video over the internet or a Blu-ray, using movie software) then it is the GPU and software that handles the upscaling. That’s got nothing to do with the monitor itself – there is a very small amount of softening to the image compared to viewing such content on a native Full HD monitor, but it’s slight and shouldn’t bother most users.

Video review

The video below summarises some of the key points raised in this written review and shows the monitor in action. The video review is designed to complement the written piece and is not nearly as comprehensive.

Timestamps:
Features & Aesthetics
Contrast
Colour reproduction
HDR (High Dynamic Range)
Responsiveness

Conclusion

Having used a wide range of screen sizes and resolutions, we find the combination of ‘4K’ UHD resolution and 32” screen size particularly appealing. The CG32UQ delivers this combination, providing an excellent pixel density that brings appropriate detail and clarity to suitably high-resolution content. The desktop remains nice and readable without the high level of scaling (if any at all) or application-specific zoom demanded by smaller UHD screens. The screen size provides a nice level of immersion when sitting at a desk, too. And makes it quite practical to use from a little distance back for console gaming – something this model is specifically marketed for. The overall design is quite ‘unfussy’, with matte black plastic used extensively. The stand base’s integrated USB charging functionality and grippy mats can be useful as well, for charging controllers and suchlike. It isn’t a function we had any use for, although the pads acted as a convenient place to rest the included OSD remote. This is an important practicality if you’re sitting a little way away from the monitor and want to adjust the volume and suchlike in the OSD. The menu system is also designed to be very clear from a distance. For PC usage the remote proved a useful way to navigate through the OSD, even more so than the included ‘Navi Key’ joystick.

And we need to mention a few other features we were fond of. The integrated speakers offered the best sound output we’ve heard from a monitor, whilst the ambient lighting feature proved useful. We found the ‘Halo Sync’ mode quite gimmicky, were unable to use ‘Aura Sync’ due to a software issue on our system and didn’t care for some of the flashing patterns of the OSD-controlled ‘Aura RGB’. Using the lighting system with static colours such as red and cyan, though, was very useful. Helping enhance perceived contrast in dimmer lighting conditions, with a field of light behind the monitor that’s significantly stronger than most RGB lighting features provide. Speaking of contrast, this was really a key strength of the monitor. The main aspect was a good strong static contrast exceeding the panel specifications, even after our ‘Test Settings’ were applied. There was only a small amount of ‘VA glow’, so the atmosphere for dark scenes was good. We weren’t too enamoured with the somewhat grainy screen surface, although that’s something we’re quite sensitive to. And the panel exhibited a moderate amount of gamma shift and ‘black crush’, more so than some curved VA alternatives we’ve used but characteristic of the VA panel used.

The monitor was setup quite nicely out of the box, with a reduction in brightness being the most useful alternation. Shades were outputted in a fairly vibrant and varied way. Some saturation was lost towards the bottom and edges of the screen, due to the perceived gamma shifts of the panel. The colour gamut was generous and extended well beyond sRGB, covering 96% of the DCI-P3 colour space. This injected an extra dose of vibrancy and saturation into regular sRGB content. there was no sRGB emulation mode included on the monitor for those who prefer a more natural and accurate representation of sRGB content. The generous gamut was appropriate for HDR usage, toning down some of the oversaturation. ASUS implemented HDR in a way that adds a little bit of extra vibrancy, beyond the developers intentions – but much less than under sRGB. Elements that were supposed to look relatively muted still did, certainly compared to under SDR, whilst elements intended to look vibrant showed strong saturation overall. The VESA DisplayHDR 600 certified monitor outputted strong luminance and provided local dimming for HDR content, too. This worked very nicely for brighter scenes, delivering a natural look to daylight and helping very bright elements stand out well. The enhanced precision under HDR was also evident, enhancing nuanced shade variety at the high and low end. The relatively low number of dimming zones for such a large screen didn’t afford the sort of precision needed to keep dark shade suitably deep. This affected the atmosphere for darker scenes under HDR. It could be alleviated somewhat by appropriate lighting in the room or using the RGB lighting as a bias light, but extra depth would still have been welcome here.

The monitor provided a reasonable response performance. Input lag was reasonably low – a bit higher than some models, but lower than most TVs and at a level which most users will be perfectly content with. The pixel responsiveness was something of a mixed bag, as expected for the panel type. There were some weaknesses where darker shades were involved in the transitions, but lighter to medium shades were handled better. Many users would be comfortable with the level of pixel responsiveness offered and will also appreciate the flexible ‘OD’ settings (6 levels). Adaptive-Sync worked well to get rid of tearing and stuttering from frame rate and refresh rate mismatches. This included both AMD FreeSync and Nvidia’s ‘G-SYNC Compatible Mode’. The technology could be used alongside HDR, too. On our Nvidia GPU we observed some flickering at the low end of the variable refresh rate range, only bothersome with HDR active. Fortunately, we were able to keep things above 45fps with our GTX 1080 Ti quite easily, avoiding this issue. And it was an improvement over what we observed on the Philips 326M6VJRMB we tested, with obnoxious flickering at all below 60Hz with HDR and Adaptive-Sync both active.

Speaking of the Philips, it’s appropriate to compare the two given many obvious similarities. The Philips comes in at a lower price. It offers a lower (but still relatively high) minimum white luminance and somewhat lower input lag. Although most users wouldn’t see/feel a difference between the two in terms of latency. The Philips also offers an sRGB emulation mode. Plus an HDR mode that may appeal to those who just wish to have the colour gamut and 10-bit colour processing capabilities put to use, without elevated luminance levels. On the flip side, the ASUS offers slightly more vibrant HDR output due to how ASUS has tuned things. It also supports ‘Nvidia G-SYNC Compatible Mode’ at the same time as HDR – provided your frame rate doesn’t dip too low. The OSD remote, integrated USB charging solution and superior and in our view surprisingly useful RGB LED ambient lighting feature may sway some users as well. As might the height-adjustable stand. As usual it was a tale of two halves with this monitor, but it will deliver the sort of SDR and HDR experience that some users are after. And for both console gaming and PC usage, it provides an attractive feature-set that’s well-implemented overall.

The bottom line; fairly vibrant and varied colour reproduction and very competent bright-scene HDR performance – but a greater number of dimming zones to enhance dark scene HDR performance would’ve been nice.

Positives	Negatives
Quite vibrant and varied colour output and excellent DCI-P3 coverage which is appropriate for HDR usage	Moderate gamma and saturation shifts and no sRGB emulation mode
Strong static contrast and relatively low ‘VA glow’. Good luminance and effective local dimming provided a pleasing look to bright elements under HDR	Somewhat grainy screen surface, high minimum white luminance and moderate ‘black crush’. Dark scene HDR performance hampered by relatively few dimming zones
Decent 60Hz VA pixel responsiveness overall, reasonably low input lag and Adaptive-Sync working well to get rid of frame and refresh rate mismatches	Some weaknesses in pixel responsiveness and a limited refresh rate which won’t appeal to everyone
A good screen size for an immersive and pixel-rich ‘4K’ experience, effective RGB LED lighting, excellent speakers and a useful OSD remote	No SDR local dimming, fairly expensive and stand not fully adjustable (it does offer tilt and height adjustment)

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases made using the below link.

 

Donations are also greatly appreciated.