Author: Adam Simmons
Date published: August 22nd 2013
Table of Contents
Introduction
Keeping up with their theme of instantly forgettable and overly stretched out model numbers, Philips brings you the 272P4QPJKEB (272P if you’re being lazy). This monitor sports a 2560 x 1440 PLS panel and heavy-duty fully adjustable stand with some little additions like a built in webcam and microphone. Although little additions are always nice, we’re really interested in how the monitor itself performs. We’ll be employing our usual in-depth testing methodology to see how this screen performs across a range of applications.
Specifications
The basic specifications reveal a ‘true 8-bit’ 27” PLS panel with WQHD. There are no higher-end extras such as hardware calibration, a built in LUT with additional hardware-based correction or luminance uniformity compensation. These are the things that some more demanding users may desire, but that most users (even those wishing to do some colour-critical work) can make do without. Other PLS models of similar price, such as the ASUS PB278Q and ViewSonic VP2770, also lack such high-end features. Only the more expensive Samsung S27B970D and S27B971D offer such flexibility.
Grey to grey acceleration is included, with Philips quoting a 6ms accelerated response time here. Despite its backlight being a standard WLED design, the monitor is quite heavy at 8.5kg. That’s due largely to the robust and fully adjustable stand. The key ‘talking points’ of the specification have been highlighted in blue.
Features and aesthetics
From the front the monitor has a fairly chunky, robust business-like look. The stand has a reasonably large but flat footprint, extending around 300mm (1ft) in width, 270mm (10.5 inches) in depth and 10.5mm (0.4 inches) in height. This means the monitor is firmly planted on the desk – also helped by grippy rubber feet on the underside of the base. The bezels have a brushed metal texture but are also plastic. They’re fairly thick – 19mm (0.75 inches) at the side, 26mm (1 inch) at the top and 38mm (1.5 inches) at the bottom. In the centre of the top bezel there is a 2 megapixel webcam and microphone. In the central region of the bottom bezel there are 2 infrared ‘PowerSensor’(s) that detect whether somebody is close to the monitor and therefore considered to be using it. If not the screen dims significantly and returns to normal brightness when the user returns. There are also some simple 2W stereo speakers hidden away in the bottom bezel and a headphone jack (3.5mm audio output) on the underside, towards the left. Also of note from the front is the screen surface, which is ‘semi glossy’. This is a light anti-glare surface that effectively reduces glare when the monitor is in use and isn’t in an overly bright room. Note that in the image the screen is off and facing a window with sunlight streaming in to highlight its ‘semi glossy’ nature. At the same time it provides superior clarity and vividness, giving a far less dull and grainy image compared to stronger anti-glare treatments. The stand is as robust as the monitor looks, providing 20° of backwards tilt (5° forwards), 65° of swivel either side, 150mm (6 inches) of height adjustment and pivoting 90° into portrait as shown below. At the lowest height setting the stand clears the desk by just 25mm (1 inch). The touch-sensitive controls and power light are found at the right side of the bottom bezel. The power light is a very unobtrusive small white dot when the screen is on, flashing to indicate the monitor is on standby. The control buttons are touch-sensitive but very responsive, with the following functions; ‘SmartImage/Right’, ‘MultiView/Down’, ‘User configurable (Audio Source by default)/Up’, ‘Menu/OK’. The labels are found on the bezel but there are no accompanying on-screen prompts or illumination. This can make navigating the menu in the dark difficult. The OSD (On Screen Display) which these buttons control is quite straightforward to use and well laid out. There is no sharpness control, but Philips feels that sharpness is already optimal straight from the box (we agree). You can also select a target colour temperature and gamma and of course adjust brightness and contrast. There is also Picture in Picture and Picture by Picture functionality. The video below gives a quick run-through of the OSD. Further information on some key features can be found in the PDF manual. From the side the monitor’s robust stand can be seen in all its glory. The screen is around 22mm (0.87 inches) thick at thinnest point, bulking out considerably in the centre to accommodate the stand, ports and various electronics. At the left side there are 3 USB 3.0 downstream ports and 1 USB 3.0 upstream port. The upstream port must be connected to the PC (a cable is included) in order to use the downstream ports, webcam and microphone. At the right side of the monitor is a ‘Zero Switch’ power switch to completely shut off all power to the monitor – so that you can’t even use the normal power button at the front of the monitor. This reduces the idle power consumption of the monitor from a fraction of a watt to 0 watts. The rear of the 272P4QPJKEB is dominated by the matte black plastic stand and its attachment point to the screen. Surrounding this the screen itself (the bit that’s thinnest from a side aspect) has a matte black plastic with a subtle honeycomb texture, or slightly indented hexagons. The stand attaches by 100 x 100mm VESA. It can be removed easily using a quick release button under the VESA attachment point to make way for another stand or mount. Towards the bottom of the monitor’s rear are the remaining ports and a Kensington lock. At the far left there is an AC power input. Then the rest; DP 1.2 input, DVI, HDMI ports, DP 1.2 output (for MST ‘Daisy Chaining’) and 3.5mm audio input. The typical Philips retail package for the monitor includes a DVI Dual-Link cable, DisplayPort cable, power cable and a USB 3.0 upstream cable. Philips provides 6 ‘SmartImage’ presets for the 272P4QPJKEB; ‘Office’, ‘Photo’, ‘Movie’, ‘Game’, ‘Economy’ and ‘Off’. As is usual for features with the prefix ‘smart’, these presets are anything but. They oversaturate the image to varying degrees and make things look completely unnatural. The really ‘smart’ thing to do is to set this to ‘Off’ and make adjustments in the OSD from there. One of the features you can adjust which has a significant impact on the image is ‘Gamma’ which can be set between 1.8 and 2.6 in increments of 0.2 – with 2.2 being the default and something of a calibration standard for Windows. Using an Nvidia GTX 780 connected to the monitor by DisplayPort we assessed the image performance under the various gamma modes and also under the test settings we settled for. Philips supplies a Dual-Link DVI cable with the monitor which provides a very similar image. The image is also very much comparable on modern AMD GPUs using either DP or DVI. The table below gives key readings such as gamma and white point as well as some subjective impressions using the various ‘Gamma’ settings. All other settings were kept at default. A similar analysis using our test settings in the section proceeding the table is also included. As usual for most screens the 272P4QPJKEB was very bright out of the box, set to full brightness in fact. Although the white point was close to the daylight target of 6500K ‘out of the box’, the green channel was slightly weak which gave the image a slightly purple tint. This was easily correctable using the monitor’s OSD. If the gamma setting was altered then the white point fell to around 6200K and a warm tint was evident. The gamma did reach the specified point on average, but only at ‘2.2’ was the tracking actually close to where it should be all along the curve. One curious thing we noticed is that if you select a preset ‘Color Temperature’ (even the default 6500K) or ‘sRGB’ in the ‘Color’ menu some faint banding appears. This is not visible when using ‘User Define’ unless you make unnecessarily large adjustments. Under our test settings colours were very nicely balanced and looked very lively with good vibrancy and variety. Gamma performance was also good and very close to the 2.2 curve as specified by the default ‘2.2’ setting. For our test settings brightness was reduced significantly and some relatively minor adjustments were made to colour channels. We used the following settings, but note that each individual 272P4 is different so you may have to make slightly different adjustments. Contrast= 50 Gamma= 2.2 Color Temperature= User Define Red= 97 Green= 100 Blue= 95 A Konica Minolta CS-200 luminance meter was used to measure black depth, the brightness of white and the resulting contrast ratio under a variety of settings. We focused on adjustments to brightness and then to the ‘Gamma’ setting rather than the ‘SmartImage’ presets, which as noted previously are rather lacklustre. Aside from the adjustments made to the ‘test settings’ assume all other settings were in their default state. The table below shows the readings and calculated contrast ratios with the highest white luminance, lowest black luminance and highest contrast ratio highlighted in black. The results from the test settings are highlighted in blue. The Philips 272P4QPJKEB gave an average contrast ratio of 946:1 with brightness only adjusted which is quite decent really and slightly better than you might expect from a high-resolution PLS panel. Employing different gamma settings had no significant impact on the contrast ratio. As always the contrast ratio is reduced when colour channels are altered; white becomes less bright whilst the black point remains the same. Under our test settings we recorded 910:1 which is still respectable. The maximum luminance recorded was 291.6 cd/m2 (just below the 300 cd/m2 specified) and the minimum white luminance was 37.8 cd/m2. This gives an excellent 253.8 cd/m2 brightness adjustment range with a good range of practical values. A ‘SmartContrast’ Dynamic Contrast feature can be enabled that will allow the backlight brightness to adjust according to how ‘light’ or ‘dark’ the image is. This can be used in conjunction with a ‘SmartImage’ preset and allows all settings aside from brightness and contrast to be adjusted. Rather awkwardly you can still adjust brightness and contrast after enabling this mode, but any adjustments made here will disable the ‘SmartImage’ mode even though it will remain as ‘On’ in the OSD. You will need to toggle it off then on again without touching brightness or contrast to enable it again. This dynamic contrast mode reacts at a reasonable pace to changes in on-screen brightness, tending towards a rather high brightness even during mixed images. As is always the case with current backlight implementations the whole backlight adjusts as one unit so you can’t have different areas of the image displaying ‘light’ and ‘dark’ with appropriate backlight control at the same time. Instead you get a sort of intermediate compromise that reflects the overall makeup of the image – something that limits the appeal of Dynamic Contrast in our eyes. As is common PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) is used to modulate brightness of the monitor. Some users are sensitive to the rapid ‘on’ and ‘off’ pulses of the backlight that are used to reduce the brightness to values below ‘100’. Some of these individuals can suffer varying forms of visual discomfort, so be aware that it is used on this monitor. Many users suffer no ill effect from PWM, however. Whilst observing a black screen in a darkened room there was minor backlight bleed in the bottom right corner. There was also some slight clouding here and towards the top right, but nothing too severe. Each individual unit will be slightly different in this respect, but the uniformity issues observed on our unit were fairly minor really. They were somewhat overshadowed by ‘PLS glow’, a sort of silver sheen that becomes most noticeable if you view the monitor ‘off angle’ but can be observed from directly in front towards the corners of the screen. This is a normal characteristic for both IPS and PLS panels. Some of the consequences of this are discussed in the subsequent section and shown in a video in the ‘Viewing angles’ section, too. We also considered the uniformity of lighter colours, using a Spyder4Elite to record the white luminance of 9 equidistant ‘quadrants’ running across the screen from top left to bottom right. The table below gives the luminance recorded at each quadrant as well as the percentage deviation between each quadrant and the brightest point on the screen. The uniformity of luminance across the screen was reasonable. The maximum luminance of 185.2 cd/m2 was recorded at ‘Quadrant 2’ (top central region). ‘Quadrant 5’ (central region) was just 2% dimmer than this at 181.9 cd/m2. Elsewhere the screen was 5- 15% dimmer with the highest deviation occurring at ‘quadrant 9’ (bottom right) where 156.9 cd/m2 was recorded. Uniformity can of course vary between individual units, there are no guarantees here. As mentioned in the specifications section there is no luminance uniformity compensation built into the monitor, a feature only seen on even more expensive PLS models such as some of Samsung’s own models. The deviations observed on our unit were not too severe really and shouldn’t cause any problems for most users, but some users may prefer to seek a model with a uniformity compensation feature. The graphic below illustrates the deviations in luminance, coupled with a bit of artistic flair using extrapolated values. Here lighter greys represent higher luminance and darker greys lower luminance. The darker greys therefore represent the greatest deviation from the brightest point. On Battlefield 3 the level of detail shown in dark areas was respectable centrally. Some minor detail (distinctions between the darkest shades) was lacking, but that’s typical from a non-VA panel with appropriate gamma setup. Some further loss of detail was observed towards the corners of the screen in particular, due to the aforementioned ‘PLS glow’. The high-end (light and bright colours) showed pleasing relative intensity with artificial lights, fire and explosions piercing through the darkness nicely. These elements were not as ‘pure’ as you’d see on a glossy screen but were not hampered by obtrusive graininess either. On Dirt 3 the level of detail in dark areas was decent overall with only quite subtle distinctions missing across most of the screen. PLS glow, again, caused some further loss of detail peripherally. The high-end was relatively ‘clean’ for a screen with an anti-glare surface and offered plenty of good intensity and distinction without appearing bleached. On the Blu-ray film Skyfall detail levels were mainly good without major loss of detail. Subtle distinctions between particularly dark shades were lacking in places, particularly near the corners of the screen. Bright elements had a good relative intensity and didn’t look overly grainy which is good. We used Lagom’s contrast test to help highlight specific weaknesses in the contrast performance. The following observations were made. The 272P4’s colour gamut (red triangle) covers sRGB quite comprehensively and extends slightly beyond it in several areas. This extension is not extreme and adds a bit of extra depth and vibrancy to the image without making things look garish and unrealistic. If you are needing to do work where colour accuracy is vitally important then the monitor will respond well to calibration. There is no sRGB emulation mode but this is a very workable colour gamut for good results post-calibration using a colorimeter or spectrophotometer. On Battlefield 3 colours were fairly intense and bold without looking too heavily saturated. The richness and variety displayed by the Philips was as good as we’ve seen on this title. Some of the vibrant elements in the game were particularly impressive. The rich and warming glow of orange fires, the piercing cyans of the engineer repair tool and the neon (but not gaudy) look to in-game markers were particularly noteworthy. The monitor provided a superb feast of colour on Dirt 3. Whilst colours were full-bodied (like a strong wine) they were not overdone and looked natural and believable. The variety of shades was also excellent and complimented the natural look to the racing environments well. Even the slightest variations of green and golden brown vegetation could be seen, remaining consistent regardless of on-screen position. Whilst colours didn’t have the painted-on look of a glossy screen, vibrant colours had plenty of ‘pop’. Stunning deep blues, shocking bright pinks and neon greens were particularly eye-catching on the cars. The Blu-ray of Skyfall showed good variety and saturation. Various elements within the environment, building and different items of clothing expressed good subtle tones. Skin tones were also rich but appropriate looking. Some vibrant elements, most notably deep red and blue lights in Shanghai night scenes, were quite spectacular in their depth and intensity. Bright neon pinks and cyans were also impressive despite missing out on the ‘glossy pop’ factor. The Blu-ray of Futurama: Into the Wild Green Yonder really showed off the strengths of the Philips 272P4QPJKEB’s colour reproduction. Colours such as character skins and pastel shades elsewhere flaunted excellent variety and appeared appropriately muted. Plenty of deep shades and eye-catching bright shades were also part of the mix. The consistency of colours at various points of the screen was strong. On scenes where a character’s skin (a single shade) filled most of the screen there was very little variation. This quality really helps shades remain distinct and brings allows even closely matched shades to appear as they should regardless of on-screen position. To explore colour consistency and viewing angle performance more closely we used Lagom’s tests specifically designed for this. We observed the following. We measured input lag using a modified ‘camera and stopwatch’ method. To improve the reliability of results we compare latency not just with a known ‘zero input lag’ screen but also a number of other models of known input lag. Over 120 readings are taken in total. On the Philips we recorded just over 22ms (<1.5 frames) of input lag. Not everyone will have a problem with this value and it won’t impede their gaming enjoyment. For other users, though this value will be too high for their gaming. To analyse the pixel response performance under some typical grey to grey transitions we used a tool called PixPerAn (Pixel Persistence Analyser). Photographs were taken using a highly sensitive camera and the tool set to its highest ‘tempo’ (image movement speed). The images below show the results of the four different ‘SmartResponse’ settings on the monitor’; ‘Off’, ‘Fast’, ‘Faster’ and ‘Fastest. Set to ‘Off’ the pixel responses during this test are much as you’d expect from a weakly overdriven PLS monitor, with a bold primary trail and a faint secondary trail. The ‘Fast’ setting increases the level of acceleration, eliminating the secondary trail and weakening the primary trail. The ‘Faster’ setting increases acceleration again, actually pushing things too far and introducing overshoot (inverse ghosting artifacts). These are quite obvious during gameplay and are accompanied by an unnatural sharpening of some textures during fast movement. The ‘Fastest’ setting intensifies overdrive artifacts and this texture sharpening effect. In this PixPerAn screenshot you can now see multiple overdrive trails and a more obvious bright ‘halo’ trail behind the car. The ‘Fast’ setting was the best balanced, so we used this for game and movie testing. To get a better picture of what to expect during ‘real world’ use it is important to consider a broader range of pixel transitions than the fairly restrictive range used by PixPerAn. It’s also important to appreciate that our eyes move to track movement on the screen, even if we’re not consciously aware of this. This introduces what is sometimes called ‘retinal blur’, a key component of the perceived blur we see on an LCD monitor when viewing moving content. This is explored in more detail in this review. On our first test title, Battlefield 3, a moderate degree of blur was observed whilst on foot. This became more pronounced whilst manoeuvring in an agile vehicle. This perceived blur was mainly attributable to eye movements, but there was also a small degree of blur caused by the pixel response behaviour of the monitor. There were no obvious overdrive artifacts or exaggerated smeary trails, so a pretty decent balance struck by Philips here. On Dirt 3 there was a moderate degree of blur during the racing modes, particularly noticeable when cornering and observing objects in the environment. Again, this was largely but not entirely attributable to retinal blur – a limitation that would persist on even the fastest 60Hz monitors. Pixel response behaviour played a role here, albeit a relatively minor one. During the fast-paced Gymkhana mode there was significant blurring, slightly more than you’d see on a faster 60Hz monitor. The course remained distinct enough to prevent the uncomfortable dizzying sensation or general lost feeling that some slower monitors provide. We didn’t observe any overdrive artifacts such as inverse ghosting anywhere on this title. We also tested our Blu-ray movie test titles to see if there were any observable limitations from pixel responses. There weren’t, with the fluidity limited by the 24 (ish) frames per second at which the movies run. Whilst this limits fluidity compared to higher frame rates it also breaks up the motion and allows the monitor to duplicate frames (around 2.5 times each as it’s a 60Hz monitor). The pixel response times are good enough at this sort of frame rate that they aren’t a limiting factor – and thankfully there were any overdrive artifacts to ruin the experience, either. The Philips 278P4QPJKEB is a very solidly built and highly adjustable monitor with a high-performance Samsung PLS panel on the inside. Whilst not quite as tightly calibrated as some other PLS models we’ve tested (namely the Samsung S27B970D and S27B971D) the monitor provided respectable performance out of the box with a very satisfying image after only fairly minor adjustments. Colours were rich, vibrant and varied and provided a quality and consistency that brought games, movies and the desktop to life. The generous (but not excessive) colour gamut, ‘semi glossy’ screen surface and strong panel performance characteristics really helped here. sRGB emulation and some higher-end features such as hardware calibration (programmable LUT on the monitor) were lacking. However; the monitor responds well to the usual GPU-based hardware calibration which is highly recommended for colour-critical work. Contrast performance was also respectable and much in-line with what you’d hope for from a high-performance PLS panel. Static contrast readings were above 900:1, fairly good for a 27” PLS matrix, and there were no major problems during gaming or movie playback. There was some loss of detail attributed to the usual ‘PLS glow’, however. This is just one of the compromises users have to make at the moment when opting for an IPS or PLS monitor. Another area where compromise must sometimes be made on this sort of monitor is responsiveness. When it came to pixel responsiveness the Philips gave a decent performance. It wasn’t quite up there with the fastest 60Hz monitors but wasn’t really too far behind when it came to perceived blur in games or movies. The ‘Fast’ pixel overdrive setting provided a decent level of acceleration without pushing things too far, keeping things free from intrusive artifacts. With over a frame of input lag measured, though, some gamers will want to stay clear of this one. For others this won’t be a problem, though, and although not its primary purpose there is no reason why this monitor can’t be used for some very enjoyable gaming. So the Philips 278P4QPJKEB puts in a decent all-round performance without providing anything revolutionary compared to other similar monitors. There are a few little extras such as a built in web-cam, microphone and a particularly well thought-out port selection and arrangement that some users may find attractive. Even the small and unobtrusive white power LED is clearly a carefully considered design decision. Coupled with the excellent and extremely solid build quality this may all be enough to win over some users and make this monitor a worthy choice.
A robust look with semi-glossy screen
Pivot into portrait
Buttons and power light
USB on the left side
Power switch on the right side
The rear
100 x 100mm VESA attachment
Calibration
Testing the presets
Settings
Gamma (central average)
White point (kelvins) Notes Gamma 1.8
1.8 6189K Image is very bright with colours lacking the appropriate depth. The image appears too warm (red) as well. Gamma 2.0
2.0 6199K Same brightness and colour cast with some extra depth.
Gamma 2.2
2.2 6536K Depth of image is much better and aside from a slight purple tint things look vibrant, well balanced and nicely varied with good distinction of shades. Gamma 2.4 2.4 6215K As 2.2 with extra depth (too much in places – some shades appear a bit too deep) and a warm rather than purple tint. Gamma 2.6
2.6 6214K As 2.4 but some shades are now much too deep and in places the image looks overly dull as a result. Test Settings
2.2 6498K Brightness is now more comfortable but still with a vibrant and varied look. The white point is now better balanced and gradation performance is better as well.
Gamma Test Settings
Test Settings
Brightness= 56 (according to preferences and lighting)
Contrast and brightness
Contrast ratios
Monitor Profile White luminance (cd/m2) Black luminance (cd/m2) Contrast ratio (x:1) 100% brightness 292 0.31 941 80% brightness 241 0.26 926 60% brightness 190 0.20 949 40% brightness 140 0.15 936 20% brightness 88 0.09 981 0% brightness 34 0.04 945 Test settings
182 0.02 910 Gamma 1.8
289 0.31 931 Gamma 2.0
289
0.31 933 Gamma 2.4
289 0.31 931 Gamma 2.6
288 0.31 930
PWM (Pulse Width Modulation)
Luminance uniformity
Luminance uniformity table
Luminance uniformity map
Contrast in games and movies
Lagom contrast tests
Colour reproduction
Colour gamut
Colour gamut test settings
Colour in games and movies
Viewing angles
The following video shows the sort of shifts in colour and contrast you can expect from off-centre viewing angles. There are no pronounced shifts in contrast as you might observe on a TN panel in particular. The final third of the video shows a dark background and highlights the aforementioned ‘PLS glow’ that blooms out most notably from non-central viewing angles.
Responsiveness
Input lag
Pixel responsiveness
Trailing SmartResponse 'Off'
Trailing SmartResponse 'Fast'
Trailing SmartResponse 'Faster'
Trailing SmartResponse 'Fastest'
Responsiveness in games and movies
Conclusion
Positives Negatives Colours are beautifully vibrant and varied with excellent consistency. A generous (but not excessive) colour gamut and ‘semi glossy’ screen surface help bring out a good lively quality here
No sRGB emulation mode, hardware calibration capabilities or uniformity compensation. Colours do not have the absolute ‘pop’ of a glossy screen
Respectable contrast performance both measured and perceptibly. The very light matte screen surface avoids imparting an overly grainy look to the image whilst also minimising glare ‘PLS glow’ is typical for this sort of monitor but can still be off-putting to some users. The purity and clean look to whites and light colours isn’t quite up there with glossy monitors, either Configurable grey to grey acceleration with a reasonable ‘Fast’ setting that provides reasonable response performance without introducing obvious overdrive artifacts
Levels of motion blur were not too far off even the fastest 60Hz monitors but the pixel responses did increase this slightly. At over 20ms, the input lag will put some users off
A generous and well thought-out port arrangement and a very robust, ergonomically flexible stand and VESA mounting
The monitor’s chunky look and thick bezels will deter some users
