Looking for a Gaming Monitor

IPS panels simply are outclassed by comparably priced 120 / 144 Hz TN panels in gaming.....yes IPS panels have great color accuracy and great wide angle viewing..... two things that are kinda irrelevant in gaming in most cases ... how many people you have sitting on either side of you normally while gaming....if the answer is 0, them the wide viewing angle doesn't help you.

We have a Dell Ultrasharp upstairs .... it's generally considered one of the best IPS panels under $1000. Its is wonderful to work on.....but there's a Asus 120 Hz TN panel in the next room and it pales next to the Asus. The reason has less to do with the technology than in the game design process. Let me make an analogy.....

Popular music is designed "to sell" ... therefore it is mixed to sound "best" on the types of devices that are most prevalent..... that consists of iPhones / Ipods with $7 sound subsystems, car audio systems and boom boxes. The music is mixed to compensate for the deficiencies in these platforms....... Play these on expensive audiophile sound systems and in most cases, the exaggerated bass and high end from the artificialized mixing process grates on the ears.

The analogy carries over..... games are designed to look good on $300 consoles with coloring to match what they are capable of. What I notice most however is image edges on the Ultrasharp are less defined than the crisp, sharp edges ya see on 144 Hz TN panels....kinda like when ya sit too close to a big screen TV.

As for the one ya referenced, it advertises a 5 ms response time. Here's the reality

http://www.anandtech.com/show/6460/asus-pb278q-review-an-ips-competitor-emerges/5

The lag numbers for the PB278Q are right about what we’ve been seeing for 27” displays, with 16.7 ms of input lag and 11.5 ms of response time for the pixels. This gives us a total overall delay of 28.2 ms using the DVI input.

Click to expand...

Compare that with the response time on a 144HZ TN panel .... < 2 ms input lag

http://pcmonitors.info/reviews/asus-vg248qe

..... we measured just over 2ms (less than half a frame at 144Hz) of input lag on the VG248QE. Whichever way you cut it this is an absolutely miniscule amount of input lag and it won’t cause anybody problems no matter how sensitive they are to input lag. The snappy feeling and instantaneous responses to mouse movement was unmistakable when using the monitor.

Even compared to a 60Hz LCD with ‘zero input lag’ the ASUS has an advantage in fluidity in the form of its refresh rate. At 144Hz the monitor is outputting 2.4 times as much visual information every second. This includes 2.4 times as frequent input polling; more rapid updates to mouse cursor position or the position or your character in the game as you move it. It also means that, if your GPU is up to it, you’ll be getting up to 144 discrete frames every second (144fps). Each frame is, therefore, displayed for less than half as long as on a 60Hz monitor. The end result is a huge decrease in visible trailing and a much more ‘connected feel’ as you interact with the game world.

Click to expand...

If ya have other uses for the IPS panel, by all means grab it. If it's solely a gaming monitor, go out and see them both in a store before you buy it. My son is minoring in photography in college and he loves his ultrasharp....but when the Asus 120 Hz panel is free in the next room, he'll play on that.

Another issue too consider is that without 120 Hz 3D is off the table. Now Im a guy who doesn't like 3D movies .... but I had a ball in the little time I managed to get on there (fighting for time with the 3 kids) and play Batman AC in 3D.