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The 27R94 ships in its Standard picture mode, which retains access to all image controls, including gamma and white balance. Local Dimming is also available for both SDR and HDR content.
Grayscale and Gamma Tracking
Our grayscale and gamma tests use Calman calibration software from Portrait Displays. We describe our grayscale and gamma tests in detail here.
The default grayscale measurement is a bit unusual. You can see that the 27R94 is a bit warm below 30%, and a bit cool above 60%, with neutral tones in the middle. Most monitors show a progressively larger error as brightness rises. Gamma tracks almost perfectly on the 2.2. reference with just a slight dip at 10% that cannot be seen in actual content.
Calibration demonstrates that the 27R94 would benefit from a two-point RGB control. I dialed in the steps from 40 to 100% with the sliders and a reduction in the contrast value. But I could not fix the lower steps, which got a tad warmer from the adjustment. Overall, the picture is slightly improved, so I left this setup in place for the rest of the review.
sRGB grayscale tracking is excellent with only tiny errors from 80-100% brightness. Gamma takes a larger dip at 10%, which is a minor error. This mode is completely usable for color-critical work.
Comparisons
The 27R94 goes from mid-pack to the bottom when compared to the other screens’ grayscale tracking. The default value of 3.34dE is almost in the don’t-need-to-calibrate realm, but the errors are visible in the brighter parts of the image. Though the new value of 2.18dE doesn’t seem much better, it makes a visible impact for the positive.
Gamma tracking is excellent and that’s true for all the screens, which have nearly perfect tracking. The 27R94 is solid at a 0.13 range of values and a 1.82% deviation from the 2.2 reference. The actual average is 2.16, and that’s solely because of the 10% brightness step.
Color Gamut Accuracy
Our color gamut and volume testing use Portrait Displays’ Calman software. For details on our color gamut testing and volume calculations, click here.
You can see the 27R94’s Quantum Dot layer is doing its thing with a completely covered DCI-P3 gamut. All primaries are fully rendered, and there’s some bonus blue and magenta. Saturation targets are on point with only minor hue errors. These are fixed by the grayscale calibration to lower the average error slightly. This is excellent performance.
The sRGB gamut is spot-on with a tiny 1.63dE error. There is nothing to complain about here.
Comparisons
If you lined up all six monitors, there would be no visible difference in their color accuracy. The range of values of 1.06 to 1.83dE is very tight. You will see a difference in color volume, though, specifically in the red and green parts of the image. There, the 27R94 and XG27UCS have a clear advantage. Also, the 27R94 covers an ideal 100.83% of sRGB, making it well-suited for color-critical applications.
Test Takeaway: Aside from a slight grayscale anomaly in the darker parts of the image, the 27R94 exhibits very accurate color and gamma. A two-point RGB control would be a good fix for this. It compares well to its competition and is qualified for sRGB reference use. It covers more color than its non-QD counterparts, especially in the red and green parts of the image.
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