If you're into competitive gaming but don't have a huge budget to blow on a very powerful graphics card (opens in new tab) and a high-resolution display with a fast refresh-rate, the latest price drop for AOC's 1080p (opens in new tab)C27G1 144Hz gaming monitor is worth considering. It's down to just $190 on Amazon (opens in new tab), likely in wake of the arrival of the 1440p (opens in new tab) models announced this week.
Those QHD displays are significantly more expensive, though, and aside from the resolution, the specs are comparable to the C27G1, making this one of today's best tech deals (opens in new tab).
The C27G1 has a 27-inch panel that hits up to 250 nits brightness. Because it's a VA (opens in new tab) panel, it has a respectable 3,000:1 contrast ratio, and this particular version is lightly curved with a 1800R curvature. Professional creatives should look elsewhere, however. With only 75% of AdobeRGB and 102% of sRGB color spaces accounted for, you should avoid doing important editing work on this display.
This monitor also supports AMD FreeSync (opens in new tab), but where it has its newer brethren beat is the minimum refresh rate it can drop down to: 30Hz, as opposed to 48Hz for the new variants. This means that it will keep your gameplay smoother down to lower framerates, even further reducing the GPU (opens in new tab)requirements to drive your games on here.
As the cherry on top, AOC pairs the gaming monitor (opens in new tab) with a three-year warranty that covers accidental damage.