Acer Predator XB321HK 32-inch Ultra HD G-Sync Monitor Review
Today we’re looking at Acer’s latest flagship gaming monitor, the Predator XB321HK. Sporting a 32-inch IPS screen, G-Sync and premium build quality; it looks like just the thing for a cost-no-object gaming rig.
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Color Gamut And Performance
For details on our color gamut testing and volume calculations, please click here.
The color tests are the deciding factor as to where gamma and contrast should be set. You can see that without adjustment there are issues in the lower saturations and the luminance levels, which are generally too high. We’re not trying to make too much of this since the errors average a relatively minor 3.90dE. But the XB321HK has some upward potential that can be realized without an instrumented calibration.
Reducing the contrast slider from 50 to 40 brings the errors down a bit, but now the picture looks a little drab. The overall DeltaE is now 2.42. This suggests there’s no visible problem, but we can still improve picture quality with one more change.
It seems that changing gamma to 1.8 is the key. We’ve demonstrated before how closely gamma and color saturation are linked. That’s why it’s important to measure saturation levels other than 100%. You would never see these changes take place by only recording the gamut triangle’s outer points. Now every color is on target and luminance levels are close to perfect. This is what we’d expect from a premium display called “Predator.”
Now we return to the comparison group.
In the realm of Ultra HD gaming monitors, the competition for color accuracy is fierce. 1.80dE is a great result but it only lands the XB321HK in fifth place; extraordinary. We have no complaints about any of the displays here. They exhibit superb accuracy and would grace any high-end gaming system.
Gamut Volume: Adobe RGB 1998 And sRGB
Thanks to some bonus red, the Predator delivers an extra 6% of sRGB gamut volume. That might necessitate a custom ICC profile if one were to use this display for color-critical applications. For gamers, however, it just means color will look a little bolder than many other screens.
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Christian Eberle is a Contributing Editor for Tom's Hardware US. He's a veteran reviewer of A/V equipment, specializing in monitors. Christian began his obsession with tech when he built his first PC in 1991, a 286 running DOS 3.0 at a blazing 12MHz. In 2006, he undertook training from the Imaging Science Foundation in video calibration and testing and thus started a passion for precise imaging that persists to this day. He is also a professional musician with a degree from the New England Conservatory as a classical bassoonist which he used to good effect as a performer with the West Point Army Band from 1987 to 2013. He enjoys watching movies and listening to high-end audio in his custom-built home theater and can be seen riding trails near his home on a race-ready ICE VTX recumbent trike. Christian enjoys the endless summer in Florida where he lives with his wife and Chihuahua and plays with orchestras around the state.
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Bartendalot The nite about 4K@60hz being obsolete soon is a valid one and makes the purchase price even more difficult to swallow.Reply
I'd argue that my 1440p@144hz is a more future-proof investment. -
Yaisuah I have this monitor and think its great and almost worth the money, but I want to point out that nobody on the internet seems to realize there's a perfect resolution between 1440 and 4k that looks great and runs great and I think it would be considered 3k. Try adding 2880 x 1620 to your resolutions and see how it looks on any 4k monitor. I run windows and most less intensive games at this resolution and constantly get 60fps with a 970(around 30fps at 4k). You also don't have to mess with windows scaling on a 32in monitor. After seeing how great 3k looks and runs, I really don't know why everyone immediately jumped to 4k.Reply -
mellis I am still going to wait before getting a 4K monitor, since there is still not a practical solution for 4K gaming. In a couple of more years hopefully 4K monitors will be cheap and midrange GPUs will be able to support gaming on them. I think trying to invest in 4K gaming now is a wait of money. Sticking with 1080p for now.Reply -
truerock A 4K@120Hz G-Sync video monitor based PC rig under $4,000 is probably 2 to 3 years away.Reply -
RedJaron
I would hazard a few guesses. First would be that 2880x1620 is so close to 2560x1440 that no manufacturer wants to complicate product lines like that.18346905 said:I have this monitor and think its great and almost worth the money, but I want to point out that nobody on the internet seems to realize there's a perfect resolution between 1440 and 4k that looks great and runs great and I think it would be considered 3k. Try adding 2880 x 1620 to your resolutions and see how it looks on any 4k monitor. I run windows and most less intensive games at this resolution and constantly get 60fps with a 970(around 30fps at 4k). You also don't have to mess with windows scaling on a 32in monitor. After seeing how great 3k looks and runs, I really don't know why everyone immediately jumped to 4k.
Second, 2160 is the least common multiple of both 720 and 1080, meaning it's the lowest resolution that's a perfect integer scalar of both. So with proper upscaling, a 720 or 1080 source picture can be displayed reasonably well on a 4K display. These panels are made for TVs as well as computer monitors, and the majority of TV signal ( at least in the US ) is still in either 720p or 1080p. Upscaling 1080 to 1620 is the same as upscaling 720 to 1080 ( they're both a factor of 150% ). Upscaling by non-integer factors means you need a lot of pixel interpolation and anti-aliasing. To me, this looks very fuzzy ( I bought a 720p TV over a 1080 TV years ago because playing 720p PS3 games and 720p cable TV on a 1080p display looked horrible to me ). So it may be the powers that be decided on the 4K resolution so that people could adopt the new panels and still get decent picture quality with the older video sources ( at least until, or if, they get upgraded ). If so, I can agree with that. -
michalt I have one and have not regretted my purchase for a second. I tend to keep monitors for a long time (my Dell 30 inch displays have been with me for a decade). When looked at over that time period, it's not that expensive for something I'll be staring at all day every day.Reply -
photonboy It would be nice to offer a GLOBAL FPS LOCK to stay in asynchronous mode at all times regardless how high the FPS gets.Reply -
photonboy Update: AMD has this, not sure where it is for NVidia or if the GLOBAL FPS LOCK is easy to do.Reply