Auria EQ276W 27" IPS Monitor Review: QHD For $400

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Although QHD screens are nothing new, they remain atop the desktop monitor price ladder. Auria broke the $400 barrier with its new EQ276W 27” IPS panel. Today, we run it through our display benchmarks to see how it compares to far pricier competition.

Results: Calibrated Brightness And Contrast

Since we consider 200 nits to be an ideal average for peak output, we calibrate all of our test monitors to that value. In a room with some ambient light (like an office), this brightness level provides a sharp, punchy image with maximum detail and minimum eye fatigue. It's also the sweet spot for gamma and grayscale tracking, which we'll look at on pages five and six.

Even though there are 100 steps to the EQ276W’s brightness control, it doesn’t do much until you get down to 30 or so. After that, the adjustments are fairly coarse. We couldn’t get right on 200 cd/m2, so we opted to go a little over.

Calibration can either lower or raise a display’s black level. There’s no universal rule that calibration will improve black level.

In this case, the Auria’s black level was improved slightly over stock, though it’s still a good bit higher than other 27-inch IPS screens.

Contrast ratio often takes a small hit after calibration in most monitors, regardless of their price or quality level.

Calibrating the EQ276W only reduces the contrast ratio by eight percent. This difference would not be visible to the naked eye. While this result keeps Auria on the bottom of our on/off contrast tests, the actual image isn’t bad to look at. For business and graphics use, we found the monitor to be perfectly usable.

Christian Eberle
Christian Eberle
Contributing Editor

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.