Ultrawide vs. 4K Gaming – Before You Buy!

all right so both of the monitors behind me are 144 hertz one of them is a 38 inch ultra wide and the other one is 27 inch 4k but which of them offers the best gaming experience well it's actually a more difficult choice than you might think but the good news is pretty much all of the new high-end gpus that have launched recently can take advantage of these new high-end monitors even the 500 rtx 3070 will get you most of the way there so do you go with the higher pixel density of 4k or the wider aspect ratio and immersion of the curved ultrawide well a lot of it does depend on the types of games that you are playing so let's start with that and take a look at what else you need to know firstly an overview of the two monitors that we're taking a look at today which are both recent releases from lg first up is my own daily driver the 27 inch 4k 144 27 gn 950 and honestly i don't think i gave this monitor enough praise and credit in my initial review since that video i've used it every single day and it really just blows me away how uncompromising this thing is many would agree that 27 inches is a bit small for 4k resolution but i do sit reasonably close to this on my desk and i've never felt that it was too small that way this also comes with a huge benefit a higher resolution on a smaller panel means greater pixel density but more on that in just a moment then there's the ultrawide which lg kindly sent over for comparison the 38wn 95c 38 inches with a resolution of 3840x1600 nano ips panel and a glorious 144 hertz refresh rate now to be fair they do have faster ultra wides in their ultra gear lineup which is what the 27 gn 950 falls under but this is actually more of a gaming monitor than it would appear both of these monitors have g-sync and freesync support so you'll have synced frames all the way up to 144hz on both displays as well as fairly quick response times but now let's take a look at a handful of different games which ones benefit from that ultra wide gaming monitor and that 21 by 9 aspect ratio and where should you kind of just stick to a 16 by 9 monitor instead also what does ultrawide scaling actually even look like in modern titles well to save us both a bit of time there ultrawide scaling in modern games is actually pretty damn good red dead redemption 2 for example illustrates what is pretty much ideal ui elements are pushed off to the sides you gain additional field of view on the edges with no cropping vertically so gameplay is left feeling a lot more open and inviting but for cut scenes this game defaults back to 16x9 with letterboxing star wars squadrons has pretty much flawless scaling as well just extra fields of view gained here on the sides this is also graphically one of the best games i've had a chance to play this year and ultrawide only adds to that experience then witcher 3 again great scaling off to the edges allowing you to see a lot more of that landscape and also pushing those ui elements off out of the center view one thing to look out for though when it comes to ultra wide scaling in games is how far the edges of the screen become stretched this is totally normal by the way it's called perspective distortion watch this tree in the middle of the screen expand as it approaches peripheral vision this will usually become more apparent and distracting in games which already have a large field of view at 16 by 9 where stretching out to 21 by 9 widens the camera field of view even more and distorts the perspective even further this was actually really apparent in apex legends where sure you do gain additional field of view with no vertical cropping but the edges of the screen become extremely stretched this leaves you with a fairly skewed gaming experience where objects that are on the edge of the screen appear significantly closer than they are and move a lot faster than they should be luckily this game has an fov slider which will allow you to correct that to some degree but then you will be tightening the vertical crop of the screen as well this is one instance where playing on 16x9 is a better experience in my opinion similar story for call of duty modern warfare or warzone and also f1 2020 there is an fov slider in both of these games which will allow you to correct the otherwise skewed experience and a lot of that comes down to personal preference and trying to find the balance between improved gaming immersion versus the extra field of view being distracting some of you might actually like that skewed edge experience and having those objects off to the side feel a lot closer and moving a lot faster it definitely makes f1 2020 feel a lot faster than a 16x9 display and in witcher 3 and red dead redemption 2 i honestly didn't find it distracting at all and it really is those open world adventure style games where i think ultrawide monitors really shine there's just something about being able to see more of the game environment that allows you to be immersed in it even more i find it a lot more involving than a standard 16x9 display and then there are those few games out there that plainly just don't want anything to do with 21x9 although those are usually highly competitive titles like overwatch or valor for example so both of these monitors are fairly quick 144hz is by no means slow but it's the 4k monitor that's going to be slightly harder to drive from your pc because it has a slightly higher resolution but what's really interesting is the fact that the 4k monitor actually feels a little bit faster than the larger 38 inch ultra wide and i feel like this is mainly just due to the smaller panel size of the 27 inch 4k that way the transition from frame to frame is a lot smaller so the transitions feel quicker and less noticeable so i feel like there's something really interesting to keep in mind despite the 4k monitor being slightly harder to drive overall it did feel a little bit more responsive and say better for first person shooters another thing in favor of the 4k monitor is that pixel density and throughout this review testing a bunch of games on both of them on the 4k monitor you really do feel like you're seeing some games for the first time it sounds odd but really the amount of detail that you just wouldn't see at lower resolutions is seriously insane apex legends for example a game that i've played hundreds of hours on with a high refresh rate 1080p panel but 4k just makes this game feel different weapons i've picked up potentially thousands of times in this game i feel like i'm holding and seeing for the first time call of duty warzone is another example and this is a game which looks dramatically different at higher resolutions at 4k you no longer get that shimmering effect from a distant terrain and trees everything looks super crisp and again the weapon models are unbelievably clear at 4k and 27 inches we're getting a pixel density of 163 pixels per inch which is roughly 50 higher than that of the ultra wide which comes in at 109 ppi now the ultra wide is by no means a soft looking monitor it's still a noticeable step up from 1080p but you can still notice some jagged edges if you don't have anti-aliasing enabled with the 4k monitor on the other hand edge aliasing is significantly less noticeable to the point where even enabling anti-aliasing in some games just feels like a total waste now as i mentioned in my full review of the 27 gn 950 all of those pixels and all of that super clear detail is really worth nothing unless you can actually drive those high frame rates after all gaming immersion isn't delivered from a static scene it's from interacting from the game world and that responsiveness that you get from a high frame rate and high refresh rate and that rings true for both of these monitors they really do come to life at 144 hertz and that's the first thing that you should consider if you are planning on picking either of these up if you don't have the graphics power to properly drive these at high frame rates say above 100 fps i think most of you will have a much better gaming experience on a lower resolution panel to be fair the sweet spot for most gaming setups these days is probably a 27 inch 1440p 144 hertz monitor those specs are a lot easier to drive with mainstream gpus and the monitors themselves are in a lot more of an affordable price range when it comes to a general web browsing experience the ultrawide wins this hands down in my opinion and i can see that being really appealing to a lot of users since that's what most of us probably do on our pcs most of the time the horizontal pixel count is the same on both of these monitors 3840 but you also have to consider windows 10 scaling the 38 inch ultra wide runs at 100 window scaling by default and looks great whereas i run my 27 inch 4k monitor at 125 scaling which is actually smaller and denser than the default 150 scaling so for example here i just don't have the room to open up a ton of windows and applications and see them all at the same time so if that's important to you definitely consider an ultra wide instead but it's actually the vertical pixel count that matters a lot to me personally when it comes to something like video editing and that's where the 4k monitor has the edge even despite the 27 inch monitor being smaller than the 38 inch ultra wide i have more overall pixel real estate to work with this matters a lot when it comes to building up a lot of layers on your timeline and still having a high refresh rate reference window of what you're working on an ultrawide can show you more of your timeline horizontally and can give you potentially two program monitors but after editing over 400 videos on the channel i've realized that's not really important to my workflow so then ultrawide or 4k well for me it's going to be 4k i absolutely love the 27 gn 950 does feel that slight bit more responsive than the larger panel on the 38 inch ultra wide i love the pixel density on that panel as well and like i said the extra vertical pixels is really helpful for me as an end user for something like video editing and believe it or not it's also half the price of this specific ultrawide 800 us versus 1600. although if you're okay with a 34 inch panel instead of 38 inches you can save quite a bit of cash and also get a slightly faster panel in the end too i will say though there are times where i actually do prefer the 38 inch ultra white over the 27 inch 4k monitor i found it much better for general use and browsing some might prefer for video editing as well and for those open world games and also racing games i think this is as good as it gets so if you prefer those games definitely consider this instead and again these are two top end enthusiast tier monitors that do demand quite a lot of graphics power to get the most out of so i will leave these two linked down below but i'll also leave a few more mainstream options linked down there as well as always a huge thanks for watching and i'll see you all in the next one

Channel: Optimum Tech

Views: 325,278

Rating: 4.9327335 out of 5

Keywords: ultrawide gaming, 38, ultrawide, monitor, best gaming monitor, best monitor 2020, ultrawide vs 4K gaming, 4K gaming, best 4K monitor, LG 27GN950, 27GN950-B, optimum tech

Id: RZ0vnJ4B3cM

Length: 10min 50sec (650 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 30 2020