Samsung LS34E790C - Curved 34" 21:9 super-wide

No problem :) what are you on the fence about?

After spending a day with this monitor these are my thoughts.

Positives....

Out of the box colours weren't too great and brightness is way to high and makes every look washed out. Once calibrated I can barely tell any difference between the colours on this and the LG ultrawide that I had calibrated. It looks stunning.

Blacks are obviously much better than the IPS LG and the contrast ratio on the Samsung is double that of the LG.

Feels smoother than the LG and I can't see any ghosting at all while gaming and iv been playing Assetto Corsa for the last two hours and didn't notice any and with a fast paced racing game like that im sure I would have. I have it set to standard and I believe the 2.9ms compared to the 8.9 on the LG is evident as it just felt that little bit more smoother.


Looks wise this monitor is beautiful and unless im looking at it from the side I completely forget about the curve and it just feels very natural to my eyes.

I love that you have a height adjustment on this which was one of the things I didn't like on the LG.

No backlight bleed! This was one of the biggest issues with the LG for me and I sent 4 back because of it. Im Happy to say that when im looking straight on at a black screen it looks black and uniform all over.

Negatives.....

Colours out of the box can be a little off putting. My colour temp was about 5600k with out of the box colours which is poor and might put some people off but soon as I calibrated it I have it looking as good as the LG and the colours are stunning for a VA panel.

The middle part of my screen is perfect and the whites are white but the left and right side of the screen has a red tint to it which I cant get rid off unless I calibrate the side instead of the middle but then I will lose the perfect colour in the middle. Its only noticible on a white background when surfing websites but in gaming and otherwise Its not noticible.

Shift in contrast at the sides. Its there but I don't really notice it aslong as im sat directly in the middle of the screen.

There is clouding but I can only see it if I turn the brightness up really high and turn the lights off in my room and put a full black background up.
With my normal settings and a dim light on I don't see anyone of it and the blacks look uniform across the whole screen and any gaming with dark scenes is a joy. You can see by my pictures I posted earlier how the screen looks with a black image on it.

My stand has a slight tilt to the left which is annoying but I can live with that.

Overall so far this is much better than the LG. The red tint at the sides is the only thing that bothers me but you never notice it in gaming and only on white backgrounds so its not really an issue.


Here's a pic as well showing the colours and blacks. It wont look the same on your monitor as everyone is different but it gives you an idea.

K8XYuIK.jpg
 
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Just to add I pretty much concur with everything Matson says! It really is a lovely monitor IMO!

The only negative is that the viewing angles are closer to TN than they are to IPS. Other than that it's awesome. Plus I know what you mean about the brightness settings. It seems somewhat ridiculous that you need to set the brightness so low to get a balanced picture. However even at 22 (which is what I have mine set to just now) it's still very bright and vivid!
 
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Reasonably positive reviews but the reports of poor calibration, clouding and banding are off putting. For the price, this monitor should be close to perfection. I think its only popular as its the best of a bad bunch rather than being outstanding on its own merits
 
On that brightness setting of 20 my monitor is incredibly dull?? When I ramp mine's up to 57 (note the jump in luminance at this value), in terms of colour and brightness, it is indeed close to the LG. Thing is, I remember the LG to have been a hell of a lot easier on my eyes at the same perceived luminance.

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Buy me......

Samsung S34E790C: Mini Review. [I'm not going to address everything, just the salient points]:


Points for:

Looks: Simple clean lines.

Physical presence / Experience: 34" 21:9 widescreen monitors are much bigger in real life than they are in photographs. That Linus review, where he said it was like a 'command station' - he's not far off saying that.

Back light bleed: None. There is a small amount of clouding however, but it won't ever show itself when you are using dark backgrounds in games movies etc, unlike the LG panel's awful bleed which overlays itself onto dark images at the sides. If you've owned any BLB plagued LG based 34" panels (two for me), then this thing is a godsend.

Colours: On a lot of images this thing is stunning. Looks very close to the LG in terms of colour reproduction when you take the time to calibrate it properly.

Blacks: Deep and work very well in most places........ Maybe too they're too black! They can seem to give an otherworldly effect to some images, like they're almost a layered inky 2D.

Text: Crisp. The poor out of the box calibration when sorted pulls the text into line. This panel has elongated RGB pixels , so maybe that has something to do with it. PCM2's review will be out in

Ghosting: None.... Faster and fastest produce some and a lot respectively. Stick to Standard response time and games are don't show this behavior. I've done tests using Nvidia's Pendulum demo and on the fly switching verifies this. I don't know why this setting exists and you'll have seen quite a few comments from early comments about this: basically, they whacked the monitor's overdrive to full then complained about it. You can see ghosting on Youtube videos on fastest too. Note that one user here actually got bad ghosting on his on standard setting and has sent his back.

Input lag: Twitch shooters feel responsive and react instantly. The LG's I had didn't feel as fast, but there's wasn't that much in it TBH.

Curve: Unsettling to begin with; now my brain has rewired itself and it looks very natural. Viewing angles are decent(ish) - at least they do the trick for the person sitting in front of it.

Panel Uniformity: Mine's is practically even from left to right on a white screen, but please note that some users have a slight red tint to the left/right edges.



Points against:

Looks: The front bezel looks cheap.. but the rear is all Gucci -- why Samsung, why? :) The stand is flamboyant and is designed for offices -for your average user it takes up too much space.

Screen Management software: No way as good as the LG's.... you've got to right click on the title bar of each window you send to be arranged, unlike the LG where you just threw it at the area (unless I've messed up - but the help file didn't tell you much anyway).

Calibration: Poorly calibrated out of the box. EDIT: interesting comment from PCM2 on page 28: "Absolutely no need for ICC profiles on this one, especially not for gaming and general use. Further details in the upcoming review." It's taken me time to get there, but this thing looks stunning now.

Colours: On a lot of images this thing is amazing and better than the LG- but not all of them: I've noted some comments from users about some small images looking 'dirty' and I can attest to that. I'm trying my best, but I truly don't think the Samsung is overall as pleasing as the LG 34 for everything. EDIT: I've got my OSD settings looking great now, almost. Any comments I made about some images looking muddy, I take back. BTW: I started off with Cool 1 as my baseline and tweaked from there, but there are other approaches. Note: I ended up getting a hardware calibrator in the end: worth it, but why Samsung?. At the end off the day, IPS is a better general purpose viewing experience in my opinion, but this panel puts up a good fight

Colour shifting: If you're used to VA then fine; if you've come from an IPS then it's a little unsettling. Again, I've got used to it.

Colour Banding: ... mostly not an issue, though on some poor gradients/bitmaps on some webpages (ie Steam interface, ingame skies and loading screens etc), you'll slightly notice it. Some games set in the dark ie: Elite Dangerous, exhibit a very very small amount of colour banding / difference in shades in the darkness of space, but this nothing to truly worry about. This is what VA and TN monitors do.

Examples:
http://i.imgur.com/Y4AZUt7.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/YpNfbjM.jpg (the same in Arma 3 and DayZ, but only a tiny bit in Star Citizen and in Elite).
http://imgur.com/a/v7wEa (The first two images are screen caps, the second two are from my phone which of course are horribly overexposed). *I'm not totally sure if say you are looking at these images on an IPS screen that it'd be that different*.

Screen Tearing in games: Yes it's there and perhaps more noticeable than the LG if I remember, maybe I'm wrong. V-ysnc on preferably if you can (I know, asking a lot) and Nvidia Adaptive Vsync helps, but it has it's drawbacks (possible input lag in some games). Edit: Just been playing multiplayer BF4 with V-sync ON at a smooth and solid 60FPS: beautiful colours and crisp visuals - an amazing experience.



Conclusion:

Edit: Please note that the above negatives are small negatives. There's nothing terribly wrong with this monitor really, only a handful of small niggles,

If the LG did not have back light bleed, then between the two I'd have gone for the LG and not the Samsung (I like IPS). These units are a lot of cash and I wouldn't have thrown the amount of money at them if they weren't widescreen. It's seriously that good of a format to view on (and the manufacturers know it). As the poster above points out, it's a lot of money to pay for something that isn't perfect, but then again, this is a new format with it's own problems (as Matson points out below).

EDIT: Getting the calibration right on this monitor wasn't easy for me, but when you do, it's absolutely stunning (the text pulls itself into shape - must be the elongated pixels) and I completely take it back about preferring the LG on loads of points. Only the colour shifting on the monitor and the banding on poor quality images are minus points now when comparing the two- oh, and the bog awful out of the box calibration. Samsung - get a grip.
 
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I'm surprised you find 20 incredibly dull. Its exactly right for me and looks great. That's 120cd/m2 which is the ideal luminance for anything that isn't daytime viewing. My tv has been calibrated to that setting for years though so maybe my eyes are just really used to that.
Its a shame that none of these monitors are perfect but I can't see that happening personally. At least for a long time.
The 144hz Acer ultrawide that's due out later this year wont be perfect. If its IPS it will most likely have IPS glow and maybe bleed. If its TN the colours wont look that great and if its VA it will have the same issues this has most likely.
These ultrawide screens are more noticible with these issues because of how wide they are. I could see the IPS glow shifting on my LG by moving even a little off center.

The banding is only ever so slight and I haven't noticed it in anything but the test pattern.

The only real thing that I actually don't like is the colour shift at the sides of the screen. Its a red tint on white backgrounds but its only subtle so I can live with that.

Id probably give this an 8.5/10 at the moment.

Obviously mine is calibrated too so its the best its possibly going to look for me and others who don't have a calibration tool at hand can only go by eye which makes it harder and considering the default out of the box settings were rubbish for me I can see how it can look worse for some.

I agree if the LG didn't have and bleed and in my case a tear down the center fault I would have probably stayed with the LG but so far im much happier with this.

As stated above though its the best ultrawide so far but not perfect.
 
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@Matson: No way - 20 is absolutely terrible on my monitor - I can't imagine anybody using that value as it's way too dark / unusable for any person in any environment. As I say, maybe mine's is a slight dud and if it is, then a lot of points above ought to be discarded.

Yes, the ultrawide screen does exacerbate shifting/glow problems over a standard 16:9er, whether IPS or VA etc and they both present different problems according to their tech. You can see the clouding shifting too with the Samsung, but in use you won't notice it. I'm hoping the engineers can overcome these problems in the future - right now, I don't think they're quite just there.

I know you're really pleased with yours and I'm glad that's the case. Got to admit: I felt a little off when I read my post above as I felt I would be putting a downer on all the owners of the Samsung.
 
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Hopefully other owner's can pipe up and counter my points. I know we're paying for the curve and the widescreen so maybe I'm asking too much of it as you point out. We are after all early adopters.
 
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Yeah it could just be your monitor or your not used to it being that low. Our eyes are different and with my LG my brightness settings varied on each of the 4 monitors I tried.

The optimal settings are ideally 6500K 2.2 gamma and between 100 and 150cd/m2 for luminance. Mines at 120cd/m2 right now with a brightness setting of 21. Brightness at 60 gave me a luminance of about 200cd/m2 which is more ideal for daytime with the light glaring through the window as it would give me eyestrain if I used that at night.

Would be nice to get some other thoughts for sure on these things.
 
I asked my GF and brother yesterday to look at it at 20 brightness and they said it was far too low - unusably so. 30 was slightly better for them ofc, but here's the thing: I've never seen anybody in my life use a (decent) monitor on such dim settings, anywhere. Seeing as everybody else is using 20-30 values, I can only conclude that mine's is perhaps off - that would account for some of the findings I laid out above as I've had to pump up the values to make it the same brightness as the LG.

I've ramped the exposure up to 95 with a brightness of 45, but that's pushing it. I'll keep at it - maybe pay an extra £70 for a hardware calibrator...............
 
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SaL<XXX said:
I asked my GF and brother yesterday to look at it at 20 brightness and they said it was far too low - unusably so. 30 was slightly better for them ofc, but here's the thing: I've never seen anybody in my life use a (decent) monitor on such dim settings, anywhere. Seeing as everybody else is using 20-30 values, I can only conclude that mine's is perhaps off - that would account for some of the findings I laid out above as I've had to pump up the values to make it the same brightness as the LG.

I've ramped the exposure up to 95 with a brightness of 45, but that's pushing it. I'll keep at it - maybe pay an extra £70 for a hardware calibrator...............
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Are you talking about '20' with everything else at factory defaults, or '20' following other adjustments? It would make a difference. And what are the lighting conditions like in the room when you consider it dim? You should also give yours and anybody else's eyes time to adjust. After an hour you might be surprised by how it doesn't look so dim any more.

As an aside, 120 cd/m2 is only really recommended for fairly dim rooms. It is a fair bit lower than most people are used to given the relative brightness of some TVs, phone displays and other screens people use these days. In a moderately bright to bright room you will find 160 - 200 cd/m2 more suitable.
 
Booner! said:
Cheers for the colour profiles, all set up now. Deep colours. Very impressed with this monitor. It's surreal, really surreal to have so much screen space without a break down the middle.

I've installed a couple of plugin/extentions for chrome for ultra wide viewing on netflix and youtube. I'm going to try gaming now. Dying light worked a treat earlier. I dropped the shadows and view distance down and it runs fine on high settings on a 290

Anyone on the fence, buy.
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Hi do you know any plugins or extensions for internet explorer?
 
guybrushthree said:
I have a 2014 MacBook Air and was wondering if anyone has used one on this monitor at native resolution at 60Hz. I'm pretty sure it'll work, but I've read enough people saying they could only get the LG one running at 50Hz to make me want to be 100% sure before I spend so much money.
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Sorry to be a pain, but from what I can see the most active discussion on this monitor is here and I really need to be sure before I order. Thanks in advance!
 
The only reason im still holding back on the samsung is because i initially returned my lgs and didnt get a replacement was because i wanted o hold out on a freesync ultrawide but im not sure how long that will be
 
skarpinis said:
Hi do you know any plugins or extensions for internet explorer?
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No just chrome, but the chrome ones are pretty good! You lose some top/bottom image, but you get used to it. It's pretty awesome watching youtube/netflix full screen.

I'll be honest, many of the posts here are obviously in great detail for the enthusiast and given the price of the monitor, this is mainly who will be attracted to it given the new tech (early adopters). I would consider myself to be nowhere near an expert and just happened to be in the market for a bigger monitor. For a standard punter like myself who likes to game/watch movies and video edit where the basics are important, but I wouldn't understand colour to the nth degree - the monitor is superb by my standards.

Yes I agree that many of you will have compared this with ultra calibrated monitors and very strict test environments to meet your needs, but for anyone who is on the fence and looking for a great monitor I'd highly recommend it. I haven't noticed any of the niggles above, I think the build quality is great, colours are awesome with a small tweak and no dead pixels/banding/ghosting/bleed in comparison to my 120hz Benq.
 
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Booner! said:
No just chrome, but the chrome ones are pretty good! You lose some top/bottom image, but you get used to it. It's pretty awesome watching youtube/netflix full screen.

I'll be honest, many of the posts here are obviously in great detail for the enthusiast and given the price of the monitor, this is mainly who will be attracted to it given the new tech (early adopters). I would consider myself to be nowhere near an expert and just happened to be in the market for a bigger monitor. For a standard punter like myself who likes to game/watch movies and video edit where the basics are important, but I wouldn't understand colour to the nth degree - the monitor is superb by my standards.

Yes I agree that many of you will have compared this with ultra calibrated monitors and very strict test environments to meet your needs, but for anyone who is on the fence and looking for a great monitor I'd highly recommend it. I haven't noticed any of the niggles above, I think the build quality is great, colours are awesome with a small tweak and no dead pixels/banding/ghosting/bleed in comparison to my 120hz Benq.
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Any clouding?
 
Booner! said:
No just chrome, but the chrome ones are pretty good! You lose some top/bottom image, but you get used to it. It's pretty awesome watching youtube/netflix full screen.

I'll be honest, many of the posts here are obviously in great detail for the enthusiast and given the price of the monitor, this is mainly who will be attracted to it given the new tech (early adopters). I would consider myself to be nowhere near an expert and just happened to be in the market for a bigger monitor. For a standard punter like myself who likes to game/watch movies and video edit where the basics are important, but I wouldn't understand colour to the nth degree - the monitor is superb by my standards.

Yes I agree that many of you will have compared this with ultra calibrated monitors and very strict test environments to meet your needs, but for anyone who is on the fence and looking for a great monitor I'd highly recommend it. I haven't noticed any of the niggles above, I think the build quality is great, colours are awesome with a small tweak and no dead pixels/banding/ghosting/bleed in comparison to my 120hz Benq.
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Your spot on there. I was gaming last night for a few hours and its a better experience on this than the LG and overall very pleasing.
 
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