The Asus ROG SWIFT PG278Q – a 27” 1400p 144Hz Monitor with G-SYNC

rtho782 said:
Thought I'd post my thoughts after receiving mine today, partly because I'm an AMD user so maybe a bit unique.

Firstly, arrived promptly, usual OCUK good service, although I'm a bit peeved that had I waited a day to order, I'd have gotten free Borderlands ;) oh well..

I realised in a mad panic yesterday evening that both my Desktop and Laptop only have MiniDP ports, and ordered a MiniDP-DP cable from Amazon for next day delivery. my friend wants one of these monitors and has an nVidia 690, which is also MiniDP only. It could be a good idea for OCUK to suggest a MiniDP-DP cable at the checkout, as otherwise idiots like me will end up being unable to play with it when it arrives ;)

So, monitor arrived at work. I was impatient and opened it there, connecting it to my Laptop (nVidia GT 650m GDDR5). I was surprised to see the light go red, indicating g-sync was on, although I could find no option about this in the nVidia control panel. This is a little weird as the GT650m isn't supposed to support g-sync. I had a mad panic thinking the monitor was broken, before realising that apparently if the MiniDP connector is fully in, the machine detects the display but doesn't work? Might just be the el-cheapo amazon cable, but I found when pulling it a fraction, it clicked into place about 1mm out of the socket. Other than that, it seemed fine. Looked for dead pixels, found none. Didn't bother trying games, as the laptop is a bit anaemic, and I was at work ;)

Got the monitor home, and re-arranged my desk. My previous setup was a Dell 30" 2560x1600 panel (WFP3007-HC) as my main monitor, and and LG 27EA33V 27" 1920x1080 panel as my 2nd. Both monitors were IPS...

I have donated the LG to my other half, and the 30" has been demoted to 2nd monitor, with the ROG taking pride of place.

First impression firing up a game? It's a lot smaller than a 30". More so than I expected. 2nd impression, is that the colours are not as good as my two IPS monitors, but that is to be expected.

My desktop is a 7970 and a 7990 in crossfire, with an i7 4790k. The 7970 is the lead card, mostly because that gives me better temps on the 7990 (apparently whichever chip is actually driving the monitors gets hotter by about 10 degrees, and the 7990 hits 104C and throttles until reboot if it's the main card).

I knew G-Sync wouldn't work, but was hoping ULMB would. No such luck with an ATI card. Even the Strobelight utility won't work (as that sets custom timings based on 1080p, this stopped the monitor displaying at all until I reset it and rebooted).

So, still gives me a 1440p 144hz screen right? Well, yes and no. AMD have supposedly "fixed" frame pacing issues, but only in DX10 and 11. Add to that, the crossfire bridge interconnect with it's 0.9GB/s bandwidth is "enough for 2560x1600", but only at 60hz. (see here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7729/...rivers-now-available-mantle-frame-pacing-more )

This means that data has to be shunted across the PCIe bus, and in my case, over a PCIe bridge on the 7990. The experience leaves a little to be desired, and I think some of the issues I'm getting are the result of that.

In short, the monitor works on AMD. However, AMD suck donkey balls, so even the non-nvidia feature (144hz 1440p) isn't perfect with AMD. This is no fault of Asus however.

I think you may find less of an issue without crossfire (but driving this monitor to 144hz without crossfire isn't easy) or with 290x crossfire (due to XDMA) but I'd strongly recommend nVidia.

Anyone wanna swap a 7990 and 7970 for a 780ti? ;)
Click to expand...

Was going to order one tonight, however I only have AMD's. (290's) was going to run it in crossfire.

basing on this post, maybe not a good idea?
 
Finally got my ROG Swift today and oh my god, it is even better than I expected. Just finished installing it an hour ago so still getting used to everything but wow, what an amazing piece of engineering.

First impressions - I can't get over the colour, crispness and responsiveness. Played some Bioshock infinite and it's like a different game. Total War Rome 2 is at a different level.

And my Gigabyte 780ti OC is pushing all this glory without breaking a sweat.
 
Stanners said:
Just noticed you now get Borderlands free with the monitor, Has this just been added as I bought mine saturday and did not recieve a game code!
Click to expand...

I could have swore there was a free game back when I ordered (second batch) but have not received any codes.

Either that or my memory is playing tricks on me :(
 
Reporting in. Super monitor, never seen anything so vivid (probibly more the high refresh rate) and even in the desktop all windows move silky smooth and GSync - no tearing whatsoever. Games that you have played before seem brand new again!

It is a TN Panel as we know and if you are comming from an IPS you will notice the difference, but the features for games are spot on.

Build quality is the best I have seen in any monitor.

I have noticed that if you run at 144Hz in the desktop the card will not run in low power mode (around 380MHz ish) it stays at 850MHz ish.

Anyone had problems with SLI and g-sync? Can be erratic and frames are very steppy and need a reboot (far cry 3) and Crysis 2 seemed to want to lock at 60FPS regardless. Wonder when NVidia will get some newer drivers out.

On a side note i really dont get what ULMB is about? Tried it and it just dims the screen and gets dimmer if you change the PWM but cant really tell the difference in blur?
 
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rtho782 said:
Thought I'd post my thoughts after receiving mine today, partly because I'm an AMD user so maybe a bit unique.

Firstly, arrived promptly, usual OCUK good service, although I'm a bit peeved that had I waited a day to order, I'd have gotten free Borderlands ;) oh well..

I realised in a mad panic yesterday evening that both my Desktop and Laptop only have MiniDP ports, and ordered a MiniDP-DP cable from Amazon for next day delivery. my friend wants one of these monitors and has an nVidia 690, which is also MiniDP only. It could be a good idea for OCUK to suggest a MiniDP-DP cable at the checkout, as otherwise idiots like me will end up being unable to play with it when it arrives ;)

So, monitor arrived at work. I was impatient and opened it there, connecting it to my Laptop (nVidia GT 650m GDDR5). I was surprised to see the light go red, indicating g-sync was on, although I could find no option about this in the nVidia control panel. This is a little weird as the GT650m isn't supposed to support g-sync. I had a mad panic thinking the monitor was broken, before realising that apparently if the MiniDP connector is fully in, the machine detects the display but doesn't work? Might just be the el-cheapo amazon cable, but I found when pulling it a fraction, it clicked into place about 1mm out of the socket. Other than that, it seemed fine. Looked for dead pixels, found none. Didn't bother trying games, as the laptop is a bit anaemic, and I was at work ;)

Got the monitor home, and re-arranged my desk. My previous setup was a Dell 30" 2560x1600 panel (WFP3007-HC) as my main monitor, and and LG 27EA33V 27" 1920x1080 panel as my 2nd. Both monitors were IPS...

I have donated the LG to my other half, and the 30" has been demoted to 2nd monitor, with the ROG taking pride of place.

First impression firing up a game? It's a lot smaller than a 30". More so than I expected. 2nd impression, is that the colours are not as good as my two IPS monitors, but that is to be expected.

My desktop is a 7970 and a 7990 in crossfire, with an i7 4790k. The 7970 is the lead card, mostly because that gives me better temps on the 7990 (apparently whichever chip is actually driving the monitors gets hotter by about 10 degrees, and the 7990 hits 104C and throttles until reboot if it's the main card).

I knew G-Sync wouldn't work, but was hoping ULMB would. No such luck with an ATI card. Even the Strobelight utility won't work (as that sets custom timings based on 1080p, this stopped the monitor displaying at all until I reset it and rebooted).

So, still gives me a 1440p 144hz screen right? Well, yes and no. AMD have supposedly "fixed" frame pacing issues, but only in DX10 and 11. Add to that, the crossfire bridge interconnect with it's 0.9GB/s bandwidth is "enough for 2560x1600", but only at 60hz. (see here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7729/...rivers-now-available-mantle-frame-pacing-more )

This means that data has to be shunted across the PCIe bus, and in my case, over a PCIe bridge on the 7990. The experience leaves a little to be desired, and I think some of the issues I'm getting are the result of that.

In short, the monitor works on AMD. However, AMD suck donkey balls, so even the non-nvidia feature (144hz 1440p) isn't perfect with AMD. This is no fault of Asus however.

I think you may find less of an issue without crossfire (but driving this monitor to 144hz without crossfire isn't easy) or with 290x crossfire (due to XDMA) but I'd strongly recommend nVidia.

Anyone wanna swap a 7990 and 7970 for a 780ti? ;)
Click to expand...


Just an update to this post, I was playing L4D2 last night with a friend, mostly because I knew my GPUs would run that maxxed out at 300fps solidly (source engine cap) and 144FPS made me drool. It's hard to describe how smooth it is.

I might not get ULMB or GSync with AMD cards, but that alone has made it worth it until I upgrade.
 
1kiwi said:
Have you tried running a single 7970? I know another AMD Tri-Fire user who is considering this monitor (before moving to nvidia) but was put off by your post.
Click to expand...

No, I have not yet. But I'd then struggle to get over 60FPS in most games, at which point I'd be better sticking with the 30" 1600p screen ;)

My current feeling is that in games where you can hit 200+FPS, it's ok with AMD. vSync seems bad, because you don't output a smooth 144fps, so it feels like it stutters between 36, 48, 72, and 144fps depending on when the frame is produced. Without vSync, it's smooth as butter if you can sustain over 200FPS.

I tried Dead Space 2 using DXtory to cap to 150FPS and vSync off, and it was a flickery horrible mess. I'll try it tonight without DXtory. The point of capping the FPS was to reduce the PC's efficiency as a space heater!

I'll also play with SVP and watch some 144FPS films tonight, that could be fun, especially as 144fps is an even multiplier of 24...
 
1kiwi said:
Have you tried running a single 7970? I know another AMD Tri-Fire user who is considering this monitor (before moving to nvidia) but was put off by your post.
Click to expand...

I can run battlefield well above the needed 144fps so I might be ok, lucky I still have the retail boxes all of my cards and there was a Mini DP to DP converter. But if they start to **** me about I will drop AMD cards off a cliff and move to Nvidia with a 780ti or wait until the 880.

All these little touches of things that work from Nvidia make them worth their expense sometimes.
 
rtho782 said:
No, I have not yet. But I'd then struggle to get over 60FPS in most games, at which point I'd be better sticking with the 30" 1600p screen ;)

My current feeling is that in games where you can hit 200+FPS, it's ok with AMD. vSync seems bad, because you don't output a smooth 144fps, so it feels like it stutters between 36, 48, 72, and 144fps depending on when the frame is produced. Without vSync, it's smooth as butter if you can sustain over 200FPS.

I tried Dead Space 2 using DXtory to cap to 150FPS and vSync off, and it was a flickery horrible mess. I'll try it tonight without DXtory. The point of capping the FPS was to reduce the PC's efficiency as a space heater!

I'll also play with SVP and watch some 144FPS films tonight, that could be fun, especially as 144fps is an even multiplier of 24...
Click to expand...

You're struggling to get over 60fps with Tri Fire :confused:
 
Locky said:
I can run battlefield well above the needed 144fps so I might be ok, lucky I still have the retail boxes all of my cards and there was a Mini DP to DP converter. But if they start to **** me about I will drop AMD cards off a cliff and move to Nvidia with a 780ti or wait until the 880.

All these little touches of things that work from Nvidia make them worth their expense sometimes.
Click to expand...

I was sure the 7990 came with a miniDP to DP adaptor, I must have misplaced it then!

I agree with dumping AMD. I keep trying AMD it seems but have problems every time. I had 2900XT crossfire at the same time I had 8800GTX SLI in another PC, the top 2900XT cooked itself. I had 4870X2s in quad crossfire, frame pacing was horrible, microstutter ruined everything. I bought my 7970 on release and it was OK, but HD3D sucked balls, using random 3rd party middleware was never a solution. The 7990 I bought to mine LTC, and it paid for itself three times over, but as a gaming card, trifire has been awful.

I'll never go AMD again. I've been bitten too many times now. There are times I prefer to play games on my nVidia laptop as it has less issues.

I'm looking at purchasing a 780ti ASAP, and then sell the AMD cards to fund or part fund a 2nd one, but waiting till mid sept in case of GTX 880 release.
 
I played bf4 last night in crossfire and was surprised how smooth it was (no different from single card mode) but I have tweaked this install so much it prob has nothing to do with AMD why it's smooth, so I'm hoping it's good. If not it will prob be a trip to ocuk for a ti :D
 
Locky said:
I played bf4 last night in crossfire and was surprised how smooth it was (no different from single card mode) but I have tweaked this install so much it prob has nothing to do with AMD why it's smooth, so I'm hoping it's good. If not it will prob be a trip to ocuk for a ti :D
Click to expand...

Mantle leaves devs to implement frame pacing. Maybe EA did it well?

I'll play more tonight, last night I didn't get as much testing as I'd like done.
 
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