How Big of a Difference Does a OLED Monitor Make?

I'm currently using a Dell 2721DGF and thinking of upgrading to a 32 inch monitor. My usage split would be 50/50 gaming and productivity.

Now that I have an option between Dell 3222DGM, Neo G7 or Alienware AW3225QF i'm wondering… How big of a difference does an OLED monitor make?

I'd love to hear from all of you about your experiences with OLED technology. Do you believe that OLED truly lives up to the hype? Did you experience burn faster than expected?

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!

Comments

  • +2

    I use a 49" Odyssey OLED G9 with an 42" LG C2 OLED mounted above it … The C2 gets less and less use every day :/

    OLED is a major upgrade compared to everything else I have ever used (last monitor was an 34" IPS calibrated for photo/video editing)!

    No burn-in yet, but I do take measures to avoid static images …

    • What kind of measures do you take? Low brightness? No taskbar?

      • +1

        For productivity your don't need SDR brightness above ~ 40% anyway!
        (unless using monitor outside or facing a window with the sun rising / setting without curtain!)

        I thought everyone uses auto-hide taskbars :P

        As for measures:
        - I have no icons on the desktop (never did anyway, everything accessed via taskbar or windows tab)
        - background is dark and a LIVE wallpaper
        - dark screensaver (the colored wavy lines) after 5 mins inactivity

    • Oh Jesus, I'm running a 40" 4K basic monitor myself and 49" seems ridiculous in comparison especially since the vast majority are running up to 32" as a max.

      How are you finding it, is it too much horizontal movement? I suppose you just got used to it after a while and it's become the norm.

      I really want to replace my existing as it's developing some artifacts after many years but they're so expensive, it's in that awkward place between a monitor and a TV.

      • +1

        49" Ultrawide is actually less tall than a 40" generic monitor ;)

        I generally have 3-4 apps open side-by-side, plenty of real estate to copy/paste/code/browse, etc

        Reviewed better than I can: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSTds2SjxsU

        • Oh yeah I've seen that vid, have spent way too much time chewing over potential replacements! Just don't know anyone with one to have a conversation with.

          What's your use case and what made you go down the 49" route? My first and foremost intentions are for photos so I need that traditional 4:3 ratio, 5K would be nice, but they're sooo few and far in between and cost a damn kidney :( Oh, and they're too small for me now that I'm used to 40" and there's just no way I can convince myself to dual 5K, I'd have no organs left.

          • @[Deactivated]: The original idea was to do all my photo (150MB+ RAWs) and video work (up to 16k) on the 42" C2 and then game on the 49" G9 …

            But the G9 blows the C2 away, to the point I am doing 99% of everything on the G9 (I love the curve and sit about 90-100cm from it, which is what the 1000R curve means)!

            • @7ekn00: How on earth do you edit photos on a 32:9 you numpty lunatic :-/

              What's the intended output medium for your photos? 150MB sounds a every nerdy dream I've ever had, have done some full two page spread for property and on magazines and ~20MP was already more than enough 🤷

              • +1

                @[Deactivated]:

                How on earth do you edit photos on a 32:9

                Just set your tools up on either side, instead of above/below! The colours and zooms are just amazing …

                What's the intended output medium for your photos?

                Generally archival, but some billboard advertisements, etc

    • -3

      Not quite true. Just need to keep the brightness at a lower level like less than 50% and shouldn't get burn in.

      • -4

        My bad i dont know what i was thinking, clearly you know my life and experiance with OLED monitors better than i do.

        btw i did run it at SDR 50% brightness when not gaming toggling HDR only when i played a game, the burn in was when i wasnt gaming.

        • -1

          No need to get so snarky when you left out half the info ¯|_(ツ)_/¯

          I've been running the aorus 48 OLED monitor at 40% with no noticeable signs of burn in.

          There does seem to be some burn in lottery/QC with the AW3423DW. This guy had burn in after two months https://www.reddit.com/r/Monitors/comments/x3mjqo/aw3423dw_b…

          • -1

            @Caped Baldy: My comment was answering OP's questions.
            Maybe you should ask for more info before you blindly comment telling someone they are wrong.

          • @Caped Baldy: do you get the monitor message in middle of screen often? I have the same monitor don't get it too often but it is annoying. other than that I think is the best thing I have even bought..

            • @renster72: What message?

              Don't normally get messages except when it's back on from standby.

              I just set up the kvm and it's great connecting it to the work laptop.

      • +1

        I've never had an OLED just seen them in stores from time to time so have no experience. What's 50% really like for every day, do you give up on the vibrancy that OLED is known for, or is it purely adjusting a brightness value?

        • It's purely adjusting the brightness value. 50% is still very bright. Although the brightness increases gradually from 51% to 100%, there is a large jump from 50% to 51%. That is why a lot of people stop at 50%.

          • @skid: Awesome, thanks for sharing :)

    • I mean… I guess during work there's gonna be the taskbar and then word/powerBI etc etc. There are gonna be apps I use a lot. I guess I should keep changing the size of the app to make sure it doesn't burn in?

      • +3

        I guess I should keep changing the size of the app to make sure it doesn't burn in?

        I can't think of any currently available picture quality improvement that would justify the hassle of this. (But that's just me.)

      • If you could be bothered to do that constantly i guess, still wouldnt recomend if you intend to work on it all day every day

        Mine was watching Movies/TV Shows, Web Browsing, Gaming all about equal usage and the web browser was the thing that burnt in despite doing the Pixel refresh and panel refresh that Alienware OLED monitors have everytime it asked me to. I think i had around 2000 hours usage on the monitor before i noticed burn in, it was quite bad as i didnt notice till it was visible in games and movies so who knows when it actually started.

        I now have a Samsung 32" Odyssey Neo G8, so i dont have to worry about any of that.

  • You would not want to play games in 2024 on non-Oled monitor. I will not go back again.

  • OLED for gaming is incomparable.

    I would not use one for productivity though.

    • Use it to watch movies while being productive. You can never have too many monitors, unless it's more monitors than your computer can connect to.

    • How do you reduce the chance of burn in?

  • If you have an OLED TV, remember the jump to that? Well, it's the same. Although there are some caveats, as PCs generally display more static images, so you'll be better off hiding start menu in Windows, etc.

  • +3

    Hedonic treadmill - OLED will be WOW! for about a month then it will be normal.

    • Yes, it will be normal. But if you go back to using a good IPS monitor… youll be like, "wow this looks like ass compared to the OLED" LOL

  • +3

    OLED burn-in seems so controversial because some say it's not a issue and others swear the opposite.
    I think the most overlooked variable is environmental conditions, since high temperature is what causes the burn-in.
    If you run it at 50% brightness in Melbourne is probably not the same as running it at 50% in Brisbane.
    This is why to push higher brightness some panels now have an attached heatsink which is another reason some people see burn-in and others don't.

  • -2

    Why "how big OF a difference?" That's a Yank and Canadian error. Why ape an error? All you need to say is "how big a difference…"

    Sorry, just pisses me off.

  • +1

    Picture quality is great but here's the truth: many people just say it's the best thing because it's self-justification

    I upgraded from the same Dell monitor to OLED, the difference is I got my OLED monitor for free. So I don't have some bias.

    It's great but it's not something I would upgrade to for no reason. The Dell 2721DGF is an excellent monitor, there is zero reason to change ever unless you wanted more resolution or size.

    If you have money to blow, admit it, and your answer will be "why not" but come into it with the mindset that it's not a must.

  • As I get older the ability to keep non static images gets less higher.. So i don't think I can ever keep an OLED monitor long even though I really want to.. The amount of time I just fall asleep and leave everything just hanging is too high now and I love desktop icons and have many static images like hwinfo64 and net speed monitor running just to name a few.. Very common for me to have notepad just up in the background also so unless they create some magic software that can negate all that I can never go OLED to save risk of burn in.. It's ok my eyes are aging fast too now anyways I just need a large monitor and that does it enough for me

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