Top-of-the-line specs everywhere
Incredibly bright
Glorious 4K 144Hz panel
Lots of ports
Great design and build
Bulky stand and overall size
Tricky to get the perfect HDR and brightnes🃏s settings
A large price tag that's impossible to ignore
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The top-end of the gaming monitor market expands in a few directionsඣ - size, speed, resolution, and so🍌 on - and the AOC Agon PD32M looks to grab as many of those threads as possible and smash them all together in a premium display that costs a pretty penny. Well, $1,799 to be exact.
It's premium, but this is a thing of beauty on the inside and outside, and offers a spec list to make the most expensive 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming TV blush. With looks to beautifully complement a minimalist gaming setup, the AOC Agon PD32M has the promise to be one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming monitors to enter the market in 2022, and perhaps for a good🦂 long while.
I've lived with the monitor for a while, using it for work and play - on PC and console - and let me tell you, this is possibly the brightest gaming monitor I have ever seen, and it throws in a bunch of premium features too. But does this automatically mean it's one of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best 4K monitors? The signs꧋ are promiꦓsing but what's it like in reality?
While this is a big monitor, it is sleek and modern, and very cool in its aesthetic. Having reviewed the AOC PD27 a couple of years ago, the PD32M is instantly recognisable to me as🦩 being from the Porsche Design school. Matte black and steel finishes abound and it's a symphony in class. It's 🍌almost 'classier' than the PD27, really too.
The PD27 was a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:curved monitor with a sizeable stand evoking a car's roll cage, taking up some serious desk real estate and 🍒stopping it from being VESA mounted. The PD32M is a little more restrained in that sense, and is VESA compatible - though it is a bit on the heavy side, at 8.29kg without the stand. Despite being a flat monitor, the PD27 does take up a bunch of desk space: the legs span to a maximum distance of about 50cm, and the front to back measurement is a good 30cm or so.
The PD32M is a 4K, 32-inch monitor with an IPS panel, and Mini-LED backlighting, offering up to 144Hz refresh rates, and a GtG response time of 1ms. The specifications also state a Vesa Display HDR 1400 and a peak brightness rating of 1600 nits, which is just bonkers. 'Most' gaming monitors have somewhere in the 300-500 range of brightness, and the new 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Alienware QD-OLED AW3423DW has a rating of 1,000 nits so this i♌s hug🐼e if true.
This is an unbelievable sheet of monitor specs, and if you were to write a tick list, this cro🐼sses off a bunch of them all in one hit. The only thing 'missing' is G-Sync, but you are well served by its FreeSync cousin.
To utilise all the gaming chops, you're well set with ports too: there's one DisplayPort 1.4, USB-C connectivity (for display and charging) a USB hub, and two HDMI 2.1s. Yes, two HDMI 2.1s. This factor means the PD32M can be pointed at those with new-gen consoles as ♏well as PC gamers - or, indeed, those folks who have both.
The finishing touches are the healthy onboard menu with a bunch of settings to help you tweak and optimise - more on that later - and some funky RGB lighting, as well as some surprisingly decent speakers (which will take you by surprise on eveꦐry boot-up of the monitor).
There's also the same triangular remote control that featured wit𒐪h the PD27, and, in a relentlessly boring but necessary take, I do feel the need to tell that the power brick is enormous. Obviously, that helps to supply the monitor 🐻and all its ports with enough juice, but, seriously, you could kill a man with that thing.
As soon as I turned the PD32M I was immediately hit by the brightness. Boy, is the brightness actually there - you can tell this has got beans and that HDR1400 rating isn't an exaggeration. But it wasn't a one-off in this regard: having🧔 lived with the monitor I can tel👍l you it's the brightest gaming screen I have ever used.
But with that comes a few small challenges. And that is that iꩲt is sometimes too bright - to the point of oversaturation. I was spending a lot of time diving straight into the menus and increasing and decreasing levels and brightness, making HDR changes, and so on. Even if it didn🌄't get to 1400 peak brightness and only got to 1000 or so, it would still be way brighter than most.
The out-of-the-box image is good, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't perfect and you will need to do some calibration to find your perfect setting or settings. The built-in presets f🐼or a range ofꦯ games do offer good choices, but I did find it tricky to find the right balance and to find it quickly. This is especially difficult when it comes to finding the elusive, all-purpose, set-and-forget balance that we all want. (Nobody wants to be going into menus every time you change from work to play.)
However, this does really reveal how bright the AOC AGON PD32M actually is, and how well it does colours and contrasts. and that is to say: very well indeed. It passes all the usual tests with flying colours - those UFOs looked smooth and bright as heck - and this type of performance is backed up in my day-to-day, real-world testing. Once you do hit that right color balance, you will find a monitor 🧜that gives you the most glorious of gaming experiences no matter what you play.
Naturally, you'll need something at the very top end of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best gaming PC and 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best graphics card lists to enjoy this thing in all its 4K glory with high framerates. But if you can, then you are in for a treat. Gaming in 4K at 144Hz is tremendous and I'm not sure my eyes can go back to anything else now. Control is even more cinematic than I remember, the simplest of shapes and colours in Red Alert Remastered pop beautifully, and Apex Legends is a different game running in such quality and at such speeds. As a cherry on the top, I was also deeply impressed by the PD32M's performance as a 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:PS5 monitor. The HDMI 2🀅.1 ports make this seamless, the games look superb on it, and you're keeping that door to 120Hz on console games open too.
As൲ for the extras? I felt the RGB lighting was a little unnecessary and, along with the extending headset hangers on either side, could easily be sacrificed - particularly if it would shave even a bit off the price tag. Even against a wallꦅ, the RGB lighting was just fine - nothing more. It's the on-screen performance that does the talking and does more than enough to immerse you.
If you have an itch for a premium panel to fit a setup that has, say, a new-gen console as well as a mid-level PC then this could be perfect. Chef's kiss levels of perfect. Provided you have the machine to power it, it'll pump out quality pictures and games no matter what. 4K, 144Hz, super bright and colorful, dark and murky, whatev𒆙er, it does it beautifully with clarity, depth, and detail.
On performance alone,꧅ the PD32M is a brilliant monitor. It's a truly premium experience, and to get all tha🌟t offered in one screen is something spectacular. If you're looking to invest in a display that ticks all the boxes, then the PD32M will not let you down and you will not regret it.
I can imagine the PD32M being particularly at home in a PC-and-console 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:gaming desk setup - even one with work factored in too. If you don't ne🍌ed ultrawide or curves, then this could be the one gaming monitor to rule them al🦋l.
However, the $1,799 price tag will put people off - and do so quickly. At first, that cost does seem just enormous, and insurmountable. However, when you start adding it all up, it's not too bad. Factoring in all the qualities - the Mini-LED backlighting, 4K resolution, 144Hz, and so on, the nearest rival might be something like the ASUS PG32UQX which is basical🅷ly twice the pr🌊ice of the PD32M.
However, as I said in my Herm❀an Miller X Logitech Emobdy gaming chair review, spending this much will be a personal matter in 2022 - but it's a decision that could well be right for some folks if the proposition and setup are right. If you're someone who likes to make big investments to get things right, rather than spending more on 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:cheap gaming monitors🥂 over the long term, then this could absolutely be it - as long as you've got the kit to make the most of it𝔍.
The AOC AGON PD32M monitor is due out on June 15, 2022.
The PD32M became my main monitor for PC play and offi𒁃ce work and stayed like that for a good long while. Even while on a 𒆙standing desk with annoying shelves above, the big monitor was my main screen - either pushed back when the desk was down or brought forward when it was up to avoid the shelves (note: this is definitely too close.)
This meant I could test the monitor from everyday work tasks to late-night gaming sessions. The former put the monitor through the rigours of incredible amounts of Chrome tabs, 💎spreadsheets, and other file and image management tasks, while the latter saw me test the screen with games of all genres from Strategy games like Total War: Troy, to action games like Control, and from fast shooters like Apex Legends to those with incredible environments like P🐎rey and Red Dead Redemption 2.
We're also rounding up all the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best monitors for Xbox Series X and the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best G-Sync monitors if you're after more inspiration. Of course, for on-the-go gaming, we'd also recommend taking a look at the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best portable gaming monitors as well.
Reviewed with a supplied by Razer.
Rob is the Deputy Editor of sister site, TechRadar Gaming, and has been in the games and tech industry for years. Prior to a recent stint as Gaming Editor at WePC, Rob was the Commissioning Editor for Hardwa🧔re at GamesRadar+, and was on the hardware team for more than four years, since its inception in late 2018. He is also a writer on games and has had work published over the last six years or so at the likes of Eurogamer, RPS, PCGN, and more. He is also a qualified landscape and garden designer,🐻 so does that in his spare time, while he is also an expert on the virtual landscapes and environments of games and loves to write about them too, including in an !
