I've been eyeing this monitor (and others like it) since January of 2014, when you could in theory import it from Korean vendors for a hefty price premium (and not receive any warranty if you were based in the US). January of 2015, I finally convinced myself to purchase it.
I was primarily interested in this monitor for workflow and productivity reasons...I work in the audio field, and the extra horizontal screen real estate is amazing in applications like Pro Tools and Logic. I can see so much more of my timeline in the Edit Window, and much more of my mixer in the Mix Window. Or, I could split the screen real estate for both and still work very efficiently. To me, the 21:9 aspect ratio at this resolution is a lot more useful than a larger 4K (and even a 5K) display.
I did not detract any stars off of my rating for this, but I believe this is important to share in a review: Both Amazon and FedEx royally screwed up the packing and delivery of this monitor. A couple of people have mentioned it in their reviews, and I had the same issue: Amazon did not properly pack this thing to be shipped. It arrived in a box that was literally 3x the size of the box the monitor came in, with only a couple of sheets of brown packing paper that might as well have not even been there. Both the shipping box, as well as the box the monitor came in, were crushed and in bad condition upon arrival. Had I seen that, I likely would have rejected delivery and asked Amazon to ship it to me again, this time making sure someone over the age of 7 packed it. The problem is, Amazon did not require a signature for this item. I was shocked...you would think an $850 order would. Not only that, but FedEx left the package in my driveway without ever ringing my bell. My driveway is uncovered and it was lightly raining as well. The thing that makes me the angriest, however, is that I watched the delivery person unload it from the truck and handle it in the most disrespectful way possible by manhandling it and dropping it like it wasn't an extremely expensive and fragile package. Huge fails on both the part of Amazon and FedEx. Thankfully, LG had the mind to pack it inside of their box pretty well, so there was no damage to the panel itself. The small little piece on the back of the stand cover for cable management had snapped off, but I wasn't about to go through the hassle of a return/exchange for that.
Going back to the monitor itself, I'm using it with both a 2012 non-Retina 15" Macbook Pro with discrete graphics (NVIDIA GT 650m) as well as a 2013 Mac Pro with AMD FirePro 500, both over the Thunderbolt connection, and I've had no issues. The Macbook Pro, surprisingly, can drive this monitor at the full 3440x1440 resolution at 60Hz. I was worried because some users were unable to drive it at anything over 50Hz, but I believe the discrete graphics card in the Macbook makes the difference.
A quick note, the Thunderbolt ports on this monitor are actually Thunderbolt 2.0. Some users believed that only the curved version of this monitor has the Thunderbolt 2.0 ports, due to LG not saying 'Thunderbolt 2.0' on the specs listing. But this monitor does indeed have Thunderbolt 2.0 ports.
Panel quality on mine is great, very nearly uniform. On an IPS display this wide, you're going to get some uneven backlight towards the edges of the display, it's just inherent with the technology. It's not noticeable on anything other than a completely black picture. I do have a very small bit of what I would call minor light bleed (I'm defining 'light bleed' as the display looking a tinge more yellow when looking at black, and 'IPS glow' as the standard glow you would get around the edges of every IPS panel every created) on the bottom left corner. It extends maybe an inch or two, and does not bother me at all as I only notice it when watching 16:9 content which creates the empty space on the left and right sides of the monitor. And even then, it doesn't interfere with the content on the screen in any way. I do believe that earlier revisions of this monitor from early last year until about June or July might be worse in this regard, but mine is completely normal and acceptable for an IPS panel. My build date is November 2014, for anyone interested.
Some final thoughts to wrap this up:
PROs:
- Excellent color reproduction and calibration from the factory. Whites look very white to me...not too warm or cool. Comparable to every great quality LCD display I have at my disposal. As the display is factory calibrated before being shipped out, I'm fairly certain colors are very accurate out of the box. I may end up in the future buying a calibrator to calibrate it myself, but I'm not a graphics professional or photo editor, so having the panel be 100% accurate is not all that important to me. All I know is, colors look really great and not overly dull or overly "poppy" (as they would on an AMOLED panel, for instance)
- Black level is great for a backlit IPS display.
- Flawless operation over Thunderbolt with both of my Macs. Full resolution and refresh rate. USB hub works over the Thunderbolt connection as well, which gives me two extra USB 2.0 ports and an extra USB 3.0 port. I have my keyboard and mouse hooked into the USB 2.0 ports, and my USB 3.0 Time Machine backup drive in the USB 3.0 port. This leaves the back of my computer free for more USB 3.0 gear, which is excellent.
- I also get the boot screen on my Mac Pro every time. Some users of the 2013 Mac Pro and this monitor have noted issues with the monitor taking too long to register a signal, thus not showing the boot screen when doing things like booting from a USB stick or Bootcamp partition...I don't have this issue at all. It works exactly as if I was using Apple's own display (the LG is a lot nicer, obviously).
- 21:9 content is obviously stunning, and 16:9 content runs in an area that is equivalent to a 27" monitor. To me, this is the perfect setup to have. Media professionals who work in timeline-based applications will LOVE this monitor.
- Speakers are nice and loud, and sound really pretty good for what they are. Great to have enabled for notification sounds and even for casual music listening or YouTube.
- The passthrough Thunderbolt 2.0 port (yes, these are actually Thunderbolt 2.0 ports, not just Thunderbolt 1.0) works as expected. I have my Apollo Twin Duo audio interface connected through it and it functions flawlessly.
SOMEWHERE IN THE MIDDLE:
- Stand looks great but is very limited in function. Would have loved more height adjustment options (there are only two, and they require you to screw the stand into different positions). Tilt works great at least. No swivel to talk about.
- Bezel as well as back of monitor is plastic, would have preferred aluminum, but I'm not a stickler for build materials really. Base of the stand is metal however. Upper part of stand is see through plastic...glass would have cool as well. At $850, I'm certainly not complaining.
- While the menus are intuitive enough with the single joystick control, there's a bit of a delay when first bringing up the menu. Not a huge deal, IMO.
CONS:
- Amazon packaged this like total crap, and FedEx then treated the package like total crap. Extremely unhappy with both, especially since I did not get a say in if I rejected the package or not since no signature was required and they didn't even bother to ring my doorbell (I would have rejected this package, it was really beat up, and the poor packaging meant the actual box for the monitor got dinged up too). I did not detract my rating for this, however...my review is about the product and the product is good. I did fill out a packing and delivery form, but we all know Amazon does not pay attention to this. Just be wary when ordering this from Amazon when Amazon is the seller.
- Very minor nitpick, but when the display goes to sleep in its low power state, the LED light near the joystick blinks on and off. I'd have preferred if it was a bit more minimal in letting you know it's sleeping rather than being completely powered off, but I'm not going to detract anything for that either.
All in all, this monitor is amazing and I'm easily going to be happy with it for the next 7-10 years. It's very hard to go back to 16:9 after experiencing this, especially at this size and resolution, which will display 16:9 content exactly like a 27-inch 2560x1440 monitor would. Would very much recommend, especially if you can get a good deal on pricing, as I believe LG and others are ready to release newer models into the market for 2015.
| Standing screen display size | 34 Inches |
|---|---|
| Screen Resolution | 3440x1440 |
| Max Screen Resolution | 3440 x 1440 |
| Number of USB 2.0 Ports | 2 |
| Number of USB 3.0 Ports | 1 |
