Incredible
The strengths of this monitor:
1. First of all, this is a GOOD monitor. No, wait – this is a GREAT monitor. It is in fact far better than pretty much every other IPS/VA/LED/LCD monitor on the market.
2. Eye comfort. I have never in my life used a computer display, either CRT or flat panel, that was this comfortable on my eyes. In fact, I feel my eyestrain getting better, rather than worse, as I use the Alienware AW3423DW!
3. The degree of curvature is just right. It creates an amazing immersive effect.
4. There is no color washout when the screen is viewed from an angle.
5. Ease of setup.
6. Many individuals have complained about marks on the display due to it being shipped in bubble wrap. However, I didn’t notice any of these particular marks on the particular unit that I received.
7. My unit did not have any stuck pixels.
8. Customizability.
9. The display is thin and attractive, and the chassis is extremely handsome.
10. The size of this monitor is just right - not too small, and not too large. It weights only about 20 pounds, so it won't overload even a relatively wobbly desk. I prefer these ultrawide 21:9 monitors to standard 16:9 monitors as the 21:9 ratio is better suited to the natural placement of the eyes. There are browser extensions available, such as "Ultrawideo" and "Ultrawidify", that will crop the video streaming to fill the 21:9 display ratio. The ultrawide display ratio is also great for multi-tasking.
11. Computer graphics, polygons, and vector images are the display's fortes, as they look incredibly eye-popping.
Its weaknesses:
1. Price. This thing costs over $1,000!
2. Out of the box, there is some text pixelation in the display, as many others have noted. This really isn’t the display’s fault, though as this is to be expected with a larger display with 2K rather than 4K definition. I advise using the “Better Clear Type” app, which will dramatically improve this issue. Using Better Clear Type along with Windows' on-board Clear Type program will make the issue basically unnoticeable. (See "Pro Tip" below for how to eliminate this issue and even make text look awesome)
3. Every flat screen monitor I've ever used, including this one, will show faint gridlines between the pixels if you look closely. This monitor has the faintest gridlines of any monitor I've ever used, but at the asking price of over $1,000 for this monitor, it would be nice to see this problem completely rectified.
Many have commented on the continual need to do a pixel refresh every four hours. If you select the setting "Refresh in standby and don't ask again", the monitor will stop bugging you and will perform a pixel refresh after you power off the monitor.
Out of the box, the Alienware AW3423DW is tuned for content, gaming, and entertainment rather than web browsing and productivity tasks. Despite this, if you use the default settings of the monitor, which I recommend, web browsing and productivity tasks look great as well.
The only real way to improve on this monitor would be to make it 4K rather than 2K - but doing this would cause the monitor to sell for a fortune.
PRO TIP: If you don't use this monitor for gaming and have an Nvidia graphics card, use Nvidia's "creator" rather than "gaming" driver. This makes content, including raster graphics, vector graphics (and text!), look incredibly beautiful. Doing this will also completely fix the text pixelation issue.
Although this monitor is expensive at $1,000, I think it's worth it. I'm glad I spent the money on this. As they say, "Quality remains after the sting of high price wears off."Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
