SAMSUNG 34" ViewFinity S50GC Series Ultra-WQHD Monitor, 100Hz, 5ms, HDR10, AMD FreeSync, Eye Care, Borderless Design, PIP, PBP, LS34C502GANXZA, 2023, Black

Been using this monitor for a while and the screen quality and response time of the VA pixels are much better than you’d think for a monitor at this price. The 100hz refresh rate actually looks like 100hz, and on a VA panel, this is impressive. It handles all my open windows well too as I hoped for, so that’s great. I do love how an ultrawide monitor adds a TON of emersion when playing games and watching content. First thing I did when I powered on the monitor on my PC was load up the second season of The Rings of Power, which felt somewhat small on my 16:9 32” 4k monitor that I have, but only because it is recorded as an ultra-wide, so when on this monitor it filled it corner to corner, giving me a FULL-screen ultra-wide 34”. Watching ultra wide content on this thing makes it feel actually a bigger image than on a standard 16:9 43” display to be honest, or at least the same. And when playing video games, the extra FOV is pretty nice for the emersion. The monitor does show the regular drawbacks of a VA panel though, especially with penning over darker colors on a bright background, or visa-versa, you do still get the smear-y look, but as a VA panel that it is, the monitor really makes up for it with the 100hz refresh rate and a good response time (with FreeSync support — dunno about G-Sync though I haven’t tried) to mitigate this.The colors are nothing to write home about, and the display lacks HDR, however, they are 10-bit and is seamlessly recognized by windows. So, that’s strange, it must be an 8-bit+FRC then, regardless, if you set the gamma, color, contrast/brightness settings right, it really does look like an HDR panel minus the brightness levels of course. But, in regular use, it does get very very bright still on the desk, I haven’t ever used it past 50-60% brightness, normally having it at around 30% or so with no issues seeing anything.The stand it comes with is a bit cumbersome (albeit not as bad as a lot of other monitor stands), so I would recommend putting it on a monitor arm though.Don’t bother getting a monitor with a higher refresh rate. 100hz at 1440p ultrawide (4k length x 1440p width), you are effectively pushing nearly the same amount of pixels as a 4k monitor, and you won’t ever get, let’s be real here, more than 100fps in almost all your games at 4k (I am using an AMD RX 6800XT), so the 100hz is more than sufficient for this. You’d benefit from a higher refresh rate for just general tasks around windows, but for games and content it is plenty.Oh, and when viewing 16:9 content or other aspect ratios, it’s still pretty good, it’ll just have the same resolution as a non-wide screen 27” monitor with black bars on the sides. But that brings me to my last couple points, the monitor recognizing different resolutions is automatic and scales very nicely, which I haven’t had good luck with with other monitors in this price range. For example, plugging in my nintendo switch, and the display automatically scales for 1080p, which is pretty convenient (just make sure you turn off FreeSync for that…yeah that’s really dumb). Then you also have the PiP mode, which is great if you want a couple different sources you want to reference at the same time on the same screen. Would’ve been nice though to be able to set the sources side by side or something and have it properly adjust the aspect ratio…the PiP is a bit janky to be frank, albeit still works well, just keep that in mind.

Freshly opened box and plugged into main PC setup. I use it mostly for work and having the ability to display multiple PC desktops at once, but do play some video games with it from time to time. Here are my pros and cons, followed by a summary review:Cons:It no longer has that luxurious polished aluminum look around the display and stand, giving it a cheaper white-plastic look in general.Pros:That base, omg, its such a HUGE improvement! Its heavy, sturdy, and doesn't require any screws; everything is now snap-into-place, very nice improvement! The base/stand now allows for rotation left/right, tilt forward/back, and elevates up/down. This is a big improvement to the previous model that only allowed for a single movement of up/down which also changed the tilt at the same time. Not independently. I also like the cord management layout in the rear, allowing for a more open feel compared to the previous model which had a rectangle slot that you were supposed to cover back up with a cover after plugging in, but never used because it wasn't great for DP fit.Overall:I'm really happy with my new monitor, despite being exactly the same monitor, just with a FAR superior stand, and slightly upgraded components, e.g. TB4 vs TB3, and including HDR10. It also came with a variety of video cords, including a new TB4 cord, which is always nice. (Didn't come with DP but that's fine).

Good quality, plug and play and super light for this size monitor. I have an older laptop which I use a port replicator on with out HDMI but it does have DVI. A DVI to HDMI cable worked perfectly without any signal loss. It's very light and the on screen controls are basic but sufficient. I bought a returned or repackaged monitor and it looked like new. No issues and registered it with Samsung. So far it's great and good value for the money.