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Monoprice 28-inch PC gaming monitor brings 4K prices down (hands-on)

The accessory company unveils a 3,840x2,160-pixel monitor for less than you'd expect to pay.

Dan Ackerman Editorial Director / Computers and Gaming
Dan Ackerman leads CNET's coverage of computers and gaming hardware. A New York native and former radio DJ, he's also a regular TV talking head and the author of "The Tetris Effect" (Hachette/PublicAffairs), a non-fiction gaming and business history book that has earned rave reviews from the New York Times, Fortune, LA Review of Books, and many other publications. "Upends the standard Silicon Valley, Steve Jobs/Mark Zuckerberg technology-creation myth... the story shines." -- The New York Times
Expertise I've been testing and reviewing computer and gaming hardware for over 20 years, covering every console launch since the Dreamcast and every MacBook...ever. Credentials
  • Author of the award-winning, NY Times-reviewed nonfiction book The Tetris Effect; Longtime consumer technology expert for CBS Mornings
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Dan Ackerman
2 min read

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Monoprice

While next-gen consoles struggle to hit 1080p resolution on new games, PC gamers are already stretching into 4K resolution, thanks to powerful, if expensive, new hardware.

We've already reviewed the first shipping 4K laptop, a 15-inch Toshiba Satellite model , as well as Apple's 4K-friendly Mac Pro desktop , but plenty of current PCs (with Nvidia's newest generation of 8000-series GPUs, for example) can push games to higher-than-1080p resolutions.

But to appreciate that, you'll need a 4K monitor, which are, like their TV counterparts, still new and expensive. Monoprice, known for its very reasonably priced PC and audiovisual accessories, has just announced a new model for less than some comparable versions we've seen.

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A couple of Monoprice's new 28-inch 4K monitors connected to a gaming PC. Dan Ackerman

Monoprice's new 28-inch ultra-high definition monitor, running at 3,840x2,160 pixels, will be available to pre-order in July and generally available sometime in the third quarter of 2014. The exact price hasn't been set yet, but we expect it to run between $550 and $600. Earlier this year, similar monitors were more than $1,000, but some recent price cuts from Dell and Samsung have started to drive prices down.

In-person, the Monoprice display is reasonably thin, with a brushed-metal bottom bezel and a sharper look than more plastic-feeling budget displays. It includes three HDMI ports, for connecting multiple devices, plus a DisplayPort. We used a 4K-ready gaming desktop from boutique PC maker Origin PC to play Battlefield 4 at full 4K resolution and "ultra" graphics settings, and it looked and played fantastic.

Mainstream PC gamers aren't going to transition to 4K anytime soon, but with hardware prices coming down, it's one area where PC games can offer a real point of differentiation from their higher-profile console counterparts.