When comparing Planar Helium PCT2785 vs Asus ROG Swift PG348Q, the Slant community recommends Planar Helium PCT2785 for most people. In the question“What are the best monitors?” Planar Helium PCT2785 is ranked 30th while Asus ROG Swift PG348Q is ranked 41st. The most important reason people chose Planar Helium PCT2785 is:
The black levels are respectively low at 0.16cd/m², which helps the contrast ratio achieve 1100:1 which is much lower than the advertised 5000:1, but still quite good.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Decent black levels, good contrast ratio
The black levels are respectively low at 0.16cd/m², which helps the contrast ratio achieve 1100:1 which is much lower than the advertised 5000:1, but still quite good.
Pro Pretty fast response times make the system feel quick
The response time is 12ms, which isn't lightning fast, but it's still quick enough to make the system feel more responsive than cheaper monitors. While not fast enough for high-level gaming, this monitor won't make your system feel slow or unresponsive.
Pro 'Massive tablet' design is unique, and versitile
It really does look like a massive tablet with a kickstand - but that's not a bad thing. There's no stand visible, leaving the front looking very clean. The stand can angle anywhere from 15-70 degrees which allows for flexible use, or it can be folded in and used flat on the desk or even mounted using the VESA mounting holes.
Pro Built-in speakers, webcam, and mic
This monitor has many peripherals built-in, and unless you use them heavily they will do the job just fine. Unless you feel the need for dedicated hardware, the built-in stereo speakers work well enough, and the webcam and mic are acceptable quality for occasional recreational use (for business calls or other uses where quality is important, you'll want to upgrade to dedicated hardware).
Pro Adjustable base
Getting the perfect viewing angles isn’t that complicated with the Asus PG348Q as it supports all the necessary ergonomic adjustments.
Pro Ergonomics, size, usability
Ergonomics: It can be lifted up and down, turned right and left, and tilted up and down. So basically the screen can be adjusted to any dimension to suit your view angle.
Size: It has an optimum size (34") that looks great in games, movies and provides a lot of space to use your Windows applications side by side without ALT-tabbing between them. Any size smaller than this is a small screen (such as PG279Q) and any screen larger than this is too large for your eyes at a desktop PC-user distance.
Quality: Asus quality is behind this monitor. So no bug, no technical problems.
Pro Curved display
The monitor’s 3800R curve offers you an extra level of immersion as you can feel the panel surrounding you.
Pro Suitable for content creation
This Asus PG348Q is an excellent tool for content creators who like to capture, edit, and upload their gaming footage to YouTube or some other popular media services as the monitor offers a great amount of on-screen real estate, combined with the full sRGB coverage.
Pro Has speakers
The monitor’s pair of 6 W integrated speakers sound surprisingly good and will come in handy outside of gaming.
Pro Has a USB hub
You can use the monitor’s integrated USB 3.0 hub for charging and interconnecting peripheral USB devices. The hub consists of a single upstream and four downstream USB 3.0 ports.
Pro Excellent viewing angles
The PG348Q looks good even from sides as the monitor offers some of the best viewing angles on the market. You’ll notice some color and shadow shifting only when the viewing angle exceeds 50 degrees, which is an outstanding result, as even the best IPS panels usually start to degrade at the 40 degrees angles.
Pro Adequate motion handling
The Asus PG348Q recreates relatively good-looking motion, with only some minor trails of motion blur following fast-moving objects on the screen. While fighting motion blur, the panel’s main weapon is the overdrive feature which allows each pixel of the Asus PG348Q to change its color within only five milliseconds. Unfortunately, some tiny trails of motion blur manage to get through.
Alternatively, you can use Asus’s ultra-low-motion-blur feature to eliminate the unwanted effect of motion blur, but that would cost you G-Sync, which can’t be used together with the ULMB.
Pro Lag-free
Even while playing fast-paced FPS games, the Asus PG348Q feels highly responsive because of its low input lag of only 5,3 ms. Even though there are some faster panels available on the market, it is highly unlikely that you will be able to feel the 5,3 ms delay.
Monitor’s input lag is a time delay needed to process a frame generated by a computer.
Pro Supports G-Sync
G-Sync reduces stutter and eliminates screen-tearing as it allows the Asus PG348Q to synchronize its refresh rate to the framerate of a Nvidia GPU.
The monitor supports G-Sync in the 30-100 Hz range.
Pro Gamer-centric features
The Asus PG348Q comes with a rich selection of gamer-specific features, which include an FPS counter, timer, and multiple crosshair options. You can find those in the monitor’s GamePlus menu. All the elements are customizable.
Pro Excellent picture quality
The monitor’s native contrast ratio, peak brightness, gamma, and color uniformity are on par with what the best gaming monitors on the market offer.
The Asus PG348Q displays fascinating images, with crisp and vivid colors, accurate intermediate tones, and deep blacks. Colors pop and look vibrant thanks to the monitor’s peak brightness of 309 nits. Mid-tones look life-like since the monitor’s average gamma deviation is only 1.3% off from the perfect value. Blacks look rich and consistent because, while the panel’s native contrast ratio of 1081:1 manages to push blacks to relatively intense levels, the monitor’s overall uniformity dE of 0.78 ensures that the dark tones don’t blend with bright spots nearby. Such high color uniformity is a rare feature even for high-end monitors.
Moreover, the PG348Q’s color inaccuracies are virtually invisible to the human eye, because of it’s small color gamut error dE of 1.71.
Pro Excellent for gaming
The Asus ROG Swift PG348Q offers a combination of picture quality, responsiveness, and motion handling capabilities only the best gaming monitors can match. It is also equipped with a bunch of top-notch gaming features, like G-Sync, crosshair, and FPS counter.
Cons
Con Disappointing color accuracy
The MVA panel (multi-domain vertical alignment: in-between of TN and IPS technologies) doesn't reproduce colors very accurately. It scores just 82% of the sRGB color gamut, while other panels offer high 80s and even above 90%. This display's weakest points are with the green and cyan shades, while reds and blues appeared just fine.
Con Dim display
The display doesn't get very bright - at just 172cd/m² this panel is very dim. Many monitors can achieve 300cd/m² or higher brightnesses.
Con Takes much more power than similar monitors
Without using the ECO mode, this monitor requires about 50 watts to power it. This is double than other monitors. There are different levels of ECO modes, however these dim the display and barely get down to the power level of other monitors when they are all enabled.
Con Price
A bit expensive.
Con Poorly situated USB ports
Once the monitor’s back lid is closed, you can’t access its integrated USB hub.
Con Needs calibration
To achieve the best monitor’s picture quality and color accuracy you need to calibrate some of its settings. Fortunately, all the critical calibration parameters are available online.
Con Requires a beefy computer
Only the best hardware can unleash the monitor’s full potential while running the latest AAA games on maximum graphics settings. In fact, the Asus itself suggests using ‘GTX 980 Ti or above’ for smooth gameplay.