There are a lot of affordable monitors in the market right now – but I think this ASUS TUF Gaming VG27UQEL5A has one of the best value-for-money deals that you can get right now. And I am not joking. If we have a look online right now, this monitor only goes for around RM1,400 only, and it go even lower during discounts.
So, let’s start talking about the panel as this is the main highlight of the monitor. This is a 27-inch IPS LCD panel. From our test, it can reach a maximum brightness of around 480 nits in both SDR and HDR modes. Pretty bright for an IPS LCD monitor.
We have not mentioned about the resolution or the refresh rate of the display of this monitor because it has dual modes. We can select either 4K 75Hz, or 1080p 300Hz. It can be toggled by selecting the “Frame Rate Boost” in the OSD menu.
I know that the product page says that the monitor can actually go 4K 80Hz or 1080p 310Hz – but that’s not by default. We’ll have to go into the OSD menu and enable the “Overclocking” option. You can turn it on if you want to, but in our review – we’re leaving it off. Frankly speaking, it doesn’t really offer much of a difference.
The display itself comes with a few different color profiles to select from, so we tested it in sRGB mode.
At the 4K 75Hz mode, it covers:
- sRGB: 99.40%
- DCI-P3: 93.16%
- Maximum ΔE: 2.406214
- Average ΔE: 0.105981
Then, we also used the same settings but retested it in 1080p 300Hz mode and we got:
- sRGB: 99.39%
- DCI-P3: 93.10%
- Maximum ΔE: 2.453025
- Average ΔE: 0.115866
According to our data, all the data obtained here shows that the color performance on both modes is going to be identical – or at least within very tight margin of error. However, from what we can see with our own eyes, it seems like the pixels look kind of blocky and sharp when in 1080p mode.
With that said, I personally think that it is for the better. That 1080p 300Hz mode is meant for fast, competitive games anyway – and this kind of clear separation means that we can visually identify the target’s edges at a pixel-perfect level. Plus, no one is playing competitive games to enjoy the view anyway – so it’s fine. To actually enjoy the scenery, we can switch it to 4K 75Hz mode instead.
Also, this monitor surprisingly comes with native NVIDIA G-Sync support too. Yes, a monitor of this price with such great capabilities that comes with native G-Sync support is really a huge benefit and eliminates screen tearing, and we don’t have to sacrifice performance by turning on V-Sync.
There are a whole lot more features built into this monitor. We have the aforementioned dual modes and overclocked display, but we also have the usual features like overlaying a crosshair via the GamePlus feature, or bump up the shadows so we can see dark areas in the game better.
All of the OSD menu controls are done through the joystick and buttons at the right side of the monitor, behind the display. It’s quite intuitive, but if you’re lazy like me and don’t want to touch the monitor but still want to adjust the settings, then just use the ASUS DisplayWidget Center companion app.
Through this app, we can adjust all the OSD menu settings and a whole lot more – like MultiScreen that partitions the screen into a few different sections so that all the apps can sit side-to-side, or use set hotkeys to quickly adjust brightness, contrast, and all of those things – or even use the app tweaker so that the monitor automatically changes the color profile when certain applications are in focus.
The ASUS DisplayWidget Center is a great application, and in my opinion, one of the more handy companion app for your display when compared to other brands in the market too. Plus, this companion app is available for Macs as well.
The MyASUS utility also works as well if you are connecting this monitor to an ASUS laptop or PC with an ASUS motherboard. The MyASUS utility is made to deal with all things ASUS in terms of firmware and system settings.
The ASUS TUF Gaming VG27UQEL5A also comes with a very ergonomic stand, as it has height adjustment, swivel, tilt, and also rotation. And if you want to use your own monitor arm, you can. This monitor also supports the standard 100x100mm VESA mount too.
As for the ports, we have:
- 1x USB-C (service port)
- 2x HDMI 2.0
- DisplayPort 1.4
- 3.5mm audio jack
That’s it. Please do note that HDMI 2.0 can only handle 4K 60fps or 1080p 240Hz at most, so you’ll need to connect it to DisplayPort to take full advantage of this monitor’s capabilities. The USB-C found in this monitor is a service port meant for firmware updates only. As of now, there are no firmware updates.
With this little amount of ports, the cable management here is pretty simple and I personally have no complaints about it. ASUS integrated the cable holder into the stand itself, which makes it aesthetically pleasing.
Should you buy the ASUS TUF Gaming VG27UQEL5A?
All in all, the ASUS TUF Gaming VG27UQEL5A is a solid monitor – especially because of its native 4K 75Hz or 1080p 300Hz display mode, and all the great features like NVIDIA G-Sync. The utilities that ASUS provides for a monitor is a nice cherry on top.
While I personally think that not having any USB ports on the monitor is a bit of a bummer, I really can’t complain since ASUS has placed all its focus on the display alone for the TUF Gaming VG27UQEL5A.
With the undeniably great price of just around RM1,400, it just seals the deal, especially since we can get it for a lower price during promotions.
