Dell U2713HM - Unbeatable performance out of the box
by Chris Heinonen on October 4, 2012 12:00 AM ESTDell U2713HM Input Lag and Power Use
As I stated on the Nixeus review, since I don’t have a CRT that can do 1440p resolution I’m stuck testing these higher resolution displays at 1080p. Because of that the scaler gets involved, and that can lead to extra delays that you might not see if you run at 1440p. The pixel response should be the same, but the lag could vary from being the same to perhaps the low 1-2ms we see from some displays like the HP ZR2740w.
Here the Dell performs almost identically to the Nixeus that we recently reviewed, which means bad things for gamers. We have over a full frame of input lag, and then 11ms of pixel response time to bring our total lag up to 29.5ms, which is nearly two full frames on a 60 fps game. While the U2713HM is fine for everything else, for games that require fast reflexes and can’t deal with two frames of lag you’ll probably need to look elsewhere. I know some consider two frames to be acceptable and some consider anything over one frame to be unacceptable, so you will have to decide what you can live with.
On the power use side, I don’t know what Dell did to this display but it is stingy when it comes to energy use. Even with the backlight at maximum and the screen pure white, we see only 45 watts of power being used. With the backlight at minimum this drops down to 18 watts of power. No 27” display in here has come close to this yet, and there are 23” and 24” class displays that almost use as much power as the 27” Dell does. I guess the eco consciousness at Dell goes beyond just packaging to the actual power use of the monitor as well.
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cheinonen - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
In that case, you're still using the monitors internal scaler, which is what is causing the lag. You need to have them at the same identical resolution to have an apples-to-apples comparison.p05esto - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Great review! I'm in the market for a 27" LED/IPS professional monitor. A tad for gaming, but mostly programming and graphics. This monitor was on my short list, so I'm thrilled you reviewed it.In my research the only other monitor really on my list is the Asus PB278Q which will be released on 10/8. I've been hearing some good rumors about this one (and for $699).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
How great would it be if you reviewed this guy as well :) For me the brightness and color uniformity are a couple of the biggest details. I saw some pictures of this Dell in a dark room with a black screen and there was too much light bleed, horrible really. I'm not sure if in real life you would notice that, but it put a bad taste in my mouth. I have other Dell IPS monitors that I still love!
cheinonen - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
I ran the benchmarks on the ASUS today, so the review is a bit out as I haven't written anything on it yet, and still have a couple tests to do, but it's coming shortly.p05esto - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Great news! I will be patiently waiting (would wait for a sale anyhow).lukechip - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
In Australia, Dell have these on special at 559 AUD until Oct 5 (about 250 AUD discount). I snapped one up yesterday, and it arrived today. Haven't hooked it up yet. It feels good to read a good review of it the very next day !peterfares - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
For some reason Dell monitors are far cheaper in Australia than in the United States.ComputerGuy2006 - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Im tired of 1440p and im tired of 60hz.Time for 1600p at 120hz.... or better.
JarredWalton - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
Problem is you need basically quad-link DVI-D to do 1600p at 120Hz (or 1440p at 120Hz). I think DisplayPort can handle it, but no one has made such a display that I'm aware of (overclocking/hacking of Korean panels notwithstanding).Ryan Smith - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
DisplayPort 1.2 could in fact do it. It has almost exactly twice the bandwidth of DL-DVI.EnzoFX - Thursday, October 4, 2012 - link
I don't understand why obvious comparable monitors are left out sometimes in these graphs. I notice this a lot. Why isn't the U2711 in the input lag?