V
videohound
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Trying to decide between these two monitors for work in Premiere and After Effects (and general productivity) connecting primarily to a Mac Pro 2019 and possibly to a 16" MacBook Pro:
Dell UltraSharp 40 Curved WUHD Monitor - U4021QW
LG 38WN95C-W 38 Inch UltraWide QHD+ IPS Curved Monitor
RTINGS.com picks LG 38WN95C-W for best ultrawide for video editing, though it seems that their Dell review came out after that guide was updated. The “media creation” score is also slightly higher for the LG. However, Dell does have a higher resolution. I primarily work with 1080p content, so not sure the higher resolution will be a huge benefit for me, but perhaps fitting more on the screen will be useful.
Here are some of the specific concerns and questions I have regarding these monitors …
RTINGS reports better motion blur ratings on the LG, which seems to be mostly a concern for gaming. I don’t do gaming, but I wonder if this would matter for doing motion graphics work in After Effects? Will it influence how I see motion blur when designing graphics?
The LG gets much brighter than the Dell, which at first I thought was an advantage. Though, upon further research it seems that optimal brightness for video editing is closer to 120 cd/m² unless you’re doing HDR editing, so perhaps this doesn’t matter? (I haven't done any HDR editing, so it's not a priority. Though, it might be nice to have in case we want to experiment in the future.) I do have some concerns about whether having to dial the brightness way down on the LG will impact picture quality. I've seen some people complaining the LG is too bright to use comfortably in a dark room and even RTINGS mentions it's not great for a dark room, though they did calibrate it at a low brightness setting that measured 100 cd/m² so not sure why people are complaining if it can indeed get that dark. I guess this partly has to do with the blacks not looking super black in a dark environment, but I don't think the Dell is much better in that regard.
For general productivity, I’ve seen some customer reviews stating that text is hard to read on the Dell at full resolution, but RTINGS gives the Dell a much better score on text clarity, so not sure what to believe there.
Dell also seems to have a better reputation for customer support and a better replacement policy and faster turnaround than LG. So, all else being roughly equal, that might be enough of a reason to go with Dell.
Oh, and I did do a lot of research before settling on these two monitors. I understand there may be smaller e.g. 27-inch panels with better picture quality. Though, the appeal of having a single ultrawide monitor seemed to outweigh those concerns. If anyone has any other suggestions or thinks both of these will be terrible, I'd also like to hear that!
Thanks!
Dell UltraSharp 40 Curved WUHD Monitor - U4021QW
LG 38WN95C-W 38 Inch UltraWide QHD+ IPS Curved Monitor
RTINGS.com picks LG 38WN95C-W for best ultrawide for video editing, though it seems that their Dell review came out after that guide was updated. The “media creation” score is also slightly higher for the LG. However, Dell does have a higher resolution. I primarily work with 1080p content, so not sure the higher resolution will be a huge benefit for me, but perhaps fitting more on the screen will be useful.
Here are some of the specific concerns and questions I have regarding these monitors …
RTINGS reports better motion blur ratings on the LG, which seems to be mostly a concern for gaming. I don’t do gaming, but I wonder if this would matter for doing motion graphics work in After Effects? Will it influence how I see motion blur when designing graphics?
The LG gets much brighter than the Dell, which at first I thought was an advantage. Though, upon further research it seems that optimal brightness for video editing is closer to 120 cd/m² unless you’re doing HDR editing, so perhaps this doesn’t matter? (I haven't done any HDR editing, so it's not a priority. Though, it might be nice to have in case we want to experiment in the future.) I do have some concerns about whether having to dial the brightness way down on the LG will impact picture quality. I've seen some people complaining the LG is too bright to use comfortably in a dark room and even RTINGS mentions it's not great for a dark room, though they did calibrate it at a low brightness setting that measured 100 cd/m² so not sure why people are complaining if it can indeed get that dark. I guess this partly has to do with the blacks not looking super black in a dark environment, but I don't think the Dell is much better in that regard.
For general productivity, I’ve seen some customer reviews stating that text is hard to read on the Dell at full resolution, but RTINGS gives the Dell a much better score on text clarity, so not sure what to believe there.
Dell also seems to have a better reputation for customer support and a better replacement policy and faster turnaround than LG. So, all else being roughly equal, that might be enough of a reason to go with Dell.
Oh, and I did do a lot of research before settling on these two monitors. I understand there may be smaller e.g. 27-inch panels with better picture quality. Though, the appeal of having a single ultrawide monitor seemed to outweigh those concerns. If anyone has any other suggestions or thinks both of these will be terrible, I'd also like to hear that!
Thanks!