AOC AGON AG352UCG6 Review

AOC AGON AG352UCG6

The AG352UCG6 is a huge monitor from AOC’s gaming brand, AGON.

Its 35in diagonal positions it alongside the biggest screens on test, and its price gets you an ample set of features. The AOC includes G-Sync at a peak rate of 120Hz, which is 20Hz more than the HP Omen X. The 3,440 x 1,440 resolution delivers a density level of 107ppi too – matching the HP and Acer – and its quoted response time of 4ms also lines up with its rivals.

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The panel inside this screen uses MVA technology – so, in other words, it’s VA. That means you’re getting good viewing angles and great contrast. That’s another area where this screen matches its 35in competitors. Like the Acer and HP, if s an 8-bit panel, which means you get 16.7 million colours, which is fine for gaming. That’s the same as the HP and Acer panels.

AOC clearly means business with this panel too. The 35in screen sits on a stand that’s deeper and wider than any stand on test, bar the Acer, and its 11.8kg weight means if s virtually as heavy as the chunky HP. Handily, a headset hook swings out from the right-hand side, and you get some ambient lighting below the bottom bezel.

There’s a chunky bezel on this chunky monitor, but that’s about the only design misstep, and it won’t bother most people as these large, wide panels aren’t usually arranged in multi-monitor setups.

You get height adjustment, tilting and side- to-side swinging, with that latter feature only shared by the Acer in this month’s test. You also get HDM11.4 and DisplayPort 1.2 connections, with the latter being the only one that supports 120Hz G-Sync. You get two USB 3 ports too, although the Acer gives you four.

Straight out of the box, the AOC delivered good levels of quality. Its colour temperature of 6,588K is excellent, and its average delta E of 1.66 is impressive. Its brightness level of 323cd/m2 is ample, and the black level of 0.15 is pleasingly deep. That creates a contrast ratio of 2,153:1 – not far off the panel’s claimed 2,500:1 figure. Those results are all great for games – they’ll deliver plenty of depth in darker areas and accurate, vivid colour in lighter parts of the screen.

Those results were maintained when we dropped the brightness to a more sensible 150cd/m2. Throughout our tests, the AOC delivered an excellent sRGB coverage figure of 99.5 percent sRGB. That brightness level

It delivers plenty of depth in darker areas and accurate, vivid colour in lighter parts

outpaces the HP and Acer panels, and contrast is slightly better than both. The AOC’s delta E is also a tiny bit better than those competitors, and it’s a little ahead with sRGB coverage. Another good gaming result is the AOC’s input lag figure of 13.9ms. There’s very little in it when compared with the Acer panel, but the AOC’s result was the best in the Labs.

It’s a good start, but the AOC isn’t without issues. The screen lost almost 20 percent of its backlight strength along both sides, which is high, even for an ultra-wide panel – and both sides exhibited a little backlight bleed. The two 2W speakers don’t have a huge amount of volume either, and they’re a little too bassy, but they’re definitely better than the poor audio offering from the Acer. Finally, there’s the disappointing OSD. The joystick is flimsy, and the software itself is plain and tricky to navigate, with right-hand taps used to open menus to the left.

Conclusion

AOC’s panel delivers some of the best basic image quality on test, and it also has the best input lag timeout of the larger, VA-based gaming screens – only the smaller LG was better. There’s 120Hz G-Sync and plenty of good design features too.

On the downside, the AOC’s uniformity results aren’t great and the OSD system is underwhelming. Neither of these issues is terminal, though, and they won’t affect everyday gaming either – they’re just caveats to bear in mind. Otherwise, the AOC offers superb image quality and a cracking feature set-a great display.

VERDICT

The Labs-winning AOC mixes great image quality with keen design and a solid range of features.

SPECIFICATIONS

Panel type VA

Native resolution 3,440 x 1,440 Diagonal 35in

Maximum refresh rate 120Hz

Active sync Nvidia G-Sync

Display inputs 1 x HDMI 1.4, 1 x DisplayPort 1.2

Extras 2 x 2W speakers, 2 x USB 3 ports