ASUS VG278HE review

Asus’s screen goes one better, with its 144Hz refresh rate. Once we’d set the screen to this refresh rate in the Advanced section of Windows’ Screen Resolution settings, everything was smoother. Comparing the screen side-by-side with a 60Hz model on the Windows desktop, the animation when maximising, minimising and dragging around windows was significantly slicker. When playing a game with an older engine, such as the Half-Life 2 Black Mesa mod, turning on vsync led to a 144fps frame rate and beautifully smooth gameplay with absolutely no tearing artefacts.

Higher refresh rates also help with 3D. As active shutter 3D systems such as Nvidia’s 3D Vision rely on alternate frames being shown to the left and right eyes to create the stereoscopic 3D effect, you need twice the frame rate to maintain the same smooth motion as in non-3D mode. We certainly experienced some immersive 3D gaming on the VG278HE, but we struggled to see any difference when running the screen in 120Hz or 144Hz mode.

This was also the case in non-3D mode; we just couldn’t see any difference between 120Hz and 144Hz. This means that while the VG278HE is undoubtedly a superb gaming monitor, you shouldn’t spend the £70 premium over the 120Hz 27in Iiyama G2773HS just for the Asus monitor’s extra Hertz.

However, the Asus VG278HE has punchier colours and better contrast than the Iiyama display, as well as an adjustable stand, classier looks and support for Nvidia’s 3D Vision system. The VG278HE is certainly expensive, but with all its advantages taken into account, it’s still the best 1080p gaming screen we’ve seen.