Color Performance and Scale

Moving on to the all-important colour functioning, and things aren't looking then expert for the AG322QCX in its default country. The monitor ships with brightness set to 90, or 220 nits, merely it's the white balance that is far from authentic. Bizarrely, in that location's a noticeable red tint to this display from the factory, at least my review unit, leading to a color temperature average of merely 6047K. Greyscale performance is all over the shop also, with a gamma less than 2.0 and a greyscale sweep dE2000 boilerplate of 5.23.

Default Calibration

Poor white balance shifts all colors towards the blood-red area of the spectrum, leading to a weak saturation average of 4.16. Some colors do exceed the sRGB spectrum with their peak levels – greens and reds in particular – though blues aren't quite as saturated. Still, sRGB coverage reaches 99.89%, albeit with a dE average of just 4.64 in our intensive ColorChecker exam.

Because these results, it's surprising AOC has opted to utilise the 'warm' colour temperature fashion by default, as opposed to the included sRGB fashion. Switching to this sRGB mode delivers significantly better results, essentially fixing the colour tint. In this style, the boilerplate CCT is 6566K and there'due south a greyscale dE of i.08, which is fantastic. Gamma is still slightly too depression, but much improved over default.

sRGB Mode

How nigh color performance in the sRGB mode? Well, it'southward very good, with a saturation dE2000 average of i.22 and a ColorChecker result of i.24. The fact you can change just one setting in the OSD and achieve results like this is outstanding from a gaming monitor.

However I do have one minor complaint about the sRGB mode, and that is how the mode is locked to one effulgence level: 203 nits. I normally calibrate all monitors to 200 nits, only others may want to use the brandish at lower or higher brightness levels depending on their ambience conditions. The fact yous can't change the effulgence while in the color-accurate sRGB mode is disappointing, as you'll have to fully calibrate the display using the manual OSD controls should you want to change the brightness. In future models, AOC should really unlock the effulgence adjustment for all modes.

Normally here I'd talk almost the tweaks you can make in the OSD to meliorate the colour operation without a calibration tool, but for most people, the sRGB fashion will provide good enough operation without any hassle. Instead, I'll be moving on to looking at merely how skilful this display tin can become through full calibration using SpectraCAL'south CALMAN five software.

Fully Calibrated using SpectraCAL CALMAN 5

With a stiff sRGB fashion, information technology's no surprise that the AG322QCX can exist calibrated to an impressive standard. I achieved an excellent grayscale deltaE of 0.36 with substantially spot-on colour temperature and gamma. This led to accurate colour performance: a deltaE of 0.52 in saturation sweeps and 0.73 in ColorChecker.

While the calibrated results hither are potent, I wouldn't recommend this monitor for professionals due to the uniformity issues I mentioned earlier. That said, equally a gaming monitor, yous won't be disappointed with how this display performs with a simple setting modify in the OSD.