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The menu control system could be better, though. It uses a row of four buttons on the underside of the panel’s edge, where they sit alongside an identical-feeling power button. Not only is it easy to hit the power button accidentally and turn the monitor off, but the buttons are small and difficult to press, plus the menu system isn’t intuitive. Game Setting has more picture modes though we found the best image with Game Mode turned off. You can adjust Shadow Control for more visible dark detail and color saturation. There’s a low blue light mode for reading here too. Video processing options include a three-level overdrive, Adaptive-Sync toggle and motion blur reduction. It’s grayed out in the photo but when you turn off Adaptive-Sync, it comes on with a 20-level slider control. Higher settings reduce what little blur there is but also reduce brightness.
This monitor is, therefore, vibrant and bright enough for most gaming situations. Even the shadowy parts are visible enough, though you do lose some details in shadow, and the highlights sometimes get a bit overblown. If you’re looking for the aiming point, press the third button from the left. You get a single choice, a red circle with a crosshair inside. AOC CQ27G2 Calibration Settings On paper, this 165Hz screen’s performance is less immediately compelling, as its initial response time varies between 13.2ms with no overdrive and 8.9ms at maximum overdrive, while hitting 10.1ms at its default Medium overdrive setting. READ NEXT: Our full roundup of the best gaming monitors you can buy AOC C27G2U/BK review: Should you buy it? That makes this display not at all ideal for detailed image editing, watching the latest 4K video or playing cinematic-looking games, but it’s ideal for gaming where a high frame rate is important, especially if your graphics card has limited processing power.
A great entry-level 1080p gaming monitor with more features than you’d expect
The AOC 27G2 may have a modest feature set, but it hardly compromises on performance. In fact, for a monitor in its price range, we’re surprised at how clean, crisp and vibrant the image quality is.
Anecdotally, the C27G2 is good for casual gaming. The wide gamut equates to vibrant colours and the high contrast to dark shadows, producing a pleasing overall image. It’s clearly not going to be a match for a high-end 4K gaming monitor or a purpose-built esports display but, if you’re a new PC gamer looking for something that will make the most of your entry-level to mid-range gaming PC, the C27G2’s combination of 1080p resolution and 165Hz refresh rate fit the bill nicely. For general use, a 27-inch monitor like the AOC CQ27G2 strikes a good balance of size and usable screen area. It doesn’t take up a lot of room on the desktop but provides plenty of space for documents. The thin bezel and low price means putting two screens together is a reasonable can be done without breaking the budget. Photo editing where the graphic sits on one panel and your tools and utilities sit on the other is a very efficient way to work. That includes ergonomics. The AOC 27G2 has a decent tilt on it, up to 21.5 degrees (if only 4 degrees up). It also swivels 30 degrees to the left and 30 degrees to the right, making it versatile enough for many types of setups. A nice little addition to this is its ability to pivot to a portrait orientation or vertical format. This might not be useful to a lot of people, but it certainly has its uses for programming and reading, as well as serving as a secondary monitor for gamers.Being an IPS panel, viewing angles are excellent too. All told, there’s no need to touch any settings but the brightness control on this display, unless you’re using the sRGB mode, which also delivers spot-on image quality just with a color gamut reduced to 100% sRGB and fixed brightness of 277cd/m² (which is a bit higher than ideal but usable). That said, there are issues with the C27G2’s panel – as you’d expect from such a resonably priced product. While the VA technology produces a great contrast ratio it also creates a noticeable amount of ghosting. Cranking the Overdrive settings up to the maximum (level three) mitigates this somewhat but introduces a little bit of inverse ghosting to brighter scenes. This is a budget gaming monitor through and through, and a good one at that. If you’re just starting out in the world of PC gaming, or you’ve blown your budget on LED-lit water cooling, the AOC C27G2 is proof you don’t need to spend a fortune to enjoy smooth, colourful 1080p gaming with a few thoughtful extras thrown in. Moreover, in every other regard, this screen’s image quality is exceptional. Its out-of-the-box color temperature of 6,474K isremarkably close to the ideal of 6500K and its gamma of 2.21 is also very close to the 2.2 measure that we expect. Contrast is also very high for an IPS panel at 1276:1. We also measured a maximum brightness of 354cd/m²– miles above its rated 250cd/m². As this is only a 1080p panel, image quality is somewhat let down by overall sharpness, with a pixel density of just 81 pixels per inch (ppi). That compares to 110ppi for typical 27″ 2,560 x 1,440 screens and 93ppi for 2,560 x 1,440 32in screens.
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