Following on from my review of the AOC AGON AG352QCX, I was intrigued to see how the Taiwanese manufacturer could push the limits of its MVA panel technology technology. The AG352UCG is a 35in curved monitor that utilises this technology to push an impressive 1,440p resolution at 100Hz.
READ NEXT: AOC AGON AG352QCX review: A curved monitor made for competitive gamers
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Tl;dr
There’s much to like about the AG352UCG: it’s well built, has an excellent contrast ratio and has an impressive screen uniformity for a screen of its size. Granted, it's not the fastest panel you can buy, nor one with the most tantalising colour accuracy, but its ultrawide aspect ratio and 1440p resolution offer an immersive gaming experience for casual gamers that standard monitors can’t match.
With Nvidia G-Sync built in, the AG352UCG also provides Nvidia graphics card owners tear-free gaming. It’s an expensive monitor, at £720, but you’re getting a lot for your money.
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Price and competition
The price of £720 might seem like a lot of money ($900 in the US) for any monitor, but its direct competitors are nearer the £950 mark. This means the AOC is actually pretty good value. There are three other monitors available that offer similar specifications: the Acer X34A at £915, Acer XR341CK at £1,050 and the ASUS PG348Q at £990.
The Samsung CF791 is closer in price to the AOC, costing £729, but that comes with AMD FreeSync rather than Nvidia G-Sync.
READ NEXT: Best monitors of 2017 – the best monitors you can currently buy
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Design, features and build quality
The monitor is good to look at. It comes in a silver and black colour scheme that lends it an understated, classy appearance and, if you prefer your gaming monitors a bit more garish, a selection of LED strips at the rear can be used to add a pool of red, green or blue light to your desk.
Despite its size, there’s a fair degree of positional flexibility on offer. The monitor can be tilted in the range of -5.5 to 29 degrees and swivelled from -30 to 30 degrees, making it easy to move around and adjust on any desk. Plus, if you want to use your own choice of stand you can attach a 100 x 100mm VESA mount.
There’s a handle at the top of the stand that allows you to carry it around (although given how big and heavy this 35in screen is, you probably won’t be doing this all that often) and a retractable arm in the top left-hand corner for hanging your headphones on.
OSD settings are easily adjusted via a downward-facing joystick found at the bottom of the monitor, which grants access to the monitor’s OSD settings. Here, you’ll be able to adjust the monitor’s brightness, contrast, overdrive settings, and colour profile and toggle the monitor’s blue light filter mode on and off.
As for connectivity, the AOC monitor has single HDMI 1.4 and DisplayPort 1.2 inputs, 3.5mm input and output jacks for your headphones and mic, two USB 3.0 ports beneath the screen, one of which has fast-charging capabilities. There’s also a pair of two 2W speakers, which means you can listen to music directly through the monitor, however, it’s something I’d avoid given the poor sound quality.
Finally, the AOC AG352QCX has support for Nvidia G-Sync, which is excellent if you have a compatible Nvidia graphics card. AMD FreeSync is not supported.
READ NEXT: Best gaming headset - our pick of the best
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Image quality
The Agon AG352UCG’s resolution is a stunning UWQHD (3,440 x 1,440) and a major step up over the 1080p AOC AGON AG352QCX. Its MVA panel allows the monitor to run natively at 100Hz, and I can confirm that it doesn’t suffer from any frame skipping like the AOC C3583FQ.
Image quality is pretty good, too. In sRGB mode, the AG352UCG covers 99.3% of the sRGB colour space. This means colours are vibrant and, coupled with its 1,958:1 contrast ratio, the monitor is capable of dredging details from the darkest of scenes in movies and games.
What isn’t quite as impressive, however, is colour accuracy is not quite as impressive, though, with an average Delta E of 1.85. That’s not completely disastrous but, to the naked eye, colours lacked the pop I’d expect from an MVA panel.
Brightness, however, is on point, reaching a maximum of 335cd/m2, meaning you’ll be able to use it in bright, sunlit rooms. I was impressed by backlight uniformity across the panel as well with variance limited to 11%, an impressive feat in a gaming monitor of this size. However, there is a slight shift in colours at more extreme viewing angles, something that’s subtle, but still noticeable if you look out for it.
READ NEXT: Samsung CF791 review: A stunning quantum dot 34in curved gaming monitor
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Gaming performance
With a 100Hz refresh rate available at native resolution, there’s lots of gaming potential here. You’ll want to first make sure that you have a DisplayPort 1.2 compatible graphics card with enough horsepower to drive a high-resolution at its 100Hz refresh rate. I’d pick a Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 as my go-to graphics card for this monitor.
Initially, when testing the monitor in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, I found its response time a little slow and that’s due to the default Overdrive settings being set to “Off”. Boosting pixel response with the monitor’s “Fast Overdrive” setting improved things a lot, but also incurs a lot of inverse ghosting, which typically takes the form of shadows around objects and is distracting to the eye. The “Medium Overdrive” setting reduced the ghosting considerably without slowing the response time too much.
Input lag is also a mixed bag, with it not being fast enough to cope for competitive games such as CS:GO, but perfectly acceptable for less demanding games like Battlefield 1. As someone who plays competitively every day, I feel the monitor is best suited for casual gamers.
AOC AGON AG352UCG review: Verdict
The £720 price tag is hard to swallow, but that doesn’t negate the fact that the AOC AGON AG352UCG packs in a lot of pixels and features. It might not be the monitor of choice for a serious competitive gamer but it’s one that’s great for everyone else.
In short, if you’re looking for a do-it-all monitor and can accommodate its huge expanse on your desk, there are few in the market that can truly compete with the AOC AGON AG352UCG.
