HP Smartbuy ZR2740w 27" 12 ms (GTG) WQHD IPS Panel Height & Pivot Adjustable Widescreen LED-Backlit LCD Monitor 380 cd/m2 1000:1, Brushed Aluminum

Pros: Honestly it's a Refurbished 27" 1440p monitor for at the time $299, you get what you pay for. And i'm very happy for what i got for the price. Coming from a 21.5" 1080p screen it was a kick to the face on how big and beautiful everything is. Using display port wasn't and issue because it was already my intention before hand.

Cons: Lack of an OSD menu kinda sucks, but i knew that going into the purchase from reviews online. You can do a lot of the adjustments via the GPU software installed with most drivers in your OS.

Overall Review: This refurb shows up on either newegg or Woot.com every other week for the same $299 price. So if you miss you chance just wait it will return to this price or maybe even cheaper. Also spend $30-50 on a monitor arm that attaches to your desk, it is worth it to have this big screen just floating there on your desk rather than the included stand taking up space.

Pros: Price, size, great stand

Cons: discoloration

Overall Review: This is a great monitor at a great price but, I have now received two of these (first one RMA) and both have had a yellow discoloration that runs from the bottom to the top of the monitor, which is made more apparent with a plain white background. I purchased the monitor for design and photo editing so, the discoloration is particularly aggravating. And its not just me being picky, I have verified with two separate every day typical users and they can both see the issue as well. I have no idea if this is typical or if I should RMA again. I wish we could reply to each others reviews and ask other people. Maybe I can get a ruling from Newegg?

Pros: Works great at native resolution. Low price

Cons: Instructions are missing a step. Before pressing the power button on the front panel, check for a power switch located next to the AC cord plug. Make sure that switch is on. The instruction sheet never mentions this switch.

Pros: $349.99 (on sale at the time of purchase) for a 27" 1440p monitor, that's a no-brainer, UHD for the cost of a mid-range video card. Noticeable difference over my old Dell 1080p monitor, I'll never go back to 1080p. No dead pixels and no bleeding from the edges. Besides the quality difference, the amount of desktop real estate you get from upgrading to 1440p is another huge bonus, you can put 2 full web pages side by side. I have 2 780 Ti's driving this and it's a thing of beauty.

Cons: No OSD, so there are customization features that are lost. The only options you have are power, brightness +/-, and the source (DVI, HDMI, DP, etc...). I also purchased a Spyder monitor calibrator so I could get the colors and brightness perfect; and it did. There was a distinct difference before and after calibration. The brightness and color depth are perfect now.

Overall Review: If you get this monitor I would suggest also getting a calibrator because without the functionality of an OSD you cant take full advantage of this beautiful screen.

Pros: The extra screen real estate over a 1080 monitor is massive. Compared to other monitors in this class, getting 2560x1440 at 60Hz on an IPS display for this price is worth it. Sounds like this monitor might have some overall quality issues, so it may be a bit of a gamble, but it has worked out splendid for me so far after several months. They skimped on software features, but only slightly on hardware. The only issue for me was no HDMI and partially functional DVI. When connected to my MBP with DVI, my only choice is 720p, and since I've heard others voice the same complaint, it clearly isn't a configuration issue. When connected to the display port, everything is grand. The image is clear, bright and beautiful. I am a software developer, so color accuracy is a minimal concern. I was tempted to buy color calibration software, but I am glad I didn't. Don't need it. The stand is solid and allows easy adjustment in all dimensions.

Cons: I wish it had HDMI. I wish it worked in tall mode (probably an OSX issue). I wish the bezel was thinner. The pros definitely outweigh the cons.

Pros: This monitor displays very sharp text. Colors pop nicely. Somebody else commented that the text was fuzzy with jaggies. This is IMHO the fault of the operating system. Here's how I fixed it in Windows 7: right click on the icon you use to run a program, choose "Properties". Inside Properties, choose the "Compatibility" tab. Inside the Compatibility tab click "Disable DPI scaling on high DPI settings". Then the program in question will display fine, crisp text. But it ( the program ) will vary in size if you move it to another monitor. Personally I don't much care if a program varies in size from monitor to monitor, but I *DO* care about crisp text.

Cons: broke after a month & a half. The raster faded out from right to left, with fine horizontal bars during the transition.

Overall Review: So yesterday I had to spend an hour on the phone navigating through options and then talking to people with foreign accents working from scripts. I was rewarded with a promise of a fast local delivery truck with a new monitor. And a new box. And a prepaid UPS label to send the old monitor back to HP. That's why I bought this HP refurb instead of one of the Korean quad-def monitors, like a Catleap or Crossover. Hope the new one lasts. The warranty on the refurbs is only 90 days.

Pros: I was a little apprehensive about buying a refurbished monitor, but I decided to try this one out based on the $ savings. I had been looking at "professional" monitors for some time. I have owned 3 other 27" monitors running at 1920x1080 and found that it just seemed as if the pixels were to large in that size monitor. So I wanted to get a 27" running at a higher resolution. I have to say I am very happy with this purchase. This monitor is a beast. You really feel like you are taking the next step up in quality when you unbox this thing. Very heavy, think bezel, the stand is very strong and stable. Some people say that it is a con to not have color, and other adjustments built into the monitor, but I kinda like the simplicity of just having a brightness setting. I can fine tune it via my graphics card software (ati catalyst). Everything is much smaller due to the higher resolution, I bumped up my font settings in windows to medium, and tend to have my web browser at 125 percent zoom. I really am very happy with this monitor seeing as I only paid $350 for it. Games run well on it, I don't notice any ghosting with the higher 12ms latency. All the cables were included, the dual link dvi, power cable, display port, and it even came with an usb cable to hook from the pc to the back of the monitor. I like the 2 usb ports in the back, and then the other two on the side are a nice touch as well. I found that it needed very little calibration, I turned down the brightness a little, and the contrast a touch, but the colors look great! Even though things are smaller in general it feels like I have less eye strain, I think the smaller pixels help make everything more crisp, and the balance in general better. NO dead pixels, super fast free shipping. A+ overall.

Cons: I really don't have any cons with this monitor, the only one I can think to say, is that the cables, ie, dvi, usb uplink, and power cord, are visible under the monitor. There is really no way of hiding them with out kinking them in a bad way. It does not bother me, and I hardly notice them. The other thing that could be better is the brightness adjustment has no display that tells you where you are. The monitor just gets dimmer when you press the - button and brighter when you push the + button. A simple 1-100 brightness display would be nice to pop up.

Overall Review: I wouldn't recommend this monitor for someone who is buying it solely for gaming. The higher resolution is not that noticeable and 12ms is not ideal. But for photoshop and other non gaming related work its great.

Pros: The monitors came in very large, well-packed boxes. I wanted a high-resolution display to do remote troubleshooting - my previous 1900x1200 weren't cutting it anymore - and these monitors deliver excellent quality for that and then some. Gaming is good enough for my tastes.

Cons: I do have a little trouble (enough to deduct an egg) with the screens changing settings sometimes. For example, if I lock my computer (screens shutting off for a split second) sometimes they won't wake back up. Same thing if the UAC in Windows 7 kicks in for a second, or when changing modes. I typically don't do things with my computer that will make this happen, but when it does and I have to reset my computer it makes me grumpy. The cards are connected to Asus GTX 760 video cards via the DisplayPort cables that came with the monitors.

Overall Review: All in all, I'm pretty happy with my purchase. If I could figure out why these monitors didn't wake up and could fix the problem so I could use them 100% the way that I'd like, I'd be fully happy.