The Acer R240HY ($139.99) is a 24-inch midrange monitor that uses an In-Plane Switching (IPS) panel to deliver good color accuracy and solid gray-scale performance without drawing a lot of power. It is equipped with three video inputs and features a sleek bezel-free design, but it lacks USB connectivity and ergonomic adjustments, and it won't give you the same level of detail that you get from its high-resolution sibling and our current Editors' Choice for midrange monitors, the Acer H257HU ($369.99 at Acer) .

Design and Features
The R240HY's ($129.99 at Amazon) good looks come by way of a bezel-free, glossy-black cabinet that is only a half-inch thick at its thinnest point. It is supported by a matching ring-shaped base that provides 20 degrees of tilt adjustability, but has no height, pivot, or swivel adjustment. It also lacks VESA-mounting capabilities. The 1,920-by-1,080-resolution IPS panel has a non-reflective coating and a peak brightness of 250 nits.

Along the bottom edge of the panel is a strip of glossy-black trim that holds five function buttons and a Power switch, and around back are an HDMI port, a DVI port, and a VGA port, as well as a headphone jack. As with many midrange monitors, the R240HY lacks USB ports and speakers. It's also missing a DisplayPort input. Picture settings are basic and include Brightness, Contrast, and Blue Light adjustments, along with the usual analog (Position, Focus, and Clock) settings. You won't find any advanced settings, such as the 6-Axis-Color and Gamma settings that you get with the Acer H257HU. Picture presets include User, ECO, Standard, Graphics, and Movie modes.

The R240HY comes with a three-year warranty on parts, labor, and backlight. Inside the box are DVI, VGA, and HDMI cables.

Performance
The R240HY's out-of-the-box color accuracy is good, but not ideal. As shown on the chromaticity chart below, red and green colors (represented by the dots) are just a tad misaligned with their ideal CIE coordinates (represented by the boxes), but blue is spot-on. Nevertheless, the panel produced rich, well-saturated colors in testing and while displaying scenes from Marvel's Iron Man 3 on Blu-ray.

Gray-scale performance was also good; although the R240HY managed to display every shade of gray on the DisplayMate 64-Step Gray-Scale test, you don't get the same level of highlight and shadow detail that you'll get from a high-end IPS panel, such as the one used on the NEC MultiSync P212. Viewing-angle performance, on the other hand, was excellent in testing, with no color shifting or loss of luminance from any angle.

See How We Test Monitors

The panel's 4-millisecond (gray-to-gray) pixel response did a good job of displaying fast-moving images. There was no evidence of ghosting or blurring on my Crysis 3 (PC) and Grand Theft Auto V (Sony Playstation 4 ($499.00 at Amazon) ) gaming tests. Input lag (the amount of time it takes for the monitor to react to a controller command) came in at an impressive 9.6 milliseconds, as measured using the Leo Bodnar Video Signal Lag Tester. Our fastest monitors, the BenQ SW2700PT ($599.00 at Amazon) and the BenQ XL2430T ($399.99 at Amazon) , both measured 9.5 milliseconds.

Using the R240HY won't stress your electric bill. It used a meager 19 watts of power in testing while set to Standard mode, and only 12 watts while set to ECO mode. The BenQ VZ2470H ( at Amazon) turned in similar numbers (24 watts in Standard mode and 12 watts in ECO mode), while the Viewsonic XG2401 ($291.91 at Amazon) used 29 watts in Standard mode and 16 watts in ECO mode.

Conclusion
The Acer R240HY is a good choice if you're looking for a fairly affordable, stylish 24-inch IPS monitor. Granted, you don't get a lot of features, such as USB ports and DisplayPort inputs, and it lacks a fully adjustable stand. That said, it delivers solid color and gray-scale performance, does a fairly good job of displaying fast-action gaming, and it's easy on your utility bill. If you require a monitor with a higher resolution, consider the Acer H257HU, our Editors' Choice midrange monitor. Granted, it's twice the price of the R240HY, but it has a slightly larger 25-inch screen with a much higher 2,560-by-1,440 resolution, and it offers very accurate colors and advanced color settings.

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• Report: LG and Samsung Are Developing Portable Displays for Phones