When we reviewed the Asus PQ321 ( at Amazon) back in 2013, it had the distinction of being the first Ultra-High-Definition (UHD) monitor we had seen. It also had a jaw-dropping $3,500 price tag. Now, almost three years later, big-screen UHD displays, such as the AOC U2879VF ($369.99), can be had for less than $400, but these savings come with sacrifices. While the U2879VF's ($375.00 at Amazon) 28-inch Twisted Nematic (TN) panel can display content at a 3,840-by-2,160 resolution, it has trouble displaying light shades of gray and suffers from narrow viewing angles and skewed greens. The monitor also lacks ergonomic adjustments and USB connectivity.

Although AOC touts the U2879VF as a Professional monitor model, it also offers AMD's FreeSync anti-tearing technology and a speedy 1ms pixel response, both of which are features typically found on gaming monitors. It delivered good gaming performance and a crisp 4K picture in our tests, but its overall performance and feature set fall short of our top pick for midrange UHD monitors, the 27-inch ViewSonic VP2780-4K ($601.00 at Amazon) .

Design and Features
There's nothing fancy about the U2879VF's design. It uses a two-tone, glossy-black/matte-black cabinet with a rectangular, silver base that lets you tilt the panel 5 degrees forward and 25 degrees backward, but lacks height, swivel, and pivot adjustments. The 60Hz panel has a non-reflective coating, a 300 cd/m² peak brightness, a 1,000:1 contrast ratio, and a 16:9 aspect ratio. There are five buttons beneath the lower bezel that are used to power the monitor on and off, select an input source, and access the monitor's setting menus.

Picture settings include Brightness, Contrast, Gamma, Dynamic Contrast Ratio (DCR), and there are seven picture presets (Standard, Text, Internet, Game, Movie, Sports, and Uniformity). There are four preset Color Temperature settings (Warm, Cool, sRGB, and Normal) and a User setting with Red, Green, and Blue sliders for adjusting color intensity. There are also several Picture-in-Picture (PiP) settings that allow you to select a source and a sub-source, position the windows, and adjust window sizes. Missing are the advanced Six-Axis Color controls and Blue Light settings that you get with the Acer S277HK ( at Amazon) .

AOC U2879VF

You get a decent selection of video inputs with the U2879VF, including DisplayPort, HDMI/MHL, DVI, and VGA, all of which are positioned at the rear of the cabinet, facing outward. There's also a headphone jack back there, but this monitor does not offer USB connectivity or speakers.

The U2879VF ships with VGA and HDMI cables, a resource CD, and a user guide. It comes with a three-year warranty on parts, labor, and backlight.

Performance
The U2879VF's out-of-the-box color accuracy was decent, but not ideal. As shown on the chromaticity chart below, red and blue colors (represented by the colored dots) were closely aligned with their ideal CIE coordinates (represented by the boxes), but green was just outside of its box. I didn't observe oversaturated colors or tinting in my test images as a result of the skewed greens, but if your work is color critical, you are better off with a high-end In-Plane Switching (IPS) monitor, such as the Asus PA328Q ($793.40 at Amazon) . On the plus side, my UHD (4K) test images appeared sharp and evenly saturated.

Grayscale performance was also mixed. The TN panel did a good job of displaying dark shades of gray on the DisplayMate 64-Step Gray-Scale test and provided good shadow detail in my test images, but the two lightest shades of gray appeared whitewashed. As a result, highlight detail was a bit soft. Viewing-angle performance was typical for a TN panel; there was noticeable color shifting when viewed from an extreme side and top angle, and the picture appeared dark when viewed from a bottom angle.

See How We Test Monitors

Fast-action games and movies looked fine on the U2879VF. While viewing scenes from The Giver on Blu-ray, the panel showed no signs of ghosting or blurring, and the action appeared fluid. Results were similar on my Crysis 3 (PC) and Grand Theft Auto V (Sony PlayStation 4 ($499.00 at Amazon) ) gaming tests. I didn't observe screen tearing while playing Crysis 3 with AMD's FreeSync disabled, but the action was noticeably smoother with it enabled.

Using a Leo Bodnar Video Signal Lag Tester, I measured input lag (the time it takes for the monitor to react to a controller command) at 29.5ms. While not terrible, that's significantly longer than the 9.5ms input lag measured on our fastest gaming monitors, the BenQ XL2430T($399.99 at Amazon) and SW2700PT($599.00 at Amazon).

The U2879VF doesn't offer an ECO power-saving mode, but it only consumed 36 watts of power in testing while operating in the Standard preset mode. That's much more energy efficient than the AOC U2868PQU ( at Amazon) (57 watts), the Acer Predator XB271HK ($629.00 at Amazon) (52 watts), and the ViewSonic VP2780-4K (41 watts).

Conclusion
The AOC U2879VF won't wow you with features and aesthetics, but it gives you a sharp 4K picture without depleting your bank account. Additionally, its fast pixel response and FreeSync anti-tearing technology provide good gaming performance should you decide to partake in a little after-hours entertainment. That said, its color and grayscale performance could be better, and it doesn't give you the wide viewing angles that you get with an IPS monitor. If color accuracy and grayscale performance are paramount, consider our Editors' Choice for midrange UHD monitors, the 27-inch ViewSonic VP2780-4K. It's more than twice the price of the U2879VF, but it uses an IPS panel that delivers very accurate colors, wide viewing angles, and solid grayscale performance, and it's packed with features.

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