 For years I did very few monitor videos because I don't really like making videos about them unless there's some really compelling new feature or design idea that I'm excited about. Now, as you may have noticed over the last year or so, I've done a lot of monitor videos. It's been a heck of a year. G-Sync, FreeSync, Slim Bezels, High Refresh Rate, Ultra HD, Ultra Wide, the list goes kind of on and on, doesn't it? Well now, it's gonna go on some more because the LG 31M U97 is the first monitor I've ever laid eyes on that features a 17 by 9 aspect ratio and a true 4K native resolution. So what's it like then, eh? 🎵 Save on select Intel Core i7 processors and 730 series SSDs with instant rebates during Valentine's week February 14th to 21st 2015. Click now to learn more. Let's get this out of the way right now. This is not a gaming monitor, it's not intended to be a gaming monitor, and frankly the gaming experience won't light anyone's world on fire. I measured total input lag as high as 27 milliseconds or so, so more than a frame, and almost no one has a graphics card that's capable of driving modern AAA games at its 4096 by 2160 resolution anyway. That's 8.85 million pixels or four and a quarter times as many as 1080p. Even the 3840 by 2160 resolution that most consumers refer to as 4K, but is technically actually UHD, is only 8.3 million pixels. So hold on a second then Linus, what the actual devil is this weird resolution for? The answer is professional work. And when you re-examine the 31 MU97 in matte context, the $1,400 price point makes a lot more sense. Let's begin with a physical tour though. The ID is plain looking and definitely business-like, with a mostly flat-ish not particularly thin front bezel design, simple LG branding on the front, and an unassuming looking plastic covered metal stand, but there's some good news here. The ergonomics and functionality of the aforementioned stand are pretty business-like as well. It lacks swivel, something I kind of wish it had, although in LG's defense the same functionality can be achieved by simply repositioning the entire base, but it does have tilt, a wide range of height adjust, pivot, yes, for those of you who love portrait mode, and a VESA compliant mount on the back that I was able to use easily with three of these bad boys on a, yes, so yes, 25 million pixels on an Obadu Gaming slash Workstation cockpit setup in this video here. That was freaking awesome. I have never seen screen real estate like that before. On the bottom of the display we find a pretty healthy mix of I.O. These dual HDMI ports are unfortunately not HDMI 2.0 compliant, which would allow them to operate at 60 Hz at native resolution, but the dual DisplayPort 1.2 inputs, one of which is full size and one of which is a mini, kind of makes up for that for me. With the included full size to mini cable, it gives users the flexibility to easily connect this monitor to either a desktop or a notebook without buying any adapters or new cables out of the box. Finally down here we've got the uplink for the three-port USB 3.0 hub that should accommodate most of what sits on the desk next to your monitor, and the control joystick that LG has been including on at least their high-end monitors lately and that I personally really, really like. Finally, the front where we find the satisfyingly large 31-inch panel, which is actually a great size for someone coming from an older 30-inch professional grade monitor, since the vertical height is almost identical with the extra inch contributing to a slightly wider field of view. Although I suspect a good number of those folks will be upgrading with the misguided notion that they'll be able to utilize the 31 MU97's 35% more vertical pixels, which likely won't be the case. Now I have pretty good vision, a little shy of 2020, so I do have a prescription that sharpens things up a little bit. And at a reasonable distance without my glasses, I can use this display without scaling. And with my glasses, everything is actually reasonably sharp, but for long periods, it wasn't comfortable to use like that under either scenario, so I think most people would require scaling within their operating system for optimal text readability. For those that can handle it though, it is definitely cool to have easily enough horizontal pixels for three to four pieces of content. But frankly, if my goal was pure business and productivity and spreading things out, I would choose LG's own 34UM97 or 34UC97 over this one, since they require no scaling and the ultra-wide format makes side by side by side a total pleasure to use. Alright then, so this monitor is for professionals, if not necessarily the ones who are focused on spreadsheets, well then which ones? Ah, video and imaging professionals, and it's got some pretty neat features to appeal to those folks. So first up is the 10-bit LED backlit matte finish IPS panel, something that will benefit the folks with appropriate hardware, software, and more than anything else, the need for it, so content creators. Because while most LCD computer displays out there are 8-bit or even 6-bit with FRC tricks to achieve more than the native number of colors, more granularity allows content creators to more accurately match a target color in the original work so that regardless of which medium it eventually ends up being displayed on, web, print, broadcast, cinema, whatever the case may be, it will be as close as possible to what they were trying to achieve. Which leads us into what really is the killer app of this monitor for me. Now, the number of bits per channel for color actually has little to do with the total color gamut or range of colors that a monitor can represent. It's just how many intermediary steps there are within that range, and that is where the 31MU97 really shines compared to a typical consumer monitor or even the entry-level prosumer ones that I've seen in the past. It comes pre-calibrated from the factory with a handy-dandy little report that you get in the box and covers 100% of the sRGB color space, so this would be suitable for work that will be viewed on the web or realistically most general use color applications. 99.5% of the Adobe RGB color space considered suitable for working with higher bit depth images and, depending on your printer setup, sometimes desired for print, and then this is where the video geek's jaws will drop. 97% of the DCI-P3 digital cinema color space, which I guess makes sense, since given its digital cinema standard resolution, that will also make users able to preview their cinema bound work at one-to-one on this display, means this is kind of who they were targeting with this. Now, to be clear, this is not the best available grading display for DCI. You can get 100% coverage with the Dolby PRM4220, a 42-inch 1080p display that features specialized dual modulation dimming technology and costs tens of thousands of dollars, but at under 5% of the cost for this monitor and a solid calibration system to keep it running at peak efficiency for 97% of the results, it looks pretty darn appealing. And there's one more super cool feature too, being able to preview one color space next to another one that's in use on the rest of the monitor is amazing. That way, if a project is going to be utilized in multiple ways, you can quickly ensure that you're going to get the desired results across different media. But while PC users with DisplayPort 1.2 outputs can rejoice and basically go start buying these puppies up, some Mac users have been complaining. Now, I've been saying for some time that due to its lack of expandability, limited RAM capacity, and a number of other reasons, the late 2013 Mac Pro is not a serious workstation, and now I'm getting some more ammunition for my gun. Apple users are reporting that single tile 4K, that is real 4K, not Ultra HD displays like the 31 MU97, are only capable of running at 50 Hz on the Mac Pro at their native resolution. It appears to be a driver issue since there's no problem running at 60 Hz on similar class AMD cards in Windows, so hopefully this is something that Apple will address. Because aside from still not supporting 10-bit color per channel, like Windows users have been enjoying in Adobe applications like Photoshop for years, Apple users won't be able to run at full res and refresh rate on their shiny new toy slash productivity tool, which would definitely be a fly in my glass of milk. Speaking of flies and milk glasses, someone should make a website dedicated to like, beautifully shot and graded images or like short video clips of people reacting to a fly in the bottom of their glass of milk. And you know what they should do that with? Squarespace.com, today's episode sponsor. Squarespace.com lets you build a powerful, beautiful website simply and quickly. They offer 24-7 support via live chat, it starts at 8 bucks a month, and you get a free domain if you buy Squarespace for the year. They feature responsive design in all of their beautiful templates, so your website scales to look great on a phone or on a laptop or on this or whatever else the case may be. They've got a ton of different templates, so you can make a commerce page, a blog, whatever else the case may be. You can start a trial today with no credit card required and start building your website. You get to kind of make sure that Squarespace is right for you. Then when you decide to sign up, make sure you use offer code LINUS to get 10% off your first purchase. So thanks to Squarespace for supporting LINUS Tech Tips. Thanks to you guys for watching this video. Like this video if you liked it, dislike it if you thought it just plain sucked, and as always, leave a comment if your feelings are much more complicated than that. Also, linked in the video description, aside from Squarespace, is how to support us. You can buy a cool t-shirt like this one, give us a monthly contribution if you want us to keep making the things that we do, or you can just change your Amazon bookmark to one with our affiliate code, so whenever you buy monitors or whatever else the case may be, we get a small kickback. That kind of thing helps us out a lot. And if you're gonna buy these monitors, it would actually be a fairly big kickback, so it'd be worth the effort. Thanks for that. Thanks again for watching, and as always, don't forget to subscribe.