The first Monoprice display I looked at didn’t fare well. While very affordable, it only offered a DVI input and very little in the way of controls. The worst sin was that the brightness control on the display just didn’t work correctly. A step up from that model is their IPS-Glass. With HDMI, DSub, and DisplayPort inputs to go with a dual-link DVI input, it is far more flexible than the cheaper model. It also returns the display controls to the front of the monitor instead of the rear. As important as these changes are, it won’t really matter if the issues found in the cheaper model exist here.

The Monoprice IPS-Glass Pro Panel is a 27”, 2560x1440 display using an IPS panel. It has a standard white LED backlight and uses the standard sRGB color gamut. To utilize the full resolution you’ll need to use the DVI or DisplayPort inputs as the HDMI port is 1.4a but not capable of the full 2560x1440 resolution. The included stand offers a bit of tilt but no other adjustments are available, though the 100mm VESA mounting holes make it easy to replace that with a better model if you desire. The features of the Monoprice are rounded out by a pair of speakers on the rear of the display.

The menu system inside of the Monoprice is exactly like that of the Nixeus displays. With a lot of these cheaper displays the panels and electronics are all being sourced from the same suppliers. There is still a lot that a company can do to improve upon the default performance, but the guts are the same. Unlike the cheaper Monoprice display we're glad to report that the Brightness control here works properly. Beyond the Brightness and Contrast controls you have a few preset modes that are best avoided, and a single point white balance control. There is a dynamic contrast mode but it blows the gamma curve way out of proportion, crushing shadows and highlights in the process. Overall the controls are bare-bones, but they do operate correctly.

The Monoprice IPS-Glass panel has a substantial feeling to it. There are vents at the top and the bottom and the display stays cool during use. Using an external power brick helps with this but also means another item on/near your desk. The bezel is a thick piece of glossy plastic that really picks up fingerprints, so try to avoid touching it if you can. It helps to slightly enhance the apparent contrast to your eye though I still prefer a matte finish that doesn’t show smudges as easily. The screen surface is very glossy as well. If you are in a room with bright, direct lighting the glare is probably going to be an issue.

The speakers provide adequate sound but are nothing to write home about. If you have no other speakers handy they can suffice, but that's about all I'd say of them. Since they’re rear-mounted they may also get muffled if you wall-mount the display, though wall mounting is usually only something we see with HDTVs so it's probably not a major concern. Overall the Monoprice design shows its value roots but it does not feel cheap. The HDMI resolution limitation would be a bigger deal without DisplayPort but most people should be fine with that.

Unlike the cheaper Monoprice display, the brightness control for the IPS-Glass Panel Pro actually controls the backlight correctly. Set to the maximum level it produces 348 cd/m^2 of brightness. Monoprice rates it for 440 cd/m^2 but hitting that level requires maxing out the contrast setting which introduces color shifts and white clipping.

Unfortunately the minimum setting for the brightness control does not take the Monoprice as low as we would like to see it. The minimum white level is only 163 cd/m^2, well over the 80 cd/m^2 we will try to calibrate to later. This might be by design as a really low light level would cause the glare of glossy screen to be much worse. If you work in a dark or dim environment you might find this light level to be too high for your regular use. I found myself using the display with the backlight at minimum the whole time as I prefer a level closer to 140-150 cd/m^2 in my moderately lit room.

The black levels on the Monoprice are much better than I expected them to be. IPS is typically not as highly regarded for deep blacks but the Monoprice does a great job. At the maximum setting the black level is 0.3524 cd/m^2 and at the minimum it falls to 0.1647 cd/m^2. For an IPS display these are both quite good numbers.

For the first time I had a display produce the exact same contrast level at maximum and minimum backlight settings. That is more of a fluke than anything, but the actual number is the impressive part. The Monoprice comes very close to the 1000:1 that I look for with a 989:1 ratio. This is effectively the same, and means the Monoprice works very well for dynamic content like games and movies. This might change if you calibrate, but it is capable of really good results.

The one thing I would like to have seen from the Monoprice here is a lower minimum backlight setting. Perhaps they have adjusted the backlight to provide better contrast ratios at the expense of minimum light levels, in which case most people would find this acceptable. Overall these numbers are very good and I’m happy to see them.

All calibration measurements are done using SpectraCal’s CalMAN 5.1.2 software with a custom workflow. Measurements are done using a C6 colorimeter that is first profiled against an i1Pro spectrometer to ensure accurate results. There are two sets of targets we use. Pre-Calibration and our first calibration aim for 200 cd/m^2 with an sRGB gamut and a gamma of 2.2. This is a common real-world setting for a display. The final target changes the light level target to 80 cd/m^2 and the gamma curve to the tougher sRGB standard.

There are a few preset modes in the Monoprice Glass-IPS Panel Pro display but the Standard mode is the most accurate one. Using Standard and the Normal color temperature setting produces the most accurate results. However the display still has a serious lack of blue in the grayscale and the gamma curve is well off the target. Colors also show large errors, especially in skin tones, and they are exacerbated at lower levels due to the poor gamma. The overall errors levels are OK but not wonderful.

With our 200 cd/m^2 calibration target the Monoprice improves immensely. The contrast ratio has a slight drop to 906:1 but the grayscale, RGB balance, and gamma are now virtually perfect. More impressive is the improvement in the color gamut, with an average dE2000 for the color checker chart of only 0.99. A few samples creep above dE2000 levels of 2.0 with a little over-saturation in the red gamut, but otherwise this performance is phenomenal.

The 80 cd/m^2 results are not quite as good. Due to the high minimum brightness setting the contrast has to drop all the way down to 480:1 to make our light output target. The grayscale and gamma are still virtually perfect, but you won’t have the same pop that you do with a target of 160 cd/m^2 or higher. What you will see are colors that are still as accurate as the prior calibration and virtually perfect.

Considering the color accuracy of this display after calibration, it seems like a cheap option for an image professional that wants color accuracy. Fortunately for them contrast ratio usually isn’t as important as overall accuracy so that lower contrast level may still work fine. That small change could produce a display with one of the overall best set of post-calibration benchmarks that I’ve yet to test if it were made.

As accurate as the post calibration numbers might be, to really be a professional display the Monoprice also would need to display good uniformity. If images looks different depending on where they are on the screen, that won’t work well for serious photo and print work. Before I even run the uniformity data I can see light leakage in all the corners that is very noticeable. I don’t work much against a black background as I do more spreadsheets and word processing, so I don’t see it as easily. If you watch a lot of movies or play a lot of games it will stand out more.

The White Uniformity is OK, but you can see the upper corners are dim while the lower corners are much brighter. The center of the screen produces very good numbers here but once you get to the edges some uniformity issues appear.

Black Uniformity really shows the scope of the issue. The upper corners have some noticeable changes, but the lower part of the screen really shows the problems in the uniformity. Black levels rise to be close to double that of the center of the display. Both bottom corners are bright and the left side has issues as well that can easily be seen. This is unfortunate but also a common complaint people have left in the reviews at Monoprice so I don’t believe it is confined to my sample.

These issues cause a big swing in contrast uniformity as expected. The two bright corners fall below 600:1, 33-43% lower than the center of the screen. The overall uniformity here is pretty poor and is the first place that the Monoprice display really shows its price point.

Those bright corners really cost the Monoprice when it comes to color uniformity as well. Most of the display is excellent, measuring very close to the center, but the corners really fall off. Two of them have average dE2000 errors of 2.0 or higher, so some colors will have visible errors, while the lower-left corner comes in at 3.17. Perhaps that corner will usually hold the start menu or some other, non-important content but it certainly won’t color match the center of the display.

If you’re able to use the Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro and confine your critical work to the center portions of the screen you will see excellent overall results. Even for color critical work you’ll be able to use it without a worry. If you need that performance to extend all the way to the edges of the display as well then the Monoprice is going to fall short.

Using the HDMI input and the Leo Bodnar lag tester, I measure 27.33ms of lag overall in the Monoprice IPS-Glass. This is a bit slower than the Zero-G, which used an HDMI-DVI adapter, but right in the range of most monitors out there today. Changing the mode on the display did not cause a change in the lag. Of course a bit of scaling is introduced, but other monitors have shown that you can add only 1-2ms of lag through scaling if done properly so I don't believe results will be much different at native resolution. Sadly, there are no 2560x1440 (or 4K) equivalents of the Leo Bodnar tester at present.

Power Use from the Monoprice is better than I expected it to be. It is far better on a candelas-per-watt basis than the Nixeus VUE 27 that it so closely resembles. The minimum brightness setting is hindered by the fact that the minimum brightness really isn’t all that low, indicating I perhaps need to find a way to incorporate that into this data. Overall with a pure-white screen up the Monoprice consumes 65 watts with the backlight at maximum and 37 watts when set down to minimum. This puts it ahead of a few 27” displays but not quite all of them.

The Monoprice gamut comprises almost 77% of the AdobeRGB gamut, which should allow for full sRGB coverage. As all the 100% saturation points measured by CalMAN are just slightly over-saturated, the Monoprice has no issue with the full sRGB gamut.

Coming off the cheaper Monoprice display I have to admit I wasn’t looking forward to the IPS-Glass Pro Panel version that much. With the issues that I found before I expected to find a low price that had a pair of serious flaws I would not be able to get past. So when I actually used the Monoprice for a while and ran the numbers on it, I came away very surprised.

Out of the box it really is nothing special. The pre-calibration data is okay but not excellent, and the on-screen display is the same one I used with Nixeus and never really loved. The stand is limited in adjustments as well, and the glossy plastic bezels are a design choice I wish companies would move away from.

Calibrate the Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro and it turns into something else entirely. The panel and electronics have enough quality to provide for an excellent image after calibration. You can even call it almost reference quality if you stick just to the center portions of the screen. Only a few colors that produce dE2000 levels above 2.0 keep it from being a true reference even if the overall average dE2000 is very low. The last thing to cause concern is the bright corners which will distract more if you play a lot of darker games or watch movies on it.

When the price of $475 is taken into account, the Monoprice becomes something of a steal. Yes, you can still get a Korean import model for less but it won’t have the HDMI or DisplayPort inputs, and it will lack the warranty that Monoprice offers. The overall performance comes in ahead of the Nixeus VUE 27 that I’ve usually recommended for a value 27” display as well. The main competition is the Dell U2713HM that offers two main benefits: a more adjustable, ergonomic stand and better pre-calibration results.

The Dell can now be found for around $540 so you’ll have to decide if those features are worth the extra $75 to you. The Monoprice does go on sale for $400 sometimes, but the Dell can be found refurbished for the same $400 making it a wash to me. I’m glad that Monoprice is able to offer a good performing, 27” display for a bargain price. If you’re after a 27” display and want good performance as well as a selection of inputs, the Monoprice IPS-Glass Panel Pro is definitely worth checking out.