Acer is finally back in the gaming monitor fight

This story is part of our coverage of Computex, the world's biggest computing conference.

Acer just announced three new OLED gaming monitors at Computex 2024, which isn’t too surprising. Event after event, we see a range of new Predator monitors packing a recent panel, but for a price that just isn’t competitive with the rest of the market. Pricing isn’t changing, but one of Acer’s new monitors might get it back to the legendary status is once held.

Let’s back up. Several years back, Acer was at the top of the gaming monitor stack. Its Predator X34 was one of the best gaming monitors you could buy, packing the coveted 21:9 aspect ratio and a high refresh rate. It occupied a similar space in the market that the Alienware 34 QD-OLED does now. It was early on the scene, and it rode that wave for several years.

In more recent years, Predator monitors have fallen behind. We typically see the same panel that’s already available in monitors from Asus, MSI, or Alienware packed into a Predator housing for a higher price — and generally several months behind the competition. The Predator X27U F3 is a refreshing change of pace.

This is a 1440p OLED monitor that comes with a staggering 480Hz refresh rate. We’ve seen this panel once before, in January, when Asus showed off its take on this display. The problem is that Asus hasn’t released its 480Hz display yet, and Acer is already putting a time frame on when we’ll see the Predator X27U F3.

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It’s arriving in the third quarter of the year, so sometime between July and September. There are threads asking when Asus will release its version, one of which was posted just a month ago. Asus has said that it plans to release its display in the second half of the year. So, Acer might be the first one on the scene, and even if it’s not, it’ll be close behind Asus.

The only thing that could potentially block the Predator X27U F3 is its price. Acer tells me that it’ll run $1,600, which is obscene. Granted, most OLED gaming monitors are expensive, with rare exceptions like the MSI MPG321URX and Asus ROG XG27AQDMG, but $1,600 is still a high price. It’s hard to tell if that’s the going rate with pricing for Asus’ version.

In addition to the insane refresh rate, Acer tells me that the X27U F3 will hit a peak brightness reaching up to 1,300 nits in HDR. That’s once of the highest brightness claims we’ve seen. It’ll also come with DisplayPort, HDMI, and USB-C inputs, all of which can run at the maximum resolution and refresh rate. Acer says it will include a KVM switch, but unfortunately, the USB-C port doesn’t support power delivery.

Even with the high price, the Predator X27U F3 is a shocking display to see from Acer, at least this early in a product cycle. This is the type of monitor I’d normally expect Acer to show off early next year, but that’s not where we are. Not only is the Predator X27U F3 the second 480Hz OLED we’ve seen, it’s also arriving shockingly soon.