I’ve been playing the best PC games for more than a hot minute, so naturally, I’ve been through a whole lot of gaming monitors over the last decade. At this point last year, I’d have cheerfully told you the Alienware AW3423DWF was the finest desktop display I’ve ever owned in over two decades of PC gaming.
Fast forward 12 months and it’s merely the second best. But now its price has been cut ahead of next week’s Prime Day event and it’s a gaming monitor I’d still recommend in a heartbeat.
Right now, the Alienware AW3423DWF QD-OLED Gaming Monitor is on sale for $799 at Dell. That’s the lowest price I can recall ever seeing this incredible ultrawide monitor dropping to, as it normally retails for $899, making for a $100 saving you definitely shouldn’t turn your nose up if you have the funds to afford it.
I previously owned the Alienware AW3423DWF for around a year and it’s the bee’s knees. It’s one of the best gaming monitors out there, and proves a phenomenal screen for playing some of the best Steam games on thanks to its stunning contrast levels that are brought about through a combination of peerless OLED black levels and the boosted brightness that its quantum dot panel helps produce.
During our testing for our Alienware AW3423DWF review, my computing chum Tony Palanco described Dell’s display as “a rock solid gaming monitor” that is capable of “excellent image quality and heaped love on its “fash refresh rate and low latency”. He wasn’t fibbing on that last point of praise. The AW3423DWF has a maximum refresh rate of 165Hz (through a DisplayPort connection), while response times clock in at just 0.1ms.
Picture quality on the AW3423DWF is exceptional, too. During our testing, Dell’s panel reached a respectable average peak brightness of 366 nits in HDR 400 mode, while color accuracy also impressed. This Alienware monitor covered 180% of the SRGB color gamut during our review process, also handing in a commendable 0.24 rating on the more demanding Delta-E scale, scoring 0.24 (lower is better).
Though this Alienware supports FreeSync Premium to help significantly reduce judder and eliminate screen tearing making it an ideal choice for serious gamers, it also works particularly well as a work monitor. Thanks to that 34-inch ultrawide screen and crisp 1440p resolution (3440 x 1440), its 21:10 aspect ratio is perfect for having an ungodly amount of Google Chrome windows up, making it a bit of a beast when it comes to productivity tasks.
The only reason I sold my Alienware AW3423DWF is because I took advantage of a scarcely believable Black Friday deal on the equally amazing Samsung Odyssey OLED G9 late last year. As much as I love Dell’s monitor, it’s hard to top a 49-inch super ultrawide screen that is both a dream to game and work on.
But for most people who don’t happen to own a desk the size of the Titanic, I’d say the Alienware AW3423DWF (especially at its current discounted price) is the more sensible option for most gamers.
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