Iiyama G-Master GB2888UHSU-B1 Review

Performance Analysis

Gamut coverage is exactly as expected from a screen of this calibre – the vast majority of the sRGB gamut is covered with only the very edges being called into question by our colorimeter.

The measured contrast ratio peaked at nearly 600:1, which is fine but not outstanding. The monitor's out-of-box User Colour profile proved to be the best of the colour temperature settings, with 6,200K being only a little warmer than the ideal 6,500K value.

Colour accuracy is definitely a strong point for this screen, especially considering its price. An average delta E value of less than 2 (with the vast majority of points coming under 3) is excellent for out-of-box performance, and the Iiyama has a clear advantage over the Asus panel here. On the other hand, the Asus screen gave us a near-perfect gamma reading, but here the 2.0 value distances the tone response curve from what's considered ideal. Some gamers may actually prefer this, since it lightens dark and shadowy areas in games, potentially revealing enemies or other beneficial visual information.


Uniformity measurements were mostly fine; there's some brightness degradation towards the left side but to the naked eye the impact wasn't noticed.

All in all, we were happy with the image produced by this screen. Our test images were perhaps a little lacking in vibrancy and depth but not to a degree that was off-putting. Viewing angles were predictably poor: If you're not looking at this screen head-on, you'll probably notice some colour distortion, especially at the edges.

Calibration meant we were able to achieve an average delta E value of 1.07, and the gamma curve improved too. The subjective differences between the two were subtle, but we did notice improved contrast and depth, with skin tones looking a little less washed out than before. It's a nice touch if you happen to already own a colorimeter but probably not enough of a difference to make it worth shelling out for one.

As for games, we were again pleased with the screen. It felt responsive, and FreeSync, once enabled, worked fine and resulted in much smoother gameplay. As we pointed out with the Asus MG28UQ, however, AMD really needs more powerful graphics hardware to make gaming comfortably at 4K a reality; for now, users are almost certainly going to be using Nvidia hardware, which renders FreeSync useless. We had a play with the overdrive settings as well and found that the default value was best: Lower values resulted in more obvious tails behind moving objects and higher values gave us blatant pixel overshoot effects.

Conclusion

This is a great screen and solid competition to the Asus MG28UQ that we just reviewed. It's wrong to expect an outstanding, professional-grade image at this price point, but the panel delivers solid results across the board without major weaknesses and holds up to a more subjective, general experience well too. The range of physical adjustments is also great, and this is particularly important with TN panels as you really need to get the viewing angle spot on to get the most from them. You don't get a portrait mode, but we suspect most people can live without this.

While the G-Master GB2888UHSU-B1 won't win any awards for its name, it is a great all-rounder and excellent value for a 4K, FreeSync-enabled screen, so it more than earns our Exceptional award. Sadly, the demand for such a panel is likely to be hindered by AMD's current lack of presence in the high-end GPU market, but this is something that will hopefully be fixed by the upcoming Vega cards. Even so, 4K is going to be a challenging resolution for graphics hardware for years to come, so if you're itching to make the jump, this could still be a solid upgrade choice while you wait (and save) for true 4K-capable hardware from the red team.