msi MPG 491CQP QD-OLED, 49 Curved OLED Gaming Monitor, 5120 x 1440 (DQHD), 0.03ms Response time, 144Hz, True Black HDR 400, HDMI, DP Port, USB Type C, Tilt, Height

Fantastic gaming monitor! The OLED panel delivers deep blacks, rich colors, and amazing contrast. The 240Hz refresh rate makes gameplay incredibly smooth, and the curved ultrawide format is super immersive for both gaming and movies. HDR looks great with bright highlights and clean detail. Premium build quality and a sturdy stand round it out, an excellent ultra-wide OLED for gaming and media.

Looks great and works great. Definitely worth the price when you can catch this on sale. Easy to setup, and needs very minimal calibration or adjustments to provide an excellent picture.

Huge fan of the monitor. The thing is a beast and gives off very little in the way of heat, so unlike competitors, it doesn't make your office a furnace. Another thing it does well is the color palette. The deep blacks of the OLED are impossible to beat, and the HDR is miraculous. The high refresh rate is another big bonus. Lastly, the burn-in protection functions are mostly unobtrusive and protect the screen after a long day of gaming. I would definitely recommend this screen to anyone looking for an ultrawide monitor, especially when compared to the G9 series. The value that is offered here cannot be beat.

If you buy this monitor, you can expect all the pros and cons of QD-OLEDs: extremely vibrant colors, deep blacks, great color accuracy, great HDR, but not so great brightness. QD-OLED in particular isn't as good as WOLEDs in bright rooms. But regardless of the tradeoffs, MSI has nailed it! Pros 1. HDR is beautiful with latest firmware update: EOTF boost mode. Colors POP! 2. No active cooling required! 3. Brighter than expected, especially in SDR mode. 4. Colors look AMAZING. 5. The 240 Hz refresh rate feels great, makes a huge difference in games! 6. The KVM mode is cool. You can do PIP or screen split with multiple computers 7. MSI is still updating and supporting it. Cons 1. If you do not update the firmware, HDR will look washed out 2. Display is rather thin. Doesn't feel that sturdy though it's high quality 3. Glossy surface catches fingerprints 4. Not as bright as newer models, though for $699 on black Friday this was a steal!

It's a nice monitor, don't get me wrong. The OLED ultrawide display is the cherry on top, but I've had issues with it from the start. I read online that to get G-Sync working, you need to use a DisplayPort cable, right? Since this monitor uses DisplayPort 1.4, I bought the appropriate cable. Unfortunately, I kept experiencing flickering and glitches on the screen, both while gaming and just doing regular desktop tasks. The flickering was incredibly distracting. A friend of mine later mentioned that DisplayPort 1.4 can be problematic, so I switched to HDMI 2.1. Instantly, the glitches, flickering, and stuttering disappeared. Thankfully, I can still enable G-Sync using HDMI 2.1. I’m not entirely sure why that works—it might be due to a recent firmware update—but I found conflicting advice online that insisted on using DisplayPort 1.4. My advice: skip it and go with HDMI 2.1 instead. Another important tip: look up the recommended settings for this monitor to avoid screen burn-in. As an OLED gaming monitor newbie, I didn’t do this, and my screen suffered burn-in within the first month. I highly recommend watching the YouTube video titled "Best Settings Guide for the MSI MAG 341CQP" by TFTCentral to get it right. Regarding refresh rate, I use 120 Hz with HDMI 2.1, but I’m sure the 144 Hz and 175 Hz options work just as well. Personally, I’m not too concerned about higher refresh rates, but the visual quality of this monitor is incredible, especially for graphically demanding AAA games. One more tip: don’t throw away the included cables. One is for firmware updates (which you don’t necessarily need to install), and the other is an HDMI cable. After owning this monitor for a year, I can say it’s not a bad product, but it has been a bit of a headache. Once I switched to HDMI 2.1, though, I had no more problems. In summary, it's a nice monitor, but to get the most out of it, you’ll need advice from fellow users. The issues I faced seem to affect only a small group of owners, and reliable solutions can be hard to find online.

Very nice monitor for the gaming!

I'm very pleased with this monitor so far, having had it for a week. Playing through the intro to Horizon: Forbidden West, in glorious HDR, is simply incredible. Even the HDR demos on youtube leave me with my jaw to the floor. What surprised me the most was all the things that reviews of QD-OLED monitors warn you about, and how those turned out to be nothing, at least for me. - HDR on at all times I'm using Windows 11, and a GPU that supports HDMI 2.1 (with a 2.1 certified cable). The internet says that HDR needs to be off for SDR (ie standard) content, but I am finding that is not the case at all. I have it on all the time, and everything looks perfect to me. The HDR effect is noticeable in most things, and as far as I can tell, the colour accuracy is also there (caveat: I'm no expert). I went through the Windows HDR Calibration app later, and it claims to have improved the highlights. I had no complaints before, so, yay. - Brightness I don't understand what people are talking about when they say that QD-OLED technology is not bright enough. I have mine set to True Black 400, and it's plenty bright. I find I'm reaching for the dark modes in apps even more aggressively than before, since a sudden white screen (eg a website, or Excel) is almost too much for me :). Tip: look for a Chrome extension that automatically turns most websites to dark mode. - Text clarity I had forgotten that this was even something I was supposed to worry about. It was days later that I remembered about it, and I went looking for it. I still cannot see the problem, at all. White text everywhere has a healthy white glow to it (compared to my old IPS monitor - I don't mean actual backlight bleed or anything), which ought to improve clarity if anything. - 1800R curve Having been used to 3400R for 9 years, I thought 1800R might be too much for me. That has not been the case at all, thankfully. I don't even notice the difference, most of the time. 1800R is very pleasing, and might even be the new sweet spot for me. - Reflections in a bright room / pink tint This just hasn't been an issue for me at all. If anything, the situation is better than my old monitor. However, I am usually in a dark room, and the monitor is facing away from the window. Plus, I have dark curtains. Other easily solvable issues: - 110 vs 240 volts (power input) I ordered the monitor from Amazon US, but I live in the UK. Luckily, I had no problems with the mains voltage difference. As stated in the manual, the monitor supports both kinds. I used a UK power cable from another monitor, and that was it. - The sockets at the back are placed too low, for some reason. I have the monitor on a flexible arm, and I need it to be almost at desk level (long story). That problem was easily solved with angled adaptors, like https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00T2TP7VM and https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BGJ96WHY. - I used to use VLC as a video player for most things. It seems the current public version has a bug with the rendering of the subtitles in HDR. I now recommend switching to MPC-BE. It seems better in a lot of ways, so far. Speaking of VLC or MPC-BE, they both play back my own HDR videos beautifully. Both those from my phone (with HDR on) and my camera (HLG mode). Even my photos from my phone look much more pleasing on this monitor. It's not all positives though. The risk of burn-in is still something to be taken seriously, by all accounts. My experience so far with MSI OLED Care 2.0, and Panel Protect specifically, has been mixed. On the one hand, I got the first popup after 4 hours, and I easily dismissed it with a click of the mouse (via the Gaming Intelligence app). For a few days, I didn't hear from it again, and I even wondered if it's working at all. Of course, even though I switch all my devices off at night, I make sure not to switch this monitor off at all. I can confirm via the monitor's built-in menu (not sure why the Intelligence app doesn't show this) that Panel Protect has been running, seemingly once a day. Great, I thought. However, I work from home, and sometimes that means the monitor is on for 8 hours for work, and 8 more for my own entertainment in the evening. That's 16 hours, which is the maximum you can go without running Panel Protect. Two nights in a row, it interrupted me during a film :(. That was NOT a great experience. It takes about 6-8 mins, and you can do nothing while it's running. If it ever happens in the middle of some multiplayer game, I'll be extremely annoyed! So, I have started building a habit of manually running it at the start of my lunch breaks, while I prepare food or whatever. That seems like a good compromise. I wish they had a setting to force the protection at 24 hours, or even 18. 16 is just at the limit for me, sadly. (EDIT: see below) Having said all that, I was thoroughly warned about the issues with burn-in, from all the online reviews, and I expected to face these problems. It is just a limitation of the technology, and we just need to accept it really. If this is the only problem I will ever face, I'll be very happy, considering the amazing picture quality I get. One related thing that worried me before I bought the monitor was all the Chrome tabs I tend to keep open, usually for months. I even have pinned tabs that are permanently there. Everything else was solvable, with things like hiding the Windows taskbar, switching to dark mode for everything, ensuring the screensaver is active, setting Windows to go to sleep after a bit, etc. There was no solution for the Chrome tabs though. In the end, I did some research, and found that Vivaldi (a Chrome-based browser, therefore easy to switch to it) supports customisation of its window. Some kind person on their forums wrote a script that will auto-hide the tab bar in Vivaldi, much like Windows can auto-hide its taskbar. Search for "AutoHide Tab Bar + Address Bar | Show on Hover". It's not perfect, and you have to keep reinstalling it every week, when Vivaldi updates itself, but it solves the problem. I don't know how the problem of burn-in will play out in the long term. I will try to remember to update this review, if I ever notice this problem (or any others). Meanwhile, I take comfort from people's burn-in experiments, eg on youtube. Another issue I noticed, which I was also warned about, is VRR flicker. At least I think that's what it is. I've not noticed it in games so far, only in Windows. I have the monitor set to 120 Hz for every day use, and I use the Windows 11 setting called Dynamic Refresh Rate (Settings > Display > Advanced display). With that, whenever Windows is idling, the refresh rate drops to 60 Hz, which is great in theory. However, with the slightest mouse movement or screen scrolling, the refresh rate instantly switches to 120 for a bit. I think that results in noticeably increased smoothness, but it also seems to cause this almost imperceptible flicker, sometimes. It's only really noticeable in dark or gray backgrounds. Once you notice it, it's hard to unsee, unfortunately. Well, there are easy solutions: stick with either 120 Hz at all times, or 60 Hz (and only switch up for games), or ignore it. I haven't decided yet. Hopefully it will be as easily solvable in games, if I ever experience it. Overall, I'm assigning 4 stars to this monitor, easily. I'm subtracting one mostly for the amount of effort I had to go through to solve the issue with the Chrome tabs. I'm glad there is a solution to that though, and I can now easily recommend this monitor to most people. UPDATE (4 months later): - There is now a firmware update that raises the forced OLED Care period to 24h, which is ideal I would say. Phew. I still have to worry about turning my PC off for just a bit, in case I'll come back to it 5 mins later and the monitor will have started the panel refresh thing in the middle of the day. Overall though, it is now something I just don't worry about anymore. It will never interrupt me again the middle of a film or game. Thanks for listening, MSI! - No signs of burn in so far. Not that I've gone looking, but it's hopefully way too early to worry about this. - I've had a stuck pixel, 3 weeks in... :( I decided to return the monitor and get a replacement, and so far, it hasn't happened again. Here's hoping it will stay that way. - I've switched to 60Hz permanently, while in Windows. No flickering this way. I have a script that I use to launch my games, which turns the refresh rate to 120Hz, and then automatically back to 60Hz after I exited the game. Problem solved. - I've switched to Peak 1000 mode, for now. I go back and forth on whether this is better and more accurate... On the one hand, HDR-aware apps that query the monitor's capabilities (eg MPC-BE), always seem to think that the monitor can do 1000 nits, and so they adjust their output accordingly, not knowing that the monitor is set to 400 nits (True Black 400). This results in over-bright highlights, ie lost detail. It was obvious with my camera's HLG videos. Peak 1000 solves this issue, and maybe it also improves things in games and films, not that I had noticed problems there. Unfortunately, Peak 1000 does not result in a consistent output... The monitor CONSTANTLY adjusts its output, presumably because it can't maintain true 1000 nits for very long (even if it's only advertised for 10% of the screen). This results in a very obvious "pulsing" of the overall brightness, which is fast enough to ruin the experience. This pulsing happened once as I was writing this update to my review, even though there was no obvious reason for it. Normally, you can tell it happens because of switching from a dark to a bright web page, for example, which I still find distracting. I miss the stability and consistency/uniformity of True Black 400... I may go back to it, and just try to remember to switch to Peak 1000 when I watch content or play games. If only there was a command line tool that could automate the switch... Man, first world problems are the worst ;)

Excellent monitor. Have used for a few months now and I'm very impressed. Love the size and the image quality

Very good and bright panel, as one would frankly expect from an OLED. Also it does have the VRR flickering issue that all oleds seem to have, as it’s innate to the technology. So do yr research which panel tech is best for your needs. Positive surprise is the feature rich menu of the panel and the software that can also setup the panel. E.g I didn’t expect Adobe RGB profile on a gaming monitor! Only downside I would mention is the oled care of MSI is a bit intrusive, and could be smarter (it cannot be programmed e.g to run every night). I never had this come up with my oled TV, but I suppose static pc content increases the risk of burn in. So hopefully it preserves the panel’s quality.l, in which case it’s a fair trade off against the amazing oled screen quality. Just be mindful of these drawbacks when going from IPS to OLED..

I didnt expect that i was supprise it the best upgrade for the price 3rd gen is great