Asus VG236H 3D Vision Monitor Review

A Close Look

First and foremost let's take a look at the VG236H itself. Given that most things are still incompatible with 3D technology and those that are still require an excellent display, this is by far the most important part of the package. Even if it's the one that requires the least explanation within todays review.

If you read my review of the Asus VW266H monitor a couple of weeks back will remember that the stand was quite a letdown on an otherwise good monitor. We have no such issues here as the stand provided with the VG236H is excellent. The base, which we'll see in a moment, has rotation built in. The stand has the, ahem, standard tilt control. But we also have height adjustment. This is unlocked by removing the pin you can see at the bottom of the stand on the photograph to the left. The height adjustment is very smooth indeed.

When it comes to inputs we have the major three you're likely to need. HDMI and DVI are almost a given in modern times, and we also have the image parts of the component input. As the VG236H doesn't have speakers there is no need for the left and right phono jacks.

Shiny! If there is one word that can describe the bezel and stand of the monitor it's shiny. All of it is covered in a piano black finish which is amazing to look at an a complete dust and fingerprint magnet. At the base of the stand we have a big 3D logo and around the outside quite a wordy little explanation of the monitor and its main selling point. It's strange to see because once you've spent your £400 on the monitor do you really need to be constantly reminded of what you've brought?

On the bottom right we have an identical button layout to that which we saw on the VW266H and so I wont reiterate it here. Suffice to say it's the stock Asus adjustments, On-Screen Display and Splendid modes available on all the Asus range.

If there is one huge flaw in the design, it's that the piano black effect has been continued onto the screen itself. It's amazingly shiny, like a black mirror. It's so bad I've had to manually darken the screen in this photo to save you the horrors of seeing your erstwhile reviewer in his shorts taking the photo. The screen itself is actually as reflective as the bezel.

On the rear we have a 100mm VESA mounting should you wish to use your own stand. Thankfully the quality of the supplied one is such that this is unlikely. It's great to finally see an ergonomic stand supplied with a monitor, although unfortunately as this is a £400 monitor it does back up my earlier comment that the main way you can tell the difference between a cheap and mid-range monitor is the quality of the stand. Although I do accept that the inclusion of the nVidia 3D Vision kit does increase the price beyond what we'd normally expect to pay for a TN panel.

Along with the monitor we have two substantial weighty tomes and two CDs. One provides the monitor drivers and the other is for the nVidia 3D part.

Before you blanch in horror at having such massive manuals for monitors, they cover just about every language on earth and between the two of them combined there are only 5 pages in English.