LG 38GL950G - 37.5" 3840x1600/G-Sync/175Hz

Got 38GL950G a week ago as an upgrade from 38UC99 for a good price. As long as I stretched this display with overclocking to 85 Hz and range VRR range editing to 42-85 to get LFC, it was time to move on as it was really not up to par anymore with a GPU like 4090, it is well north of 100 FPS in almost every game even with DLDSR/DSR/SSAA/SGSSAA. Funny to see a GPU outpacing a monitor for the first time in history, but it is a nice "problem" to have. I was hoping for some new 144 Hz+ 38"+ 5120x2160+ ultrawide at CES, but no dice.

I am generally satisfied; it retains like 90% of the quality of UC99 (has a bit more glow, UC99 was unusually good in that regard) while being massively faster and most importantly it doesn't have any VRR flicker, which is just a plague.

As for the G-sync fan, in its factory setup with an idiotic shroud with almost no air circulation possible it was audible and also stayed on for a long time after turning the monitor off. But since I needed to remove that stupid shroud anyway for my ambilight system because the wall behind the monitor is curved at the same rate as the monitor and that bulky shroud was ruining everything, I did that and now it is a lot better, basically inaudible even for someone as sensitive to noises as myself and it also now turns itself off together with the monitor immediately. I was taking into account that I may need to watercool it, but I am glad I don't have to, at least for now, because I kind of underestimated how little space there is for it.

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Thorstel said:
Got 38GL950G a week ago as an upgrade from 38UC99 for a good price. As long as I stretched this display with overclocking to 85 Hz and range VRR range editing to 42-85 to get LFC, it was time to move on as it was really not up to par anymore with a GPU like 4090, it is well north of 100 FPS in almost every game even with DLDSR/DSR/SSAA/SGSSAA. Funny to see a GPU outpacing a monitor for the first time in history, but it is a nice "problem" to have. I was hoping for some new 144 Hz+ 38"+ 5120x2160+ ultrawide at CES, but no dice.

I am generally satisfied; it retains like 90% of the quality of UC99 (has a bit more glow, UC99 was unusually good in that regard) while being massively faster and most importantly it doesn't have any VRR flicker, which is just a plague.

As for the G-sync fan, in its factory setup with an idiotic shroud with almost no air circulation possible it was audible and also stayed on for a long time after turning the monitor off. But since I needed to remove that stupid shroud anyway for my ambilight system because the wall behind the monitor is curved at the same rate as the monitor and that bulky shroud was ruining everything, I did that and now it is a lot better, basically inaudible even for someone as sensitive to noises as myself and it also now turns itself off together with the monitor immediately. I was taking into account that I may need to watercool it, but I am glad I don't have to, at least for now, because I kind of underestimated how little space there is for it.

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That lighting setup looks pretty fancy. I bet it really adds a lot of submersion when gaming and helps with perceived black levels. I just use the Sphere lighting 2.0 on my 38GN950 with the video sync feature and it's quite enjoyable.
 
Astral Abyss said:
That lighting setup looks pretty fancy. I bet it really adds a lot of submersion when gaming and helps with perceived black levels. I just use the Sphere lighting 2.0 on my 38GN950 with the video sync feature and it's quite enjoyable.
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It does, it makes the whole desk follow the ambience of what is on screen and also makes things a lot easier on the eyes, I got so used to it at this point that using the monitor without it feels weird.

The particular setup is a bit cumbersome with 25 10cm 3-LED stripes that need multiple devices to control them, but the advantage is that they can be individually placed and I have one device inside my case as well, so the lighting of whole PC is also following what is on screen. It is a very elegant way to do RGB lighting for the case.

Another problem used to be that the capturing of colors had around 5% performance hit and also when Microsoft started meddling with how fullscreen works, it was incompatible with VRR for a while starting from Win1809. Then someone made a custom NvFBC version and it still works, basically no performance hit and no issues.

Devices also have some USB dropout issues right after booting and sometimes hang and need a firmware flash. It is a bit work but it is worth it. Sadly they don't make them anymore, both Ambibox and Lightpack are cancelled. They are newer alternatives though, some are even using a camera for capture so you are not using any capturing on the PC itself.
 
Thorstel said:
Got 38GL950G a week ago as an upgrade from 38UC99 for a good price. As long as I stretched this display with overclocking to 85 Hz and range VRR range editing to 42-85 to get LFC, it was time to move on as it was really not up to par anymore with a GPU like 4090, it is well north of 100 FPS in almost every game even with DLDSR/DSR/SSAA/SGSSAA. Funny to see a GPU outpacing a monitor for the first time in history, but it is a nice "problem" to have. I was hoping for some new 144 Hz+ 38"+ 5120x2160+ ultrawide at CES, but no dice.

I am generally satisfied; it retains like 90% of the quality of UC99 (has a bit more glow, UC99 was unusually good in that regard) while being massively faster and most importantly it doesn't have any VRR flicker, which is just a plague.

As for the G-sync fan, in its factory setup with an idiotic shroud with almost no air circulation possible it was audible and also stayed on for a long time after turning the monitor off. But since I needed to remove that stupid shroud anyway for my ambilight system because the wall behind the monitor is curved at the same rate as the monitor and that bulky shroud was ruining everything, I did that and now it is a lot better, basically inaudible even for someone as sensitive to noises as myself and it also now turns itself off together with the monitor immediately. I was taking into account that I may need to watercool it, but I am glad I don't have to, at least for now, because I kind of underestimated how little space there is for it.

View attachment 541189
View attachment 541190
Click to expand...
Awesome! I feel foolish for not just removing the shroud from mine before going ahead and watercooling it! Maybe I should undo my waterblock and plumbing and try reinstalling the fan with the shroud removed...
 
Has anyone looked into having their 38GL firmware updated by an LG repair center since it seems LG (NVidia?) has prevented end-users from updating? Is there anything to be gained by an update?
 
It looks like the most recent firmware is 1.20, which is likely what your monitor is using. I can't figure out how to know what the firmware is being used because it doesn't list it in the OSD "information" section of the the monitor UI.

As an aside, a couple of things I've noticed with this monitor is that "deep sleep" is just that. It puts the monitor into dreamland and will not wake up for you. Avoid it. Also - I just figured out that to get 10 bit HDR, the monitor needs to be at 120Hz or less.
 
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