Samsung first introduced the Odyssey OLED G8 at IFA 2022 in August, and it’s the first of the company’s gaming monitors to come with a quantum dot OLED (QD-OLED) display. Starting today, you can preorder the 34-inch display for $1,499 on Samsung’s website and select retailers.
Samsung’s first OLED gaming monitor costs $1,499.99
Preorders are now open for the 34-inch monitor that has a streaming hub built in to play games without a PC or console directly attached.
Preorders are now open for the 34-inch monitor that has a streaming hub built in to play games without a PC or console directly attached.
Image: Samsung
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This should offer some improvement when it comes to color saturation and brightness, as we’ve already seen from Alienware’s similarly specced QD-OLED gaming monitor from 2021.
Image: Samsung
Like the Alienware monitor, this Samsung display features a slight 1800R curve, 3440 x 1440 resolution, and a speedy 175Hz refresh rate. The monitor also supports the same True Black 400 spec that’s supposed to deliver up to 400 nits of peak brightness. But as my former colleague Cameron Faulkner points out, TV reviewer HDTVTest found that Alienware’s monitor is only capable of reaching around 280 nits when showing an all-white screen, so it’s possible that the Odyssey OLED G8 could face a similar issue.
While these specs alone sound fairly impressive, the other standout ability is that it gives you a way to play games without a console or PC attached. That’s because it comes with Samsung’s Gaming Hub, a nifty portal where you can access cloud gaming services directly from the monitor, including Nvidia’s GeForce Now and Xbox Game Pass. You can also use the hub to stream content on Netflix, YouTube TV, and more.
Other nice-to-haves include an integrated SmartThings app that lets you monitor and control connected IoT devices as well as support for Mini DisplayPort, HDMI, and USB-C. It also has a Core Lighting Plus system on the rear of the monitor, which lights up the wall behind the device with colors that match what’s on the screen.
But if this 34-inch display just isn’t big enough for your liking, you’re in luck. Samsung’s readying an OLED-equipped update to its 49-inch Odyssey G9 gaming monitor and says it should arrive “later this year.”
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