LG 29EA93 Monitor Review - Rev. 1.25
by Chris Heinonen on February 12, 2013 8:49 PM ESTAnyone that read my initial review knows I was disappointed with the performance of the LG 29EA93. I’m a big fan of the aspect ratio, but I wasn’t a fan of the performance numbers that I saw from it. Well, it seems that LG wasn’t a fan either and went back to fix it, returning with a display that puts out some of the best numbers that I have ever seen. There isn’t a single issue that I found that LG didn’t address in full and add into their QA workflow to prevent the same issues from happening again. It really feels like someone gave me a totally different monitor to review than before.
While I think LG probably would prefer that every product they put out be perfect, to me this was actually a good thing to have happen. I’ve reviewed many things that I’ve given poor reviews in my life, and this is the first time I’ve had a response like this. LG wasn’t content to have a bad review out there, or to have flaws in their product, and worked hard to address those issues. Seeing that commitment from a company said a bit more to me than seeing a company put out a good monitor does.
If I were reviewing the LG 29EA93 from scratch, I’d say it’s a fantastic monitor. It has incredible uniformity, the highest contrast ratio I’ve seen in a long, long time, and after calibration it’s almost totally flawless on all our tests. The CMS for video works fantastic, and watching 2.35:1 movies on it is a really nice visual treat. The lag response is very low and for gaming it will work well and offer a very nice field-of-view in games. It really is an incredibly well made, and unique, monitor in the marketplace today.
Because of my prior review I’m even more impressed. Coaxing this performance out of what I had before is a huge improvement, and I believe that because of this experience in improving their monitor quality, it will help LG to develop better monitors down the road. As it is, I can easily recommend people look at the 29EA93 if they get a chance. It offers fantastic performance that can compete with almost any display I have used to date, and really impressed me the second time around.
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davepermen - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
I would soooo buy that.Soda-88 - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
You should've make screenshot comparison between 1920x1080 and 2560x1080 in popular competitive games (SC2, CS, LoL, Dota2, etc.) to see if you gain or lose on the viewport.Soda-88 - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
made*DaFox - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
You should check out the WSGF.For example:
http://www.wsgf.org/dr/dota-2/en DOTA2 is Hor+ and supports AR's wider than 16:9 so you can see more.
SC2 is Hor+ up to 16:9 but clamped there.
CS:GO is Hor+ and supports AR's wider than 16:9.
LoL is Hor+ and supports AR's wider than 16:9.
cheinonen - Thursday, February 14, 2013 - link
I've added a couple screenshots to the Lag and Power Use page. If I can add more before returning it I will.taltamir - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
How do we differentiate the new awesome monitor from the old crummy one in the story if both have an identical name?cheinonen - Tuesday, February 12, 2013 - link
That I don't have info on. It never went on sale in the USA I believe, as they wanted the fixes to be done, but the new version started rolling out last month to places where it was already on sale.GiantPandaMan - Sunday, February 17, 2013 - link
I actually just saw it at Fry's for $699 just tonight. I'm guessing it was the new revision (the shipment was from last month) but $699 is a lot to gamble on. I was still horribly tempted to buy it, but was worried since I don't know how to differentiate between the new and the old revision. There's no one at LG you could bug for the information?cheinonen - Monday, February 18, 2013 - link
I talked to LG and have more information on this now. You can tell from the packaging if it is the new version or not, but I'll have to update the review with an image showing how today. However, if you buy one that isn't Revision 1.25, you can contact LG support and arrange to send it in to have the firmware upgraded as well.5150Joker - Saturday, March 23, 2013 - link
Contact them how? I tried contacting the US customer services branch and they have no idea about these firmware updates. Will you provide readers with such a contact?