In October, HP used Microsoft to reveal the HP Envy 27 desktop monitor as part of its fall lineup. It was slated to arrive on December 4 with a starting price of $500 packing a 4K resolution and support for AMD’s FreeSync technology. It’s now listed on HP’s website to purchase directly from the company with an optional six-month payment plan for qualifying customers.
Here are the specs:
| Screen size: | 27 inches |
| Panel technology: | IPS |
| Native resolution: | 3,840 x 2,160 @ 60Hz |
| Contrast ratio (static): | 1,300:1 |
| Contrast ratio (dynamic): | 10,000,000:1 |
| Brightness: | 350 nits |
| Pixel pitch: | 0.1554 millimeters |
| Response time: | 14 milliseconds |
| Aspect ratio: | 16:9 |
| Color gamut: | 99 percent sRGB |
| Ports: | 1x HDMI 1.4 1x HDMI 2.0 1x DisplayPort 1.2 1x USB Type-C (up to 60 watts) |
For starters, the display is based on In-Plane Switching technology (IPS), a newer panel tech that offers brilliant colors and wide viewing angles. By comparison, the older Twisted Nematic (TN) technology has been around for a long while, and is best known for its brightness levels and fast response times. That leads us to the new panel’s 14ms response time, which is surprisingly slow compared to most other models on the market. This is the time it takes a pixel to go from white to black and back to white again.
The FreeSync aspect means it’s great for PCs packing an AMD Radeon graphics chip. To better understand what it’s for, consider that the video output of a graphics card generates a number of frames per second (FPS). Likewise, the display flashes a number of frames per second as well (refresh rate). With FreeSync technology, the output of the Radeon graphics card is synchronized with the refresh rate of the display so that when framerates drop or rise, the display’s rate drops and rises too. That provides a smooth viewing experience, eliminating screen tearing and stuttering.
As the specs show, HP’s new panel provides a USB Type-C port for generating up to 60 watts of power to a PC or mobile device. Other notable features include a micro-edge design to provide more screen and less bezel, and support for millions of colors to present crisp, brilliant images in a 4K resolution. The panel doesn’t appear to be served up with any HP-specific features such as what we see crammed into other brands, providing a simple plug-and-play solution. However, it does come with a disc packing drivers.
Here is what comes in the box:
- 1x power cable
- 1x HDMI cable
- 1x DisplayPort cable
- 1x USB Type-C cable
- VESA mount adapter
