Product Review: The Massive INNOCN 40C1R May Be One of the Best Bang for Your Buck, MASSIVE, Ultrawide Gaming Monitors!
This monitor was tested thoroughly as well as used PERSONALLY everyday to complete this full in-depth review. Here is what I found after this process...
Pros:
40 Inch Screen Size
144Hz Refresh Rate
95% of DCI-P3 Color Gamut
Great Stand & Build Quality
Very Inexpensive!
Cons:
Slightly More Ghosting than Other IPS Panels
Weird Power Cable & Ports Placement
Bad Menu System
Size, Resolution, & Panel Type
The first thing you'll experience is that this is a massive screen size at a whopping 40 inches in a 21:9 ultrawide aspect ratio, and it is glorious! However, even at this monstrous screen size the resolution is 3440 by 1440p which is ultrawide 1440p.
This means the PPI or pixels per inch, how crisp and clear the image, game, or text is going to appear on screen, comes in at about 93 pixels per inch. This PPI is almost the same as a 1080p 24 inch monitor.
Now with the PPI of about 93 the image is pretty clear, however, if you’re used to high pixel density panels this does have noticeable pixilation with small text. This doesn't bother me in most games, mainly due to the amazing gaming experience which I honestly wasn't expecting.
Now for the 40C1R's panel type, this uses an IPS ADS panel which is essentially a modified IPS panel. ADS or originally named, Advanced Super Dimension Switch, is technology that allows for a more rigid panel, slightly higher contrast ratio, and more backlight to penetrate. I personally believe they used this to bring down manufacturing cost but still stay competitive with specs (Brightness), although that is just my guess.
Now initially I wasn’t too excited about this monitor for one reason, and that is no curve. I’ve used flat 34 inch ultrawides before and they are enjoyable to use but not as immserive as curved 34 inch ultrawides. This one being so big and flat made me feel unexcited, however, I was very wrong about this. Immersion in game is incredible, this is due to the sheer size of the panel, a lot of the monitor is in your peripheral while gaming making this incredibly immersive, and quite addicting to game on.
Refresh Rate & Variable Refresh Rate
The 40C1R's refresh rate hits 144Hz. For variable refresh rate this Innocn panel has Freesync Premium. As For G-sync, this isn't a g-sync or Nvidia certified compatible monitor, but it does work well with G-Sync. During the immense amount of gaming and testing with this panel I didn’t experience any noticeable screen tearing which is to be expected.
Brightness & HDR
The brightness is where it gets weird... This is advertised with HDR400 meaning a 400 nit peak brightness, but then it claims to have 500 nits of brightness.
Now this is a small/newer company so it may just be a typo, if so, I’m assuming they meant 400 nits. Initially after unboxing this, this hit about 300 nits of brightness, which isn’t bad, but isn't amazing either. However, after going into Picture settings, then navigating to contextual mode, then setting it to movie, it increased the SDR brightness considerably. After doing this I was able to get this up to 355 nits which is good, this is a much brighter panel than I originally thought from the unboxing which is a very good thing.
For HDR...well...its just bad. There is nothing more I need to say for this, if you want a really good HDR experience, this isn’t it.
Nevertheless the overall brightness and vibrancy is good and it's very pretty to game on. However, it really bugs me that turning the brightness to 100 percent is not actually turning to 100 percent.
Colors & ACCURACY
Colors of the INNOCN 40C1R are actually pretty dang good, which was surprising to me. Firstly, this comes pre-calibrated from the factory making the out-of-the-box accuracy very good! That is a huge pro if you’re a creator or need color accuracy for your job. That being said, the lower PPI doesn’t really make sense for creatives, so including a calibration doesn't make sense to me, unless you don’t need a ton of resolution. To be fair, if you’re not used to super high resolution, you could definitely lightly edit on this.
Now this covers 95% of the DCI-P3 color gamut which is actually very very impressive for the price. And not only that but this can output 10 bits of color at full 144Hz which is awesome!
Contrast Ratio & Backlight Bleed
The contrast ratio is slightly better than non ADS IPS panels at 1200:1 compared to typical 1000:1 of most IPS panels. However, to the eye this will only be a 5% to 6% difference. Is this noticeably different? No. Unless you have this right next to a typical IPS panel you won’t notice a difference.
As for backlight bleed, my unit had none which is awesome!
Response Time, Ghosting, & Input Lag
The Innocn 40C1R's response time is slower than you’d expect for most gaming monitors, causing more ghosting than normal. But don’t run for the hills just yet, there is good news!
Firstly there is ghosting, but not that much. For an IPS panel there is a bit, but compared to almost every gaming VA panel out there this is really very little ghosting.
I reviewed this right after a crystal clear monitor, and it was noticeable to me in game. However, this little amount of ghosting won’t be noticeable for 95% of you. Oh and also, the response time settings basically change nothing, so this isn’t tuned that well.
However, more importantly, input lag! This was something I honestly expected to be bad, seeing as this brand isn’t proven yet. However, this has surprisingly low input lag! Gaming on this is very, very fluid and feels quite quick. This is MASSIVE for me.
Menu System & Controls
The menu system is bad. It is the single worst menu system I have ever used. It uses four buttons to navigate. It does have a dedicated power button which is the only good thing, although it makes you click it twice to turn it off, annoying.
The system itself is bad. Its not intuitive, the menus sometimes make no sense, things are labeled "on" or "off" when they should just be selected. Such as: picture profiles are "on" and "off", but only one of these can be on at the same time. It’s also ugly and hard to figure out. Its bad...but it shouldn’t be the reason not to get this.
Vesa Compatibility
Vesa compatibility is good being compatible with 100mm by 100mm Vesa mounts. That being said, you better get a strong mount because this thing is HEAVY!
Internal Speakers
Internal speakers on this are actually pretty good! They don’t get super loud, but they get reasonably loud and are good for YouTube tutorials or things such as that. They are muffled, but overall not bad for monitor speakers.
Connectivity & Ports
Ports include: two HDMI 1.4, one DisplayPort 1.4, one USB Type-C, and a 3.5mm audio out.
Now the HDMI's can go up to 100Hz at full resolution, but the USB Type-C has a whopping 90 Watts of charging, but the USB Type-C maxes out at 60Hz at full resolution. Very good overall, USB Type-C was a nice touch!
Stand & Build Quality
The Innocn 40C1R's stand and build quality is a mixed bag here.
The stand itself feels very good, it has similar quality as Dell or LG or any of the name brands, and the base even feels nicer, being constructed completely of metal! The monitor itself continues this looking and feeling very refined!
This refinement stops, although, at the absolutely ridiculous placement for the power and ports. They are all the way on the right and left side and separated. Now pair this with the cable-management hole in the stand, the cables dip down and are very hard to cable manage out of sight. See the picture shown to see how I cable managed mine.
For functionality, the height feels good, as good as name brands. Having said that the swivel and tilt feel plasticy and cheap. The tilt doesn’t even stay all the way tilted on my unit.
Overall functionality is good, but doesn’t feel premium.
Price & Value
Here is where this shines, for the price this monitor retails for it makes this, well, how do I say this, COMPETITIVE AS HELL! Yes this lacks is some areas but at this price point what the heck. The value at this point is pretty much unmatched.
Now I want to stress this isn’t the best monitor for everyone. But if you want a giant ultrawide with good colors and an awesome gaming experience, don’t care about a curve or high PPI, this could be a really really good option and a fantastic value.
Overall Verdict
So overall do I recommend the INNOCN 40C1R? Well if you want a huge screen, great colors, insane gaming experience, and a ton of bang for your buck, yes I absolutely recommend this!