Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx Monitor Review

The Acer Nitro XV252K has a rather simple aesthetic with an all-black plastic body and a plain back that has a strip of RGB backlighting.

The build quality is great. There aren't any obvious issues, and it's mainly made of plastic that feels well-built with minimal bending. Only the base of the stand is metal, and adjusting the screen on the stand feels stable. There isn't any noticeable fan noise, but you can hear some very minor noise if you put your ear right up to the monitor.

This monitor has outstanding ergonomics, as you can easily adjust it. As the VESA mounting size is 75x75, it's too small to use with a 100x100 mounting arm. Lastly, the stand features a clip for cable management.

The tripod stand takes up some space, but some units of this model are sold with a square-based stand, depending on the retailer.

The monitor has five buttons to control the on-screen display, but they aren't user-friendly. They feel stiff, and they even leave an imprint on your fingers. The OSD is also difficult to use, as settings with numbered adjustments take time to change, and some settings, like its RGB lighting, even reset to their default when changing other settings. While this isn't an issue if you don't change settings much, it's a downside if you like to change settings often.

• DisplayPort cable
• HDMI cable
• USB-B to USB-A cable
• USB-C cable
• Power cable and supply
• User guides

The contrast ratio of the Acer XV275K is acceptable. It has a low native contrast ratio without local dimming on. However, its full-array local dimming feature helps it display deep blacks with most content, but it doesn't improve the contrast with the checkerboard test pattern. Interestingly, setting Adaptive Dimming to 'Fast' results in a lower contrast with the checkerboard pattern than setting it to 'Low,' which has a contrast of 2,625:1.

The picture above has a warm color temperature, but this is due to an interaction between the camera and the display, similar to the Acer ‎Predator X32 Fpbmiiiiphuzx. This isn't visible in person, though.

The full-array Mini LED local dimming feature has 576 dimming zones and performs decently. Setting Adaptive Dimming to 'Fast' results in the best performance out of the three settings, as it helps it display deep blacks. There isn't too much blooming either, but it doesn't completely eliminate it as there's a bit around bright objects, like subtitles, and the blooming looks worse from the sides than from in front. If you want something with a bit less blooming, though, then consider the AOC Q27G3XMN.

As for the Acer, it keeps details well in dark scenes as there's minimal black crush because the 'Fast' setting spreads light across zones at the expense of the contrast. Besides that, the algorithm keeps up with fast-moving objects well. One downside is that when viewing from the sides there's noticeable flicker with fast-moving objects, but you don't see this when viewing from directly in front. Essentially, the local dimming looks best when sitting right in front, and not from the sides.

Settings

• Color Mode: User (after calibration)
• Brightness: 100 (max)
• Max Brightness: On
• Adaptive Dimming: Fast

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx monitor has excellent SDR brightness. It easily gets bright enough to fight glare and maintains its brightness well across different content. The screen actually gets brighter in the Real Scene test with Adaptive Dimming off as it goes up to 605 cd/m², but the overall picture quality is worse with it off due to its lower contrast.

Unfortunately, the minimum brightness is too high if you're sensitive to bright lights and want to use it in a dark room. This result is with Max Brightness on and Adaptive Dimming on 'Low,' as it gets brighter with any other combination of settings, even with Max Brightness and Adaptive Dimming off.

Settings

• Color Space: HDR
• Brightness: 100 (locked to max)
• Max Brightness: On
• Adaptive Dimming: Fast

The HDR brightness is fantastic. It easily gets bright enough to make highlights stand out and pop, but small highlights are muted. The PQ EOTF tracking is decent, but dark scenes are slightly too dark, resulting in some black crush. That said, because there's a sharp roll-off at the peak brightness, it lets highlights get the brightest they can.

Like in SDR, the Real Scene test gets brighter with local dimming off, but the picture quality is best with it on 'Fast,' and the EOTF is the same between any of the local dimming settings.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3 has a decent horizontal viewing angle. While the image washes out from wide angles, it's still good enough to share the monitor with someone sitting next to you.

The vertical viewing angle is good. The image remains consistent if you're standing up and looking down at the monitor.

The gray uniformity is good. While the edges of the screen are slightly darker, there's minimal dirty screen effect in the center, which is great.

The picture above has a warm color temperature, but this is due to an interaction between the camera and the display, similar to the Acer ‎Predator X32 Fpbmiiiiphuzx. This isn't visible in person, though.

The black uniformity is decent, and it performs best with local dimming enabled. It maintains a consistent black level across the screen, and disabling local dimming results in more clouding and backlight bleed.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx monitor has incredible accuracy before calibration in the sRGB Color Space mode. It locks colors well to the sRGB color space, and colors and the white balance have minimal inaccuracies. The color temperature is also close to the 6500K target, and gamma follows the sRGB curve well, but some dark scenes are off. Setting Color Space to 'sRGB' locks some picture settings, which you can see below, but using another picture results in more oversaturated colors.

Locked-out Settings

• Contrast
• Black Boost
• Low Blue Light
• ACM
• Gamma
• Color Temp.
• Grayscale Mode
• 6-axis Hue
• 6-axis Saturate

The accuracy after calibration is remarkable. There aren't any obvious inaccuracies, and the main advantage of calibrating it is that you get access to the settings that are locked out in the sRGB mode.

The SDR color gamut is fantastic. It has perfect coverage of the commonly used sRGB color space, but it oversaturates colors in the wider Adobe RGB color space used in content creation.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx monitor has a fantastic HDR color gamut. It displays a wide range of colors in both the DCI-P3 and Rec. 2020 color spaces, and there are minimal tone mapping issues, except for white.

The HDR color volume is amazing. It displays bright and dark colors well, but it's limited by its incomplete color gamut.

The text clarity is fantastic, thanks to its high pixel density. Enabling Windows ClearType (top photo) helps improve the text clarity with bolder lines. These photos are in Windows 10, and you can also see it in Windows 11 with ClearType on and with ClearType off.

The Acer XV275K has good reflection handling. While it struggles with strong light sources directly on it, it easily gets bright enough to fight intense glare.

The pictures above have a warm color temperature, but this is due to an interaction between the camera and the display, similar to the Acer ‎Predator X32 Fpbmiiiiphuzx. This isn't visible in person, though.

The gradient handling is outstanding, and you won't notice any issues with banding in scenes with shades of similar colors, like a sunset.

The picture above has a warm color temperature, but this is due to an interaction between the camera and the display, similar to the Acer ‎Predator X32 Fpbmiiiiphuzx. This isn't visible in person, though.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx is overclockable to 160Hz if you set Max Refresh Rate in the OSD to '160Hz,' but it only works with DisplayPort connections. However, your graphics card needs to use DSC to reach the max refresh rate over DisplayPort, and there's a DSC setting on the monitor to disable it. That said, even when we disabled it, the refresh rate was still 160Hz with 8-bit and 10-bit signals over DisplayPort.

On top of supporting FreeSync and G-SYNC compatibility, it also supports HDMI Forum VRR. While VRR works well and reduces screen tearing, there's one bug when it's part of a multi-monitor setup. With VRR enabled at a high refresh rate on the Acer monitor and a secondary monitor that's also using VRR at a low refresh rate, there are some handshaking issues that cause a black screen. This can be problematic if you have a secondary monitor while you're gaming on this monitor; otherwise, if you just have the monitor on its own, it isn't an issue.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx has good motion handling across its refresh rate range with VRR enabled. Although enabling VRR locks you out of changing any Over Drive settings, it just uses the last selected one, and you can only change it by disabling VRR. Turning the setting off produces the best results across the entire refresh rate range, and while 'Normal' performs similarly, it's worse at lower refresh rates. 'Extreme' has such a high CAD at low refresh rates that it extends past the limit of the chart, which you can see in an alternative chart.

The refresh rate compliance is good. Its response time isn't fast enough to make full color transitions before the monitor draws the next frame, but it's still good enough for most games.

The CAD at the max refresh rate is great. The 'Normal' Over Drive setting has a faster response time than 'Off,' leading to sharper motion, and it has a lot less inverse ghosting than 'Extreme.'

The CAD at 120Hz is great. Like at its max refresh rate, the recommended Over Drive setting is 'Normal,' but it has a bit more inverse ghosting than 'Off,' so it's better to turn the setting off if that bothers you.

The CAD at 60Hz is good. Unlike at higher refresh rates, the 'Off' Over Drive setting produces the best motion as it has less inverse ghosting than 'Normal' and 'Extreme.' This means you may need to change the setting if you change games to a lower frame rate.

The Acer Nitro XV275K P3biipruzx monitor has no optional backlight strobing feature to reduce persistence blur.

This monitor has minimal VRR flicker in most content, and it isn't distracting at all.

This monitor's backlight uses pulse width modulation (PWM) at all brightness levels, but it's at such a high frequency that most people won't notice it.

The Acer Nitro XV275K has low input lag for a responsive feel at high refresh rates. However, the input lag increases significantly at 60Hz, which is problematic for playing reaction-based games. This only happens if the monitor receives a 60Hz signal, and not if you start at a higher refresh rate and use VRR as the refresh rate drops to 60Hz. You can also set the refresh rate to 120Hz in the Xbox Series X|S to avoid the increased input lag.

The Acer XV275K P3 works well with the Xbox Series X|S, as it supports anything up to 4k @ 120Hz. Like other monitors, you need to enable the HDMI override setting in the console for 1440p @ 60Hz to work, which disables VRR. The Xbox doesn't support HDR with 1080p or 1440p signals, so this isn't an issue with the monitor.

With the USB-C port, you can connect your laptop and charge it simultaneously, as the 90W of power delivery is high enough to charge most laptops.

This monitor works well with macOS. If you're using a MacBook and close the lid, windows return to their original position when opening it again.

The Acer Nitro XV275K has a few extra features, including:

• Aim Point: Displays a virtual crosshair that your game's anti-cheating tool won't detect, giving you a competitive advantage.
• Black Boost: Adjusts gamma so that it's easier to see opponents better in games.
• Low Blue Light: Reduces the blue light to help reduce eye strain.
• Max Brightness: Makes the screen the brightest possible, and disabling it reduces the ABL.
• Refresh Rate Number: Displays the current refresh rate of the display.

While there's a USB Port Select setting to change which USB upstream port you want to use, either USB-B or USB-C, this isn't the same as a KVM switch as it doesn't automatically change when you switch inputs. You need to manually change it every time you switch inputs.

As explained in the Controls section, the OSD isn't user-friendly, and it takes time to switch settings with slider toggles, like Brightness and Contrast, especially if you need to go from the minimum to the maximum.

You can see more OSD pictures by downloading this zip file.