Enlarge / AMD's depiction of a game playing without FreeSync (left) and with FreeSync (right). (credit: AMD )

AMD announced this week that it has ceased FreeSync certification for monitors or TVs whose maximum refresh rates are under 144 Hz. Previously, FreeSync monitors and TVs could have refresh rates as low as 60 Hz, allowing for screens with lower price tags and ones not targeted at serious gaming to carry the variable refresh-rate technology.

AMD also boosted the refresh-rate requirements for its higher AdaptiveSync tiers, FreeSync Premium and FreeSync Premium Pro, from 120 Hz to 200 Hz.

Here are the new minimum refresh-rate requirements for FreeSync, which haven't changed for laptops.

Enlarge / Dell's upcoming UltraSharp U4025QW. (credit: Scharon Harding)

Each year, the Consumer Electronics show brings a ton of new computer monitor announcements, and it's often difficult to figure out what's worth paying attention to. When it comes to the most interesting models this year, there were two noteworthy themes.

First of all, my complaint in 2022 about there not being enough OLED monitors was largely addressed this year. CES revealed many plans for OLED monitors in 2024, with a good number of those screens set to be appropriately sized for desktops. That includes the introduction of 32-inch, non-curved QD-OLED options and other smaller screens for people who have been waiting for OLED monitors in more varied form factors.

Secondly, with more people blending their work and home lives these days, CES brought hints that the line between gaming monitors and premium monitors used for general or even professional purposes will be blurring more in the future. We're not at the point where the best productivity monitor and ideal gaming monitor perfectly align in a single product. But this week's announcements have me imagining ways that future monitors could better serve users with serious work and play interests.

• 

  Asus plans to release this foldable OLED monitor in 2024. Electronics retailer Abt Electronics captured footage of it on display at CES. [credit: Abt Electronics/YouTube ]

Foldable screens have been bending their way into consumer gadgets over the last few years. But with skepticism about durability, pricing, image quality, and the necessity of such devices, foldable screens aren't mainstream. With those concerns in mind, I haven't had much interest in owning a foldable-screen gadget, even after using a foldable laptop for a month . However, the foldable portable monitor that Asus is showing at CES in Las Vegas this week is an application of foldable OLED that makes more sense to me than others .

Asus' ZenScreen Fold OLED MQ17QH announced on Tuesday is a 17.3-inch portable monitor that can fold to a 12.5-inch size. The monitor has 2560×1920 pixels for a pixel density of 184.97 pixels per inch. Other specs include a 100 percent DCI-P3 coverage claim and VESA DisplayHDR True Black 500 certification.

When I think of the ways I use portable monitors, foldability makes more sense than it does with other device types. For example, I love working outside when possible, and an extra 17.3-inch screen that's easy to carry would make long work sessions with an ultraportable laptop more feasible. The Fold OLED's 17.3 inches is near the larger size for a portable monitor, but the fold and comparatively light weight should make it feel more transportable than similarly sized monitors that don't fold in half.

Enlarge / None of this would be necessary if it weren't for your inferior eyes, which retain the colors of pixels for fractions of a second longer than is optimal for shooting dudes. (credit: Nvidia)

Gaming hardware has done a lot in the last decade to push a lot of pixels very quickly across screens. But one piece of hardware has always led to complications: the eyeball. Nvidia is targeting that last part of the visual quality chain with its newest G-Sync offering, Pulsar .

Motion blur, when it's not caused by slow LCD pixel transitions, is caused by "the persistence of an image on the retina, as our eyes track movement on-screen," as Nvidia explains it. Prior improvements in display tech, like variable rate refresh, Ultra Low Motion Blur , and Variable Overdrive have helped with the hardware causes of this deficiency. The eyes and their object permanence, however, can only be addressed by strobing a monitor's backlight.

You can't just set that light blinking, however. Variable strobing frequencies causes flicker, and timing the strobe to the monitor refresh rate—itself also tied to the graphics card output—was tricky. Nvidia says it has solved that issue with its G-Sync Pulsar tech, employing "a novel algorithm" in "synergizing" its variable refresh smoothing and monitor pulsing. The result is that pixels are transitioned from one color to another at a rate that reduces motion blur and pixel ghosting.

Enlarge (credit: Scharon Harding)

Burn-in is always possible with OLED displays, but for computer monitors, which tend to display static content (like icons and taskbars), the risk is even more concerning than with other OLED devices, like TVs.

Generally, OLED monitors are way better at fighting burn-in than before, thanks to improved OLED materials, compensation algorithms, brightness efficiencies, manually operable features, and heat management techniques.

At the same time, there's still much to learn about OLED monitor burn-in . Since OLED monitor selection only started significantly improving over the last couple of years, long-term usage is minimal. Further, new types of OLED monitor technologies, like QD-OLED , are still evolving.

Enlarge (credit: Aurich Lawson | Getty Images)

Until recently, OLED computer monitor selection was limited . Today, there's more than a handful available. LG Display and Samsung Display have made picking an OLED monitor exciting by designing competing models—white OLED (WOLED) and quantum dot OLED ( QD-OLED ), respectively—and monitor vendors are steadily addressing OLED scarcity and price barriers.

But what about longstanding fears of OLED burn-in?

People tend to display static images on computer monitors more frequently than on TVs—things like icons, taskbars, and browser address bars—making burn-in risk a concern.

Enlarge / The hood is detachable. (credit: Acer)

Acer is expanding its series of glasses-free 3D products with a new 4K monitor. The 27-inch monitor announced Thursday differs from Acer's previous 3D designs with its desktop size and introduction of Acer's headphones-free spatial audio feature.

Like other glasses-free products, Acer's SpatialLabs View Pro 27 uses a lenticular lens and eye-tracking with an infrared (IR) camera to present a 3D view to users, without the clunky 3D glasses associated with yesterday's abandoned 3D TVs. Acer claims its eye-tracking infrared camera has 1280×480 resolution and runs at 60 frames per second. Eye-tracking purportedly works with indoor lighting as low as 10 lux. Only one person can experience 3D at a time, though.

Acer hasn't specified how close you have to be to use the monitor's 3D functions yet but says it works with up to 11.8-inch (30cm) movements across the X-axis or up and down the Y-axis, as well as 19.7-106.3 inches (50 to 270cm) across the Z-axis (or up to 59.1 inches/150cm with low lighting).

• 

  Lenovo's depiction of the 3D effect on its ThinkVision 27 3D Monitor. [credit: Lenovo ]

Lenovo's next 27-inch 4K monitor is unlike any display it has released before. Featuring a lenticular lens and real-time eye-tracking, it's a 3D monitor that doesn't require any glasses. Other companies are already pushing stereoscopic products, but Lenovo's ThinkVision 27 3D Monitor, announced at the IFA conference today, takes the glasses-free experience to a bigger screen.

The technology behind Lenovo's 3D monitor and the accompanying software, 3D Explorer, are proprietary, a Lenovo spokesperson confirmed to Ars. 3D Explorer includes a 3D player and SDK for building 3D apps. Lenovo is targeting the monitor and app at content creators, like 3D graphic designers and developers.

Like other glasses-less 3D screens, the ThinkVision works by projecting two different images to each of your eyes, resulting in a 3D effect where, as PR images would have you believe, it appears that the images are popping out of the screen. Lenovo says the monitor's 3D resolution is 1920×2160. The lenticular lens in the monitor is switchable, allowing for normal, 2D viewing at 3840×2160, too.

Enlarge (credit: Dell )

Dell's Australia arm has been slapped with a $10 million AUD (about $6.49 million) fine for "making false and misleading representations on its website about discount prices for add-on computer monitors," the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) announced today. The Australian regulator said the company sold 5,300 monitors this way.

As Ars Technica previously reported, the ACCC launched litigation against Dell Australia in November. In June, the Australian Federal Court declared that Dell Australia made shoppers believe monitors would be cheaper if bought as an add-on item.

Here's how the "misleading representations" worked. Shoppers of Dell Australia's website who were buying a computer would see an offer for a Dell display with a lower price next to a higher price with a strikethrough line. That suggested to shoppers that the price they'd pay for the monitor if they added it to their cart now would be lower than the monitor's usual cost. But it turns out the strikethrough prices weren't the typical costs. Sometimes, the lower price was actually higher than what Dell Australia typically charged.