Technical Specifications

In the world of 4K displays, Philips offers up the most color accurate panel but also the one with the most latency.

Since the introduction of the first low cost 4K TVs in the form of the SEIKI SE50UY04, and then into the wild world of MST 4K monitors from ASUS and others, and finally with the release of single stream low cost 4K panels, PC Perspective has been covering the monitor resolution revolution heavily. Just look at these reviews:

Today we bring in another vendor's 4K consumer monitor and put it to the test, pitting against the formidable options from ASUS, Samsung, Acer and others. The Philips 288P6LJEB 4K 60 Hz monitor closely mirrors many of the specifications and qualities of other low-cost 4K panels, but with a couple of twits that help it stand out.

The Philips display is a 28-in class TN panel, has a 60 Hz refresh rate when utilizing the DisplayPort 1.2 connection option but adds connection capability that most other 4K panels in this price range leave off. Here are the specs from Philips:

LCD panel type
TFT-LCD
Backlight type
W-LED system
Panel Size
28 inch / 71.1 cm
Effective viewing area
620.93 (H) x 341.28 (V)
Aspect ratio
16:9
Optimum resolution
3840 x 2160 @ 60Hz
Response time (typical)
5  ms
SmartResponse (typical)
1 ms (Gray to Gray)
Brightness
300  cd/m²
Contrast ratio (typical)
1,000:1
SmartContrast
50,000,000 :1
Pixel pitch
0.16 x 0.16 mm
Viewing angle

170º (H) / 160º (V)

@ C/R > 10

Picture enhancement
SmartImage
Display colors
Color support 1.07 billion colors
Scanning Frequency
30 – 83 kHz (H) / 56 – 76 Hz (V), Analog: 50 ~ 80Hz (V), Digital: 23 ~ 80Hz (V)
MHL
1080P @ 60Hz
sRGB
Yes
USB

USB 2.0 x 2

USB 3.0 x 2 + faster charger

Signal Input

VGA (Analog )

DVI-Dual Link (digital, HDCP)

DisplayPort 1.2

MHL-HDMI (digital, HDCP)

Sync Input

Separate Sync

Sync on Green

Audio (In/Out)

PC audio-in

Headphone out

This should mostly look familiar to anyone that has read up on the Acer or Samsung 4K 60 Hz SST panels currently for sale on the market. The size, resolution, response times, viewing angles – they are all basically the same and it seems pretty likely that all of these monitors are in fact using the exact same panel in their builds. Where the Philips 288P6LJEB differs in the connectivity section of the above tables.

The ASUS PB287Q has USB hub support but only the Philips monitor allows you to connect older connection types like VGA and DVI should you happen to want to run the monitor on a system not capable of 4K on DisplayPort. That's a welcome change from the DP + HDMI only configurations available on other monitors but it might also be the reason for a significant latency issue we found during our testing. (More on that on the third page).

Another area where the Philips 288P6LJEB excels is in the out of box color accuracy. Each and every monitor will ship with a Color Uniformity Data Sheet showing the measurement conditions and results. Of course that doesn't guarantee that the color will be completely accurate, but it shows Philips is willing to put the time into an additional step like this to improve the experience for users that might not have the ability to do accurate color calibration on their own.

Our Spyder4Elite calibration step didn't find anything to change about the 288P6LJEB we tested and it maintained a solid 96% sRGB color space. For professional users that would like to have accurate color reproduction out of the box without the need for external hardware like the Spyder, the Philips Brilliance 4K panel is the best we have seen.

Viewing angles on the Philips 288P6LJEB are, once again, very impressive for a TN monitor. Straight on view is solid with great color (as mentioned above) and movements to the left and right result in very little color shift so you shouldn't worry about quality differences as you slide around your work area (or bounce around while gaming).

The view from the top is slightly washed out but that occurs only at pretty extreme angles.

From the left and right of the panel you'll see some slight color inversion at the extremes, but overall it's an impressive result for a TN panel. Just as I said with the ASUS PB287Q, the Samsung U28D590D and the Acer XB280HK, the Philips 288P6LJEB has changed our view of the potential quality of TN panels.

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