Gaming and everyday usage
LG markets the 34UM67 as a monitor built for gamers and it certainly has decent credentials for it with customised OSD profiles for different game genres, an ultrawide resolution for increased field-of-view and a 75Hz refresh rate. The real headlining feature, though, is naturally the AMD FreeSync support.
The first aspect that becomes apparent is that the FreeSync-supported range of 48-75Hz is quite small, indeed one of the smallest among the first wave of FreeSync monitors. In practice this means not all games will fall inside the FreeSync range. Our testing entailed the use of the AMD R9 290 which cruises through the majority of games above the 75fps mark. Battlefield 4, Bioshock Infinite, Dirt 3, Grid Autosport and Tomb Raider all hit the V-Sync limitation or went well beyond, if V-Sync was turned off. By contrast game titles like Crysis 3 and Metro Last Light struggle to creep into the entry-level range of 48fps or higher. It is possible to tweak these titles to run within the allotted range by turning down some of the filtering options.
The Experience
The experience with FreeSync is an overwhelmingly positive one - when the frame-rate resides in the supported range gameplay is silky-smooth. The dynamic synchronisation greatly improves the fluidity of motion-intensive games such as racing and flight simulators; combine that with the extra field of view from the ultrawide panel and it's a very immersive gaming experience.
Outside the FreeSync range the experience is going to depend on whether the user selects V-Sync and what type of graphics hardware is being used. On LG's 34UM67 model being outside that range happens quite frequently so the user is left to jostle between the pros and cons of V-Sync. A wider range of, say, 30-90Hz would provide a much more all-encompassing range for the majority of game titles.
It's worth paying attention to the fact that stuttering associated with V-Sync primarily comes from when the frame-rate drops below the V-Sync maximum. In the case of FreeSync when the frame-rate drops below the maximum of 75Hz it generally falls into the FreeSync-supported range of 48-75Hz, avoiding the stuttering, thus the experience is generally very good with FreeSync and V-Sync both enabled. We were unable to find a game that would fluctuate, regularly, between the 75Hz upper limit and a value sub-48Hz.
Gaming aside, the LG 34UM67 is a stunning monitor to use in everyday applications - the benchmark numbers do not do justice to the vibrancy of the panel's colours. Furthermore, the viewing angles of the IPS panel are strong and the viewing experience is aided by the anti-glare finish LG applies to the panel. The lack of native 21:9 content can be a little disappointing for media consumption, although the monitor more than makes up for it with the extra width that allows for easy multi-tasking. Users running Windows 8.x can make use of the application-snapping feature to easily align two applications side by side.
Pixel density is where some users may find the LG monitor falls down. The 34UM67 is roughly similar to 24.6in screen in height except with additional width, therefore the PPI is similar to a 24.6in 1080p display. The density can't quite match equivalently priced QHD offerings, though much of the expense with the 34UM67 is derived from the uniqueness of the 21:9 panel. The LG 34UM67 does have a trick up its sleeve with a picture-by-picture mode that allows users to run a pair of independent 1,280x1,080 displays.
