What you need to know
- HP makes a variety of gaming laptops, desktops, and monitors under its OMEN branding.
- It reserves the 'Transcend' sub-brand for its more premium, products, including a brand-new monitor.
- Part of a growing wave of high-end OLED gaming monitors, the HP OMEN Transcend 32 is a 32-inch OLED monitor with a 240Hz refresh rate, 4K resolution, and 0.03ms response time.
- The HP OMEN Transcend will undoubtedly cost a pretty penny considering its specs, but availability and pricing has yet to be confirmed.
Practically every major PC manufacturer dabbles in gaming, with one of the most prominent examples being HP. The HP OMEN brand is still on the small side compared to other companies, but HP has been expanding it with new products targeting different price ranges. At the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, the company revealed what's next for OMEN.
During this year's CES, the HP OMEN Transcend 32 revealed its stunning face to the world for the first time. As the name suggests, this is a sizeable 32-inch gaming monitor, but it's also by far the most advanced gaming monitor HP has ever produced. It's premium all the way through, with a seriously impressive spec sheet that will undoubtedly water the mouths of a lot of PC gamers.
More numbers than you can count
HP's latest range of OMEN gaming monitors were genuinely fantastic mid-range options, including the incredible HP OMEN 27qs, but none of those displays are in the same league as the OMEN Transcend 32. For one, this is an OLED display, joining a rapidly growing trend in computing with vibrant colors, perfect blacks, infinite contrast, and ridiculously low response times. In many ways, however, this monitor is even more impressive than the ultra-premium ASUS ROG Swift OLED 27 (PG27AQDM) I reviewed.
It's a larger 31.5-inch monitor, and boasts an impressive 4K UHD (3840 x 2160) resolution paired with a blazingly fast 240Hz refresh rate. That's a combination that's only just now starting to become possible thanks to new display tech, as the highly-desirable 240Hz refresh rate was previously limited to 1440p (and usually 27-inches). You also get a 0.03ms response time courtesy of OLED technology and a peak brightness of 1,000 nits (with HDR content across up to 3% of the display).
What else can it do? You get Dolby Vision and VESA DisplayHDR True Black 400 for consuming HDR content, factory calibrated color accuracy rated for 100% and 99% of the sRGB and DCI-P3 color gamuts, respectively, and AMD FreeSync Premium Pro for variable refresh rate support. This is also a Quantum Dot OLED panel, which should translate to even more vibrant colors. It joins the just-announced HP OMEN Transcend 14 gaming laptop and HP Spectre x360 14 2-in-1 with that beautiful OLED technology.
The display on the OMEN Transcend 32 is undeniably impressive, but the rest of the monitor has to deliver, too. To this end, HP has built in a 4-speaker system, customizable RGB lighting on the back of its attractive two-tone design, and plenty of ports. You get DisplayPort 1.4 and a couple HDMI 2.1 ports, of course, but you also get 3 USB Type-A 3.2 ports, 1 USB Type-C 3.2 port, and 1 3.5mm audio jack courtesy of a single USB Type-C upstream connection.
Throw in KVM support to seamlessly control multiple devices with one keyboard and mouse, plenty of adjustability, and standard VESA mounting support, and the HP OMEN Transcend 32 looks to tick every box. The only compromise I can see on the spec sheet is that non-HDR brightness is on the low side at 250 nits, a common downside with OLED gaming monitors.
A new era of OLED gaming monitors
The HP OMEN Transcend 32 is an ultra-premium, highly advanced gaming monitor the likes of which we've never seen before, but it's hardly going to be the only one. Plenty of manufacturers are going to try their hand at making a 4K, 240Hz OLED gaming monitor or something similar (or even more impressive); HP's design, extra features, quality, and pricing will be what hopefully set the OMEN Transcend 32 apart.
On the former three, we'll have to wait to go hands-on with the OMEN Transcend 32 to pass our final verdict. On the latter, HP hasn't yet revealed when this monitor will go on sale or how much it'll cost, only that it's arriving later this year. Does HP have what it takes to get another display on our list of the best gaming monitors? Only time will tell — HP's recent OMEN monitors were all fantastic and come highly recommended by us, but the OMEN Transcend 32 is in a different category altogether, and is HP's first attempt at such a premium gaming monitor.
