Acer Predator CG437K P review: Titanic gaming that puts your TV to shame

Large monitors have always been something of a hot item for PC gaming, but there's been a trend in recent years towards sizes that are more akin to the television sitting in your living room. The Acer Predator CG437K P is part of that move towards super-sized displays, packing features you'd expect from any high-end gaming monitor into a 43-inch monitor that's as vibrant as it is immersive.

If you've been looking to get the most immersive gaming experience possible at your desk, or just want to replace your TV with a display that sports plenty of gaming features, the Predator CG437K P is a tantalizing option. But do the paper specs make for a solid gaming experience? Let's take a deeper dive.

What you'll like about the Acer Predator CG437K P Gaming Monitor

Let's get the biggest draw of the Predator CG437K P out of the way: its size. This thing could legitimately replace your TV as your go-to gaming display. Its mix of a 43-inch panel with a bevy of gaming features makes it not only great for PC gaming, but your Xbox or PlayStation 4 will play nice with it as well.

If you're using it at your desk, then you're in for a treat as well. The size makes it the most immersive display I've sat in front of with a desk setup. Trekking through Borderlands 3, my vision was filled entirely with glorious cell-shaded gore and guns. So much for your mom's refrain of "don't sit too close to the TV."

The big downside to that size is that it's not the greatest option for getting work done. Simply put, it's just too big. That's great if you want to multitask and don't mind manually managing the size of your windows. However, your neck will definitely get tired from physically moving your head around to different parts of the screen.

Instead, the Predator CG437K P would be much better suited as a primary gaming display on your desk, with a smaller screen of to the side as a general work and web browsing monitor. When you're spending $1,500 on a monitor, that's a bit of a bummer. However, you could get away with it as your primary monitor if you don't mind the obvious downsides of having a little too much screen real estate.

Aside from its size, the Predator CG437K P is right up there with some of the best gaming monitors out there. Colors while gaming were bright and vibrant. The HDR is up there with some of the best examples I've seen thanks to its 1000-nit brightness. That Acer makes a great gaming display shouldn't be a huge surprise; its Predator line is sought after by many a gamer, after all.

Keep in mind you'll want a pretty powerful gaming rig to push this monster to its max. You're looking at a 4K resolution with a max refresh rate of 144Hz. To push that many pixels that fast, you'll need some beefy hardware to match.

When you have such a vast screen filling your vision with anything above 60 frames per second, however, its a sight to behold. I used to be a fan of widescreen monitors as the most immersive experience possible, but the Acer CG437K P is the most immersive monitor I've had the pleasure of using to date. With support for NVIDIA G-Sync and adaptive sync, you won't have to worry about any screen tearing with your PC or Xbox, either.

One of my favorite parts of the Predator CG437K P has nothing to do with the display, though. The stand features a nice little docking area for your controllers. Simply place your controllers on the base, and a small lip hooks to the triggers to keep them firmly in place. It's an excellent little detail that makes the whole experience of using this as your go-to gaming display even better.

Another little nice-to-have feature I didn't anticipate liking so much is the light sensor at the front of the display. It can automatically adjust to the lighting in your room, and it can even tell when you're sitting in front of the monitor. If the display shuts off to conserve power, it will automatically pop back to life when you sit back down to pick up where you left off.

Finally, if you're a big fan of RGB lighting (and who isn't), there are four magnetic LED light strips that you can attach to the rear of the display. This will give you some decent bias lighting that can potentially help reduce eye fatigue for long sessions. Plus, bias lighting just looks cool.

What you'll dislike about the Acer Predator CG437K P Gaming Monitor

Despite its large size and immersive screen, there are some downsides that are worth considering with the Acer Predator CG437K P. Most notably, the speakers are very lackluster.

Despite having more powerful speakers than most monitors, the Predator CG437K P sounds incredibly hollow. It's almost like the speakers were just an afterthought, especially after coming from the absolutely fantastic sound quality I experienced on the BenQ EX2780Q. The sound in games felt hollow, and the music was missing any sort of dynamics.

It's a disappointing oversight that I feel would have pushed this display over the top. You can, of course, get around this with a headset or a solid set of PC speakers, but I would expect better sound quality on a $1,500 monitor. Even adding something like an integrated, forward-facing soundbar, like the BenQ monitor I just mentioned, would make a massive difference.

I also need to mention the tragic on-screen settings menu. It's not bad per se, but it's incredibly sluggish to navigate. There are quite a few settings to tweak, which is excellent to see. However, the slow response makes tweaking even minor settings more of a pain than it needs to be. The relatively cheap-feeling remote doesn't help matters, but I won't quibble too much over a remote. I'm happy that one is included at all.

Finally, there's the price to consider. With its large size, you're essentially getting a TV replacement that has a bunch of gaming features you otherwise wouldn't find in TVs from brands like Sony and Samsung. That justifies the high price tag, but you'll have to weight whether G-Sync and a 144Hz refresh rate are worth foregoing the TV you probably already have access to.

For anyone who is a hardcore PC gamer, the answer is probably a resounding yes. But for casual gamers, particularly those who like to kick back on a couch with their Xbox or PlayStation, the price might be hard to justify.

So should you buy the Acer Predator CG437K P Gaming Monitor?

For the PC gamers out there, the Acer Predator CG437K P is absolutely worth picking up. It's immersive, colors pop from the screen, and there's just something about playing PC games at max settings on a screen the size of your TV that's magical. Plus, if you have a console or two, it makes an excellent all-around station for all of your gaming endeavors.

If PC gaming is just a hobby for you, though, the $1,500 price Acer is asking for the Predator CG437K P is quite the barrier to entry. Consoles gamers will do just fine with their TV, and the occasional PC gamer will be better off sticking with their smaller monitors. Still, the Acer Predator CG437K P impresses on almost every front.