What you need to know
- ASUS announced a new series of what it calls the "world's first HDMI 2.1 certified gaming monitors."
- The company is scant on details, but they note the monitors, which range up to 43 inches, will handle 4K at up to 120Hz.
- The Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 will also support the HDMI 2.1 specification.
ASUS today announced that it has a line of three new monitors in the works that are all HDMI 2.1 certified. While the press release (via VideoCardz) is scant on details, all three of the monitors will support 4K resolutions running at variable refresh rates up to 120Hz. There aren't any consoles or video cards currently on the market that can take full advantage of the HDMI 2.1 spec, they're right around the corner.
Microsoft and Sony have both already announced that the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 will support HDMI 2.1. It's expected that the next generation of graphics cards from NVIDIA and AMD will as well. What it brings to the table is a 48 Gbps bandwidth, which is an increase from the current HDMI 2.0 bandwidth capacity of 18 Gbps.
That increase translates to the ability to support much higher framerates for 4K content. In terms of games, Microsoft has already announced that Xbox Series X will support running games at up to 4K resolution at 120 FPS. Developers still have to specifically design their games for this, but we've already seen that Ori and the Will of the Wisps will run at 120 FPS on Xbox Series X.
According to ASUS, this monitor line will be available in 27-, 32- and 43-inch models. There's no word on the screen technology they'll use, nor the release date. However, with next-gen consoles on the horizon, they'll likely make a solid pairing.
Without a release date, however, you might want to go ahead and pull the trigger on a new gaming monitor sooner rather than later (and potentially save some cash). We've got a handy guide to the best PC gaming monitors to help out.
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