Dell UltraSharp U2724DE review | ITPro
It’s always tough to keep the audience’s attention after a riotous main act, but the UltraSharp U2724DE is a suitably spellbinding performer. Riffing on the UltraSharp U2723Q’s eye-catching performance and fixing the odd bum note along the way, this 27-inch monitor lowers the resolution, ups the refresh rate, and improves image quality where it matters. If you’re looking for the perfect mid-sized monitor to accompany a frugally connected modern laptop – and a near-perfect premium business monitor at that – you can probably stop reading and hit the buy button now.
There’s lots of good stuff to spotlight. The IPS Black panel serves up good contrast, brightness, and guaranteed color accuracy in both sRGB, DCI-P3, and Display P3 modes; the rear ports provide 90W of power delivery for both Thunderbolt 4 and USB-C devices in addition to full-speed USB 3.2 Gen 1 and 2.5G Ethernet connectivity, and the physical design marries a flattering silhouette with a stand that provides all the adjustability you could ask for. Tick, tick, tick, boon.
You could even argue that the WQHD resolution is actually a plus point. If you do fancy loading up the occasional game, then it’s a far better match for the graphics chip in your average PC or laptop as you won’t need a megabucks GPU to play at native resolution. Not that we’d dream of alt-tabbing between Microsoft Office and Call of Duty in our lunch break, of course.
Dell UltraSharp U2724DE monitor: Design & Features
There’s precious little we’d change about Dell’s styling. It treads that fine line between stylish and showy, and the combination of subtle branding, matte silver plastics with a light sheen, and a dainty bezel make for a handsome monitor. The great thing about the U2724DE, however, is that it doesn’t just look good: it’s shot through with practical design touches.
The slender adjustable stand doesn’t have any fancy cable management – instead, it simply positions a little oblong slot towards the bottom which gathers cables neatly away to the rear. It’s simple and works well without causing any bunching or tangling as you adjust the monitor’s height or orientation.
And on that front, adjustability is excellent. You get 150mm of height adjustment which, while the mechanism is a little rumbly, works well enough to allow single-handed adjustment, and you also get enough tilt and swivel to get a comfortable viewing angle on any desk. You can quite happily tilt and swivel the monitor around with a single hand without worrying about it teetering on the base, and while there is a touch of wobble at full extension, it’s nothing we’d worry about.
Connectivity is typically generous – you get a near-identical clutch of ports as the 4K Dell UltraSharp U2723QE. The big difference here is the addition of Thunderbolt 4 connectivity: the USB-C port at the rear is compatible with both USB and Thunderbolt devices.
The HDMI, DisplayPort, and USB-C inputs are all capable of carrying 2,560 x 1,440 images at up to 120Hz, and you also get DisplayPort and Thunderbolt 4 outputs for daisy chaining a second display, again at up to 2,560 x 1,440 resolution and 120Hz refresh rates.
The USB hub and KVM functions are more than welcome, too. The main USB-C port powers up a pair of USB-A ports on the back panel in addition to a more easily accessible USB-A and USB-C port on the monitor’s bottom left-hand edge. Connect a second laptop or PC to the second upstream USB-C connection and you can also share a handful of USB devices between both machines.
When it comes to setting up the KVM and PBP/PIP settings, we’d urge owners to install the Dell Display Manager software which is available for both Windows and Mac users. While it’s easy enough to navigate the on-screen display with the little four-way joystick on the monitor’s rear, managing the various functions is far easier via the app.
Another helpful addition is the presence of a 2.5G Ethernet port. This is a boon for offices with the faster wired networking standard in place, and even more so for devices that have no Ethernet socket at all – which includes most mid – and lightweight modern laptops these days. As with the U2723QE, though, the internet connection isn’t shared with both machines via the KVM switch – it automatically connects to whichever machine is currently active. This is worth remembering if you want the dormant machine to be downloading something critical in the background.
One less commonplace addition is the presence of an ambient light sensor. You can toggle the automatic brightness on or off, though, and we prefer it off in our home office. If you have Velux windows or a lot of natural light, you may prefer to set a static brightness level to avoid the screen brightness fluctuating every time clouds pass overhead.
You do get a handful of cables in the box, too, although you’ll certainly need to dig out a few more to take full advantage of all the available connectivity. The 1.8m DisplayPort cable is a decent length, but the 1m USB-A to USB-C cable is unhelpfully short – it might reach a laptop or PC on the desk, but it’s unlikely to reach a desktop PC on the floor. Thankfully, the included 1.8m Thunderbolt 4 cable is a more sensible length.
It’s no great loss, but one thing you don’t get is integrated speakers. There is a 3.5mm audio output, though, so you can use headphones or speakers instead. Given the quality of the speakers integrated into most monitors, this is vastly preferable.
Dell UltraSharp U2724DE monitor: Display quality
Dell’s quoted specifications make for promising reading: the IPS Black panel promises a 2,000:1 contrast ratio, 100% coverage of sRGB and Rec 709, and 98% coverage of both DCI-P3 and Display P3 color spaces. Claimed color accuracy is good, too, with an average Delta E of less than 2 across all four of the preset color spaces.
The great news is that the U2724DE delivers on most of its promises. Our quick all-round health check revealed a clean bill of health, with a contrast ratio of 2,196:1, a modest peak brightness of 360cd/m2, 100% coverage of sRGB, and 95% coverage of DCI-P3, which is a little lower than claimed. Color accuracy is on point, though, with an average Delta E of less than 2 in both sRGB and DIsplay P3. In sRGB, we measured an average Delta E of 1.28 and a maximum of 2.6, and in Display P3 we measured an average Delta E of 1.49 and a maximum of 2.64, both of which are very respectable results.
It’s great to see that motion handling marks a step up over its stablemate, the U2723QE. The 120Hz refresh rate helps here, and while the panel’s 5ms response time looks decidedly sluggish when compared to the best gaming panels, it’s good enough to keep moving objects looking pleasingly defined and sharp without creating any obvious visual artifacts. For office use, this makes for silky smooth scrolling and cursor movement, and it comes into its own in games where the high refresh rate both looks and feels noticeably more responsive than a bog-standard 60Hz panel. Gamers will want to enable the Fast response time setting – it subtly improves the clarity of moving objects without introducing excessive artifacts.
One thing the U2724DE doesn’t have is HDR support – something its elder stablemate, the U2723QE, does possess. This is no great loss, however. HDR support is something of a tick-box exercise for any monitor that lacks effective local dimming, or that doesn’t utilize a Mini LED or OLED panel, and this applies to the vast proportion of monitors at or around this price. As the U2724DE has a relatively low peak brightness and no local dimming, HDR support would be of little benefit.
VRR support is present and correct, too, but Dell doesn’t advertise what flavor of VRR is supported. During our testing, it worked fine with AMD Freesync but we didn’t have an Nvidia card on hand to test for G-Sync support. Reading around the web suggests that Nvidia G-Sync is supported, but the lack of official certification suggests that support may be partial rather than comprehensive.
The only blot on the U2724DE’s copybook is the quality of the edge-lit backlighting – something we also criticized on the UltraSharp U2723QE. We tested brightness and contrast stability across 25 points on the display, and only 7 of those areas passed the recommended tolerance stipulated in the ISO 14861:2015 standard. All of the remaining areas passed the nominal tolerance levels, but it’s worth noting that brightness dipped by as much as 12% in the lower left and right corners of the display, with noticeably dim sections along the left and right-hand flanks. This isn’t very noticeable in everyday use, but it’s more obvious when displaying solid colors across the whole screen – which admittedly we don’t do very often except when testing monitors.
Dell UltraSharp U2724DE monitor: Is it worth it?
If there’s a stumbling block, then it’s the price – spending the best part of £500 on a monitor is by no small investment, especially not if you’re looking to fit out an office. And if you simply have to have a 4K resolution, then you’ll need to take the hit to refresh rates and motion handling (and forgo Thunderbolt) and opt for the still very lovely UltraSharp U2723QE instead.
There is a cheaper option, though. If you really don’t need or want all that connectivity, you can save around £100 by opting for the cheaper UltraSharp U2724D (£343) which forgoes the KVM functions in addition to the Thunderbolt and Ethernet connectivity.
If you can and will take advantage of all the U2724DE’s features, though, then it’s hard to quibble with what you’re getting for the money. Lacklustre backlighting aside, Dell has concocted a near perfect balance of image quality, connectivity, adjustability, and desk friendly dimensions. As do-it-all monitors go, they don’t get much better than the UltraSharp U2724DE.
Dell UltraSharp U2724DE specifications
| Display | 27in IPS Black panel | Row 0 – Cell 2 |
| Panel resolution | 2,560 x 1,440 | Row 1 – Cell 2 |
| Refresh rate | 120Hz | Row 2 – Cell 2 |
| Panel response time | 8ms GtG (normal) / 5ms GtG (fast) | Row 3 – Cell 2 |
| Adaptive Sync Support | Yes | Row 4 – Cell 2 |
| HDR Support | No | Row 5 – Cell 2 |
| Ports | HDMI 1.4 x 1, Thunderbolt 4/USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 x 2 (upstream, up to 90W), Thunderbolt 4/USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 x 2 (upstream, up to 15W), USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 x 4 (downstream), 3.5mm audio out, 2.5G Ethernet | Row 6 – Cell 2 |
| Other features | KVM functionality, PBP/PIP, USB PD 3.0 (up to 90W), Daisy-chain second monitor (via DisplayPort out or Thunderbolt out) | Row 7 – Cell 2 |
| Stand | Ergonomics -5~21° tilt, 150mm height adjustment | Row 8 – Cell 2 |
| Dimensions (with stand) | 612 x 192 x 536mm | Row 9 – Cell 2 |
| Weight (with stand) | 6.56kg | Row 10 – Cell 2 |
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