by Samsung has made many great gaming monitors over the years, and they’ve also made steady inroads into cloud gaming through their ongoing partnership with Microsoft. So far, most of their cloud ambitions have been neatly contained in the console space, but today Samsung unveiled its latest cloud-enabled PC monitors, presumably hoping that the combination of Xbox Cloud Gaming, Nvidia’s GeForce Now, Stadia, Utomik and Amazon Luna Services in their built-in Samsung gaming hubs will be enough to convince people to part with their towers once and for all.
Samsung announced its Gaming Hub cloud gaming platform for its smart TVs back in July, and it’s the same service that will be available on its Odyssey Ark and Odyssey G70B and G65B monitors due out at Gamescom this week were presented and will be available before the end of the year. Samsung says they’re all designed to offer a complete home gaming PC experience without the need for dedicated PC hardware, although users can still connect them wirelessly to a Windows or Mac device if they wish this.
The G70B will be available in 28-inch and 32-inch screen sizes, and its IPS panels will feature a 144Hz refresh rate, up to 4K resolution, and support for both AMD’s FreeSync Premium Pro technology and an Nvidia G -Have sync compatible badge.
The G65B, on the other hand, comes in 27-inch and 32-inch curved variants, with a resolution of 2560 x 1440 topped by an even higher 240Hz refresh rate. Like the G70B, it’s also a FreeSync Premium Pro monitor, although in His announcement statement doesn’t mention that it’s also an official G-Sync compatible job.
Then there’s the super slick Odyssey Ark, which Samsung calls the “ultimate entertainment screen”. One of Samsung’s Quantum Mini LED displays, this massive 55-inch dome comes with proprietary Matte Display and Sound Dome technology. I believe the former just boils down to an anti-glare and anti-reflection layer, but the “Sound Dome” will apparently deliver a 60W 2.2.2-channel audio system via its four integrated speakers at each corner of the ark and two woofers right in the middle . It also has what Samsung is calling a “cockpit mode,” which is probably the slickest marketing lingo I’ve heard for a height-adjustable stand, tilt, and swivel feature.
Stupid marketing aside, it’ll have a 165Hz refresh rate, AMD FreeSync Premium Pro technology like the others, and Samsung’s Gaming Hub as standard. But seriously, who wants to sit at their desk and stare at a 55-inch monitor? You’re basically talking about a TV here, and I refuse to call it anything else.
Not surprisingly, the Ark is also out of this world expensive, available for a cool £2600. No word yet on how much the other Odyssey monitors will cost, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we were looking at a bare minimum for each. I’m not sure if you’re actually going to save that much over a traditional PC and monitor combo at this price point, but you never know. Maybe they’ll make a big impression on hardware editor James once he gets to see them up close. In the meantime I think I’ll stick with my current setup, thanks.
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