I had a couple of these monitors back in late Jan/early Feb (Nov/Dec mfr dates) through Amazon UK, which both went back due to ULMB not working at 120Hz, plus one of them had a faulty base light. In terms of back light bleed, one was acceptable and the other was near perfect. After waiting a couple of months I decided to try again and got one from the January batch.
The box appeared brand new, it only had a single layer of tape and didn't have a 'QC Passed' sticker, but when I opened it I quickly got the impression that the contents had been used before.
The polystyrene packaging was damaged in a couple of places and the protective sheet over the screen looked hastily applied, plus the usual energy compliance and advertising stickers were not in place. As soon as I got the monitor out I inspected the screen, and immediately noticed a large greasy mark with what looked like a thumb print in the middle, there were also other small splash marks and smudges at the edge of the screen, plus a light layer of dust.
When I connected it up and switched the monitor on, I noticed that it wasn't at the default settings. I didn't get the usual initial question about Light in Motion, and the monitor was already set to be overclocked to 165Hz, plus the brightness setting was not default.
I also then checked for back light bleed and it was worse than the previous two, and was noticeable when gaming. However, this time there was no issue with ULMB.
This all suggests to me that this monitor was one that was returned by a customer, that has just been chucked back in a box and sent back out? Unless you have people working in a dusty environment with very grubby hands packaging them?
According to the
blog post about models in the USA, 'ASUS does not allow returned or otherwise used products to be sold as new. Monitors that have been opened by customers must be sold as such'. Is this not true in the UK too?
I find this really disappointing that I would receive a monitor, sold as new for nearly £700, in this state...
Here are some pics of the main smudge on the screen :
http://imgur.com/a/vcsQ3
