Sony 27” INZONE M9 II 4K 160Hz Full Array LED HDR Gaming Monitor

The build quality is excellent, and the stand feels high quality, with smooth vertical adjustments. The angle adjustment is fairly tight, so you’ll need to hold the base or stand arm to brace it, but the base also rotates for easy horizontal adjustments.

Visually, the monitor offers great contrast with deep black levels. When watching movies or videos, the black bars actually look black, not gray. Adaptive Sync works on a Mac when using DisplayPort, but without a USB-C to DisplayPort cable, you’ll be limited to 60Hz. This isn’t an issue for me, since I use it for office work, but it’s something to note if you’re gaming. On the plus side, it does support HDR over HDMI.

The port options on the back are quite basic and, frankly, a bit underwhelming. While it does support two HDMI inputs and a single DisplayPort, it’s sorely lacking USB-C ports, which feels like a glaring omission in 2024, especially with how large the power brick is. The inclusion of two USB-A ports, limited to 5V and 0.9 amps, is adequate for a few accessories, but it significantly curtails the monitor’s potential as a central hub for more robust setups. In a world where USB-C is the norm, its absence leaves the overall connectivity feeling somewhat dated.

This monitor excels at gaming, which isn’t a surprise since that’s what it’s marketed for. However, I’m pleasantly surprised by how well it works for visual workflows like color correction and design. It matches incredibly well with the calibrated display on my Apple laptop.

— GAME SETTINGS —
Reddit search “𝙄𝙣𝙯𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙈9 𝙄𝙄 – 𝙍𝙚𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙢𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙚𝙙 𝙎𝙚𝙩𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙨” to see my up-to-date best settings.

— REVIEW —
Pros:
* Impressive HDR color accuracy.
* Shockingly good contrast in HDR for an IPS.
* No flickering (as far as I can tell).
* Firmware upgrades via USB.
* Automatically switches to HDR mode with Windows.

Cons:
* HDR blooming can be seen on dark solid colors. However, it’s been barely noticeable in typical content.
* Max 750 nits brightness clips some detail in bright HDR highlights.

My home office PC is primarily for work and browsing the web during the day, but also gaming in the evening and on the weekends. As such, I needed an LCD that could pull double-duty and not suck at any of those things. So far, I can live with the M9 II’s deficiencies in exchange for its other benefits.

The Sony INZONE M9 ll is one of Sony’s newest gaming monitors on the market. It is the successor to the semi-controversial M9 l. I am both a PS5 and PC gamer and honestly, this monitor looks wonderful on both. A PC can take advantage of this monitor’s many features compared to the PS5 but the M9 ll is the perfect monitor for the PS5 and does take the win here in my opinion. In this review, I will cover the pros and cons of the M9 ll from using both systems along with other items I found while using it.

*TLDR at the bottom

==============
IN THE BOX/SETUP:
Let’s start with what’s in the box. There is not a lot, but you get a well-packaged M9 ll, a bulky but not abnormally large power adapter and cable, a DisplayPort cable, an INZONE sticker, and some documentation. Can you spot what is missing? If you guessed an HDMI cable, you are correct! I know with the M9 l there were no display cables included but at the least with the M9 ll, they did include a DP cable. I am not a fan of this trend of manufacturers slowly taking away items that have been included before. (blame the smartphones) Regardless, I strongly think an HDMI cable should’ve been included at this price.

Setup is all plug-and-play if you want to get into a game quickly. But, if you are someone who enjoys tweaking a monitor’s settings until they are perfect, there are customizable monitor settings available. These settings can be accessed through the monitor itself (joystick on the back, right side) or if you are on a PC, the INZONE Hub app.

==============
FIRST IMPRESSIONS:
The monitor arrives with this paper strip stuck to the top of the monitor showing some of the key specs which is neat, but the strip did unfortunately leave some residue behind. Once that minor mess was cleaned up, I got a first look at the all-black M9 ll. There is a purple rubber cable management strap closer to the base. The base design is significantly better than what the M9 l had. With this base, I do get more desk space available for my peripherals as well as other items. Ports are hard to get to but fortunately, the M9 ll is flexible on how much it can rotate. The tilt of the M9 ll is also flexible and nice to have if the monitor needs to be mounted to an arm. If you are looking to set this monitor up vertically, unfortunately, this monitor cannot be placed in a vertical position. As for the bezels, they are thin enough to the point where you almost don’t notice them! Overall, I am happy with the design choices of the M9 ll.

==============
FEATURES:
Let’s start with some physical features. The monitor has an LED on the right side, next to the large power button. This LED can be turned on or off. Above the power button, there is a joystick that can be used to access the OSD menu for the monitor. This monitor also has integrated speakers which as one may have guessed, aren’t the best. The bass is terrible, and the sound is all muffled. But at least they are included. I remember a time when I didn’t have any available external speakers or headphones for my monitor, so it is nice to see at least some integrated speakers were included for those types of folk.

Let’s move on to more of the software. If you plan to use this on a PC, I highly recommend the INZONE Hub app. The app allows you to easily access and change the monitor’s settings rather than using the OSD menu. I wish more monitors would have this feature available as it is very convenient. The software will also let you know if your monitor is up to date with the latest firmware. If it is not, the update will need to be downloaded to a flash drive and then go from there. The monitor supports HDR which looks incredible when paired with the PS5. The 160Hz refresh rate is plenty if you plan to use this with a PS5 which supports up to 4k at 120Hz. For casual PC gamers who prioritize quality over performance, the 160Hz max refresh rate should be enough. The 1ms response time is also neat to have as it reduces ghosting which in my time using this monitor, did not see any of it. Finally, this monitor is NVIDIA G-SYNC compatible which was able to help me with smoother gameplay.

==============
PERFORMANCE:
I will start with the M9ll’s performance with my PC. As a side note, my PC is using an NVIDIA RTX 3070 GPU. Also, to maximize performance, make sure to use a DP cable as well as go to display settings to set the refresh rate to the maximum possible setting. Mine defaulted to 60Hz and I was wondering why for the longest time my monitor was capped at that rate…

I was able to play a variety of games on this monitor from story-driven games like Rise of the Tomb Raider and Control to racing games like Forza Horizon 5, and FPS like Destiny 2. All the games I played looked amazing and ran smoothly. But I did have to play around with the in-game settings for each game to optimize my gameplay. I am a quality-over-performance type of person but did attempt to get each game to max out the monitor’s refresh rate. The amount of FPS you are getting can be dependent on many factors, but I was able to maximize the monitor’s refresh rate on most of them at the cost of quality. For example, in Control I was able to hit 160FPS when I changed the resolution to 1080p and set graphics to a lower setting. I also attempted to find the middle ground where I can have the best quality at a decent frame rate which I was able to do. During this time, I was able to truly see the 4k quality of the games I was playing as well as some minor issues. Let’s start with the blacks, blacks look great and not washed out. This was prevalent in Control, which has a lot of dark areas. On the other hand, it seems the monitor struggles with some bright scenes as some of the light in those scenes looks blotched. This was common in TR. Finally, while HDR was on, I felt that the monitor wasn’t able to truly display the true colors of some of the games I was playing. Some colors looked slightly washed out. Finally, as I was playing, my monitor did start to flicker every couple of minutes or so, which wasn’t the case with my previous LG monitor. I had to play around with some settings but was able to get it to stop when I turned off Adaptive Sync in the monitor’s settings which was strange. I know the M9 l had this issue, but I do hope it’s a minor bug or a one-time issue. I am nitpicking minor things here but overall; this monitor works great with PC but a LOT of tweaking will be needed to get games to run to your liking.

As for the PS5’s performance and setup with this monitor, it is mostly plug-and-play with some slight tweaks in the settings. Once that’s done, the monitor is ready! I played several games on the PS5 as well. Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart was one of my favorites that I played as the monitor brought out the broad color gamut the display has to offer and the Auto HDR truly did its wonders with this game. The details of the characters stood out and clarity in this game was amazing! Some PS5 games like Ratchet and Clank do not support the higher frame rates so for most of the time I was playing on the highest possible graphic settings (fidelity mode) which did cap my FPS to a lower frame rate which was noticeable but didn’t mind as I enjoy the eye candy graphics that some PS5 games can do. One minor issue I did have with both systems is even though the M9 ll is an IPS display, viewing the display from a slightly different angle will “gray” out your image which is unfortunate since IPS displays are known for better viewing angles.

==============
CONCLUSION/TLDR:
Overall, this is a solid gaming monitor for both the PS5 and PC. However, from experience these past couple of days, I think the PS5 takes better advantage of this monitor compared to a PC. There are a lot of factors that come into play when pairing a PC with a monitor of this caliber but as of now, I have enjoyed how the PS5 and the M9 ll pair up compared to my PC. As someone who prioritizes quality over performance, the PS5 was able to take advantage of HDR, and the large color gamut that the monitor allows. I also had issues with brighter scenes on the PC compared to the PS5. With all this in mind, if you are looking for a solid gaming monitor for the PS5, I highly recommend you give this one a shot. If you are searching for a monitor for a PC, this monitor is fine if it falls within your budget, but I recommend looking at OLED monitors (like the M10S) with high refresh rates which can be at the pricier end but will provide a better overall experience for you.

Great for Remote working and the gaming preformace is Amazing with a PS5.

The good: 27″ 4K 160Hz 10-bit HDR600 G-Sync, all the bells and whistles. I had the predecessor, the M9 (mark 1) and wasn’t all that impressed with the LED lighting zones so that was the first thing I looked at on the Mark 2. Right away I noticed the lighting zones were a lot better on this version. It wasn’t blatantly distracting during dark scenes and is much more picky to fire up the backlight than before. On the Mark 1 if there was a single white pixel on the screen, the backlight would go on full blast in a small square around the pixel, which gave a very heavy bloom effect. On the Mark 2, the backlight zone seems to be ‘anti-aliased’ among adjacent zones so the bloom isn’t so hard cut. On top of that, there needs to be more bright objects on screen for the backlight to act on it so just waving your cursor around on a black background does not trigger the backlight. I can say that the Mark 2 has very much dialed in its LED backlight and is basically perfect. The only time I notice anything amiss is the extreme left and right edges of the screen seem to have a small gradient to darkness, somewhat like a vignette across a half an inch. Luckily there isn’t much important stuff at the left and right half inches of the screen, so it doesn’t impact appreciation.

Besides the local dimming stuff, the monitor is overall excellent. I ran it at 160hz but I can’t really hit those frame rates so I dropped it to 144hz to match my other 4k monitor. Symmetrical 4k 144hz 10-bit G-Sync modes ahoy!

For color accuracy, it’s pretty good out of the box. It’s a very, very bright monitor by default. I ran the M9 Mark 2 through a calibrator and it asked me to drop the red channel and blue channel by 1 each (99,100,99) to hit a perfect white. After the full calibration, the colors were mostly the same. Contrast went up a tiny tiny bit and that was about it. I guess that means if you just turn the contrast up on the monitor settings, it’ll basically be calibrated.

This is a fantastic choice for a really high quality gaming monitor with no compromises. Marketed by Sony as optimized for compatibility with the PS5, it’s of course well suited for PC gaming as well.

I previously was using a Samsung Odyssey G70B, which is fairly comparable to this; it’s also a nice monitor, but it has a tacky nVidia logo silkscreened onto the front, distractingly glowy gamer lights, and is saddled with Samsung’s smart TV software built in that constantly nags you for Internet connectivity and their connected services. In comparison, this Sony monitor is a breath of fresh air: it’s just a really, REALLY nice panel with a simple but clear to navigate onscreen display, lots of connectivity, and a smartly designed stand. Even the nVidia logo can be removed if you want.

Setup is really simple, and I was up and running in only a couple minutes. There’s a large external 19.5V power brick, and a Displayport cable is included. (There’s 1 DP port and 2 HDMI ports, plus a USB port; only the DP cable is included, though, so if you need HDMI you’ll have to buy that separately.) Stand assembly is super easy – just screw the base onto the stand, then snap the stand onto the monitor. No tools required.

One really cool aspect of the stand is it’s designed to swivel around fluidly; if you ever want to turn your monitor to show your roommate or a guest something, you’ll love this monitor. It’s one of the smartest stand designs I’ve ever seen, and I like it way more than the two-leg-prongs designs Samsung uses.

Visually, this thing is just stunning. It’s bright, responsive, and pixel-dense – everything you’d want from a competitive gaming monitor. I have no feedback – it’s just perfect to my eyes. Color balance is correct, colors are vibrant – 10/10. I don’t have professional calibration devices to prove it, but for me, this is the best-looking monitor I’ve ever owned.

For those who care deeply about bezels, the one on this monitor is deceptive, a bit – it looks like it should go edge to edge when the power is off, but there’s actually about 6-7mm around the edge of the actual panel on all sides except the bottom, where there’s 3mm plus the bottom plastic bezel. It’s no big deal but don’t expect this to be perfectly edge-to-edge. (The Samsung Odyssey G70B is almost the exact same situation, so this is par for the course in this product category.)

Simple onscreen controls, no smart-TV nonsense, and a beautiful display in an elegant package that isn’t overly GAMER that would go with any decor – Sony has a real winner on their hands here.

The first thing that caught my attention was the sturdy and efficient stand to mount the monitor on. It was so easy to assemble and, once mounted on the stand, the monitor height is adjusted simply by pushing up or down on the monitor.

The monitor itself is light weight, and a little bit thick. The cables conveniently plug to the bottom, so no worries about cables sticking out the back.

The monitor comes with built in speakers, which connect via HDMI or DisplayPort.
While I tested this monitor with my laptop, I can see the built-in speakers being useful to connect a PS5 or any other game system. The speakers are typical of what you could expect from monitor audio, no bass and not super loud. That said, the volume was satisfactory.

Regarding the customization, the built in menu allows for many features. One of my favorites was the built in selectable cross crosshairs. I was using it for fortnite to practice no-scoping. When enabled, the monitor crosshairs stay on always so that, at all times, you know exactly what you’re aiming at. Works with any FPS game.

Picture quality was fantastic. 4k was sharp, colors were bright and fluid, and black color was very dark, creating a great contrast.

The motion blur reduction function worked well for me in testing moving objects, and I saw a noticeable improvement.

I would recommend this monitor for gaming!

This monitor was an upgrade for me. I purchased 2 of them. I have both monitors connected to my PC with an RTX 4090 and the second monitor is also connected to my PS5 (soon to be PS5 Pro). My monitors before this one were the ASUS VG28UQL1A. I was never happy when I owned the ASUS monitors and always had buyer’s remorse but held on to them because there were no other monitors that met my requirements during that time. The ASUS monitors were bright but had washed out colors and was very difficult to calibrate. These Sony monitors are factory calibrated, and I didn’t need to touch any of the settings. They look perfect out of the box. My requirements for a monitor are G-sync capable, integrated speakers, 27-inch form factor, and good HDR. The Asus had display HDR 400, and the Sony is display HDR 600. While this is a noticeable upgrade, I do wish the display HDR on the Sony was higher. The Sony has a great picture, and the colors look phenomenal via HDMI and display port. The second monitor is connected to my PC via the Sony’s display port 2.1. Unfortunately, the RTX 4090 does not support display port 2.1, so I can’t speak to how well it performs. To get the full effect of display port 2.1, you would need an AMD GPU. But the screen and colors via the display port 1.4a looks just as amazing as using an ultra-HDMI 8k cable. FYI, Sony does not provide an HDMI cable with these monitors. You only get a display port 1.4a cable and will need to have your own HDMI cable if that is what you plan to connect with. Sony has software that you can download from their website that will allow you to adjust the monitor settings using your mouse instead of reaching behind the monitor to use the joystick. The software also notifies you when there is a firmware update for the monitor. If you do happen to have an AMD GPU, then you can switch from display port 1.4a to 2.1 via the Sony software and maximize performance with the display port. When I first set up the monitors and downloaded the Sony software, I was notified that there was an update for the monitors. There is a USB update port behind the monitor that allows you to use a flash drive to perform the updates. I have owned the monitors for a week now and I have not been able to successfully update the monitors using any flash drive. I have tried multiple flash drives formatted both NTFS and FAT32 and with different storage sizes. The monitors won’t recognize the flash drives. I finally connected an external HDD, and the monitors recognized it but would not take the firmware update. It continued to give me an error message stating that that it was not the correct update even though this is the only update available through the Sony software. I am usually good with trouble-shooting technical issues, but I have not been able figure out why the monitors won’t update. A lot of the guidance on Sony’s website still refer to the previous model of this monitor. It’s possible that the update was also meant for the previous model of this monitor. I have not reached out to Sony for assistance, but I plan to. The integrated speakers on these monitors in my opinion are adequate. I don’t require much when it comes to monitor speakers, and my expectations are not that high. If you are looking for studio quality sound, then I would suggest you purchase some external speakers. In regard to connecting the monitor to a PS5, the monitors will notify you that it detected the PS5 and automatically optimizes its settings. I am currently playing Suicide Squad, and I have never seen the colors and the graphics look this good on any game that I have played since owning the PS5. This monitor takes the PS5 and the games you play on it to another level. I have never appreciated being an owner of the PS5 as much as I do now since connecting it to this monitor. I can only imagine what the PS5 Pro will look like when it arrives. I would like to add that no Best Buy location in my area has these monitor on display, so I took a chance when ordering them off the Best Buy website. Since these monitors are so new, there were not a lot of reviews to go off of. I could not be happier. I can say with certainty that I no longer have buyer’s remorse about the monitors that I own, and this is the best electronics purchase I have made this year from Best Buy.

This is my first 4k monitor. It is pretty hefty for a 27″ monitor. Heftier than I expected. The monitor has built-in speakers which can tie you over in a pinch but it unsurprisingly lacks bass.

The 4k monitor far exceeds what my computer and video card can output. My computer & video will not be able to push the upper limits of this monitor’s capability.

The function button and power switch are on the rear right side.

There are a variety of ports on the monitor. HDMI, Displayport, USB-A, and headphone, to name a few.

You can tilt the monitor angle as well as adjust the height of the monitor. However, adjusting the height is a little strange. It is based on the monitor weight sitting on some springs. You simply lift or press on the monitor to adjust the height. The stand allows for swiveling to both the right and the left without having to lift or drag the monitor.

In regards to the gaming video quality, I play strategy games which have details, not FPS or other action games where fast movement or blur is a problem. The color very bright and crisp. And I get far more detail with this monitor than any other monitor I’ve ever owned.

If you install Sony’s inzone software, you will be able to bypass the rear function switch and customize the monitor to your preferences.

Overall, this is the best monitor I’ve ever owned. Perhaps there are other 4k monitors which are similar or better than this Sony monitor. But for me, this 4k monitor is just super and exceeds my requirements.

This is a great monitor. It’s got fantastic contrast, vibrant colors, and is super smooth. I wouldn’t say it exceeds its specs though – This monitor is very much a jack of all trades, master of none case. If you want a better HDR experience than VESA 600, you can get it. If you want better colors, you can get it. If you want more contrast, you can get it. It’s fast for gaming but there are far faster monitors out there. If you want better sound, just use some speakers.
Where this monitor shines though is how good it is at everything it does. It isn’t chart topping anywhere but it’s respectable everywhere. And compared to my VESA 400 HDR 1440p monitor, this is a huge upgrade in every way. Even compared to my high refresh rate 1440p gaming monitor, this easily holds its own.
The speakers are nice to have but don’t sound great. They just make setup and testing faster. I haven’t noticed a halo from the LEDs around my mouse in daily use but I also don’t have a black background that would reveal a halo easily. I feel like the colors are amazing but i haven’t measured or calibrated this at all.

So I highly recommend this for nearly everyone but if you have a specific need, get a monitor specifically to fill it. If you just want a great display, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.