I bought the Philips 499P9H to upgrade my home office and to be able to work more efficiently. Specifically, I chose this monitor because it is the cheapest 49" monitor with 5120 x 1440 resolution (vs Dell UltraSharp 49 inch eg). This resolution gives you (even) more workspace compared to a 49" 1080p screen, more than enough pixels to get rid of everything!
This screen is equivalent to two 27" 1440p monitors, but without a border in the middle. Note, once you're used to an ultrawide, you won't want to go back to the dual screen setup!
I use the monitor daily and almost exclusively to work on (several Excels, remote desktops, documents, emails, ...). I connect my laptop through the USB-C cable that comes with the screen, the screen charges the laptop, so you don't need the charger of the laptop (the screen supplies 65 watts through the USB-C cable. most laptops have enough with this, but the Dell XPS 15 for example not). The screen has multiple USB connections and devices connected via the USB-C cable are detected on your PC via the screen. So the screen functions as a hub, which is very convenient.
When you play a game on this monitor, the wide curved image ensures that you are completely immersed in the game, which is a nice experience. Playing a racing game on a monitor like this is very unique! Due to its refresh rate of 60Hz, it is not a monitor for the serious gamer.
In terms of design, this monitor is an eye catcher. The sturdy metal stand has a luxurious look, just like the bottom edge of the screen. The lower edge is made of plastic, but has a brushed metal pattern and looks very neat.
A nice extra with this monitor is the fold-out webcam that supports Windows Hello. He can therefore recognize your face and log in to Windows. Nice feature, I hadn't seen this before!
The price made me think about this purchase for a while, so long that the screen was sold out at Coolblue! Luckily it was back in stock quickly and I ordered it right away. 999 euros for a monitor is expensive, especially while 2 monitors of 27" 1440p are (can be) cheaper, but in my opinion you certainly get a lot for this money. Just to name: less cable work, built-in hub, windows hello, no edge in the middle so you can effectively put something in the middle to focus on, high curve radius, ...
Just to mention my negatives: There is very minimal backlight bleed, which is normal for a larger screen. I have not put this in the negatives because it is absolutely not noticeable in normal use. When connecting 2 PCs, after activating this function, the monitor shows the 2 inputs next to each other. This gave me problems with the resolution of 1 of the 2 PCs on the screen. Other than that, I haven't found any downsides so far.
In short, I am very satisfied with this screen, it increases my efficiency and I always feel like crawling behind this monitor. They won't take this from me anymore. Small tip: if you opt for a 49-inch screen, make sure you install good window manager software. Personally, I use WindowGrid, it does exactly what I want, but that's personal preference!
