In this review I’m looking at AOC’s Q24B36X: a genuinely ultra-budget 24-inch 1440p 144Hz IPS gaming monitor, and the big question is whether it’s actually worth your hard-earned cash. Straight out of the box it absolutely screams budget—slim, almost disturbingly featureless, tilt-only plastic stand, external power brick, and just two inputs (HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort) plus an audio jack. The OSD is controlled by separate buttons and it’s basic, but easy enough to use, and you do surprisingly get things like MBR sync and multiple overdrive modes. On image quality, it’s “good enough” rather than exciting. I measured around 85% DCI-P3 coverage (61% Rec.2020), but the out-of-box accuracy was actually solid at ~1.03 average Delta E (with one odd blue result way off). Brightness beat the 300-nit claim at roughly 383 nits, and contrast was impressively high for IPS at around 1500:1, with decent overall uniformity. The real budget reality check is response times. With overdrive off it’s abysmal (~16ms), and even on Strong it’s only around 8.1ms with some overshoot—serviceable, not crisp. But at ~£110-£115, it’s hard to argue: 1440p, high refresh, adaptive sync for basic office-monitor money is, frankly, exceptional value—perfect “kid’s first gaming monitor” territory.