BenQ XL2720T Gaming Monitor Reviewed
by Chris Heinonen on June 17, 2013 4:35 PM ESTLooking at the white uniformity of the BenQ XL2720T, we see a large drop-off in the upper left, and another drop on the right side that isn’t quite as drastic. I like to see everything stay within 5% of the center value ideally, which means 180-220 nits if the center is at 200 nits, but this one measurement drops down to 167 nits and is clearly darker. The right side only drops down to 172 nits, but that is still fairly low. Most of the display stays within that 5% threshold, but on the edges it has an issue.
With the black uniformity, we see some bright corners on the left side, and the surrounding numbers are much lower than they are, and with an all-black screen it is quite easy to tell the difference. The center actually has the highest black level of anywhere other than that one bright corner.
The contrast uniformity on the display varies by a lot. The center comes in at 795:1 (not quite the 820:1 we measured earlier, but the black reading changing by as little as 0.001 nits can influence this highly), but the rest of the monitor swings from as low as 754:1 to as high as 946:1. With contrast ratio higher is going to be better, but looking at the chart really shows that the overall uniformity of the white and black levels on the BenQ isn’t ideal.
The grayscale uniformity shows this as well. The center is still quite good, coming in at a dE2000 of 0.92. The reason for the higher value here than on the calibration page is that uniformity testing uses 0%, 20%, 40%, 60%, 80%, and 100% values, not 0-100% in 5% increments. Since the 0% value is the highest, it has added weight here, but doing uniformity testing with all 21 values would be unreasonably time consuming to do. We see that the dE2000 rises up to 3.46 in that hot-spot on the left side of the screen, and has a few other areas above 2.0 as well. Most of the screen is still good, and as I said these numbers might be lower if I measured 21 points per location, but that’s still a large difference on the display.
With the colorchecker uniformity, we see the same issues, only worse. Since the colorchecker starts with a higher error than the grayscale, we see that many points on the screen have managed to rise above 3.0, which is considered not visible to the human eye when in motion. We also see that corners are measuring really well, while the center of the screen is further off. This is a bit strange, but overall the uniformity isn’t as strong as with other displays.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
79 Comments
View All Comments
chizow - Tuesday, June 18, 2013 - link
Glad to see you are revisiting the review of this monitor with a fresh outlook. Honestly, after you have your new results with LightBoost, you may consider just re-writing the entire review. It's a completely different market for this type of monitor that gets away from the muddy mosaics of finely pixeled high-res monitors.qiplayer - Saturday, November 9, 2013 - link
The today's problem is comunication. Companies want to throw stuff on the market and us to buy. Actually they have no idea what is our need expectations and so on. They lack on ability to observe. ...Today I saw the graps of gtx 780 gtx780ti gtx titan clock behaviour during heavy load/gameplay. Clock is high and every 45 seconds it drops by 40% =every 40 second you get fps drops. Is it possible that they sell a card for 1000$ and haven't found a better solution? YES, they (nvidia) probably even didn't notice it. It would have been enough to let the max clock be 3-5% lower to avoid the needing to downcloack.So yes they produce and hope to sell, they found out the solution that many gamers aspire to have in a monitor by case, by looking for a better 3D.
And if we look cell phones, I'm since years looking for something that is not an iphone, but I always felt I can't type half that fast with samsung htc and so on because the keys had a lag lighting up when pressed. For years this aspect hasn't been seen in reviews, then, one day "tadaaahhh" revelation: a test of touchscreen responsetime. Iphone was far better than the best samsung. So is it possible that no one of the thousands worldwide reviewers noticed it? No one engineer?
cheinonen - Wednesday, June 19, 2013 - link
I've added charts and data on Lightboost to the review, as well as commentary on the image quality of it. They can all be found on the gaming use and lag page.chizow - Wednesday, June 19, 2013 - link
"One thing this does do it lock out all the picture controls except color and brightness."It only locks you out once you enable LightBoost, prior to that you can make any adjustments to presets, color, temperature, sharpness etc. At least that is how it worked on my 2 previous 3D Vision monitors.
Also, you shouldn't lose any brightness, if anything, the image is usually too bright for those who are not accustomed to it as brightness is maxed out and locked and strobing at 2x brightness.
Anyone interested in the truly important vitals of this monitor should follow mdrejhon's links as they give a much more accurate picture of this monitor's strengths.
cheinonen - Wednesday, June 19, 2013 - link
You're going to lose brightness because it's working with black frame insertion basically to mimic the performance of a CRT in that way. The lack of object permanence on-screen causes the eye to see motion as being more fluid when tracking something. This same behavior also means that instead of the backlight being on all the time, it's shut down every so often and that causes a measurable drop in light output. With the monitor at factory settings, other than Lightboost, and contrast set to the maximum level before clipping, I got under 130 cd/m2. Going higher requires clipping.As far as the user controls being locked out, at least on the BenQ when it went into Lightboost mode my previously set user color temperature settings were removed, leading to the blue image. Different monitors could easily have different settings, but on the BenQ they were all locked out.
I've read all of mdrejhon's links, and he's providing his perspective. He, and many others, are after the least amount of blur no matter what, and that's fine. To me, the trade-off in brightness, color quality, and noticeable flicker are not worth it to me. But that's my opinion. However I think comments that color quality is unimportant compared to the 120Hz mode is giving BenQ a free pass. They could easily provide both, but choose not to due to cost or another reason. If color accuracy isn't important to you at all, that's fine, but it shouldn't be dismissed outright.
sweenish - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
180-220 is a 10% range, is it not?brucek2 - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
Thanks Chris. I really appreciate direct, straight forward conclusions like yours. The most important part of most reviews to me is the part that says this product is either the winner for some specific use case, or if not here are the likely better options to consider. Far too many reviewers are afraid to be so blunt so I always appreciate it when I see it.mdrejhon - Tuesday, June 18, 2013 - link
To be fair, SkyViper (a former CRT user) thought a 120Hz monitor was disappointing until he enabled LightBoost:http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?p=1039591537#p...
"I felt like I may have wasted $300 bucks on a monitor that is full of compromises. The next thing I tried of course was using the Lightboost hack."
[...Enables LightBoost....]
“SWEET MOTHER OF GOD!
Am I seeing this correctly? The last time I gamed on a CRT monitor was back in 2006 before I got my first LCD and this ASUS monitor is EXACTLY like how I remembered gaming on a CRT monitor. I was absolutely shocked and amazed at how clear everything was when moving around. After seeing Lightboost in action, I would have gladly paid twice the amount for something that can reproduce the feeling I got when playing on a CRT. Now I really can’t see myself going back to my 30″ 2560×1600 IPS monitor when gaming. Everything looks so much clearer on the ASUS with Lightboost turned on.”
Panzerknacker - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
Agree with your conclusion Chris, TN monitors are just completely worthless for anything, looking at them makes me puke. Many years ago I used to be a hardcore gamer, but when my CRT died and I was forced to purchase a LCD monitor, that completely spoiled the fun I had in gaming. Everything suddenly looked like complete crap, especially the dark atmospheric games I used to enjoy like Doom 3 and Splinter Cell. Displays like this are maybe only good for one thing, and that is proffesional gaming tournaments where nothing matters but respons. Even while practicing at home though I would prefer the better looks of a IPS over the faster respons of the TN.offtopic:
How do modern IPS screens do in terms of allround gaming vs CRT's? I still use to think all LCD's just suck, I just bought a phone with the best display on the planet and everybody and every review says it has the most awesome black levels ever in a LCD, but imo it still sucks compared to CRT.
Insomniator - Monday, June 17, 2013 - link
TN panels ruined gaming for you? Give me a break.