Are Benq's really that bad in image quality?

[Grimezy]

Hi, I've been browsing these forums for a couple of weeks now in search for a new monitor recommendation and I'm still slightly in doubt. A bit of background info... I bought my rig about 6 months ago and started by playing on a 32 inch Hitachi LCD tv. This wasn't really working and I finally found enough room to have a proper desk setup. Which left me using our 7 year old Samsung Syncmaster 920n... A lovely 1280x1024, VGA connected, office monitor.

I've been looking all over the places at every review on the internet and I'm still no wiser (well a bit wiser but not massively). I run a i5-3570 with a 2gb GTX 670. I achieve 60-70fps on the latest games with max settings and older games I easily get over 100fps and even on most of the newer ones if I tweak the graphics slightly.

So I've been considering a 120hz screen which really in the UK, narrows it down to one of the Benq's, in which I'm edging towards the XL2411t as it's cheaper, newer and seems to have fixed some of the 2420's problems.

Now my questions are:

1) Will my single GTX 670 really benefit from a 120hz screen. I'd assume so when I'm playing older games, etc but I don't want to be buying new games and having to turn the graphics down if they're not getting a decent frame rate. I assume that a 120hz screen will perform identically to a 60hz screen at lower frame rates? Although I will notice more laggyness if it drops from 120 to 60 than if I am consistently only achieving 60fps...?

2) I've read all the arguments online. Yes the human eye can see more than 30fps and yes, apparently 120hz is night and day compared to 60hz. This is my reason for wanting one to take advantage of my pricey rig. But the downside always seems to be the colours looking washed out. Now like I said, I'm playing on a 7 year old monitor and the colours genuinely don't bother me. The image looks slightly blurry due to the VGA input and the colours can shift on the screen a bit but I don't inspect every tree to make sure it has realistic colours and once I'm immersed into a game I tend not to pay attention to those things.

However, I do want the image to 'wow' me still, I want to turn on a game like Crysis 3 and think flippin heck, that looks brilliant. Am I going to get this from the benq? And if not is the 120hz really worth it for that major downside? My friends all think that PC graphics will be amazing compared to their consoles and will want to give mine a go, but if I stick them on a 120hz that looks shoddy I doubt they're going to be that impressed, especially if they aren't really noticing the 120hz advantages.

3) Are there any other recommendations that may suit me more? I play FPS's although I wouldn't necessarily call BF3 fast paced... Which is the reason I probably wouldn't mind a 60hz IPS or something as I would see 120hz being more beneficial for playing things like Quake and Counterstrike. I'm quite a firm believer that peripherals do not turn a player into Jesus, and that while they may be an advantage, I have never been killed by somebody and thought "Dam, they had a quicker screen than me". Other than FPS's I also play quite a variety of single player games so image quality may be more important than refresh rates to me. However, if the higher refresh rates produce a better image due to their smoothness then I'm good with that. I don't really have a budget for other recommendations but I probably have about £500 if I'm honest. I don't want to spend that but if it's genuinely worth while to do so with my setup then I'll consider it.

Thanks for any info, I didn't mean to rant but it turns out I did anyway. I'm sure I'd be happy with any screen so should just buy one but I want it to be right! I just get the feeling reviewers can be far too critical and that I'd probably be content with the colours and quality of a TN panel. Heck, I read reviews about my Punto online and it gets absolutely slated whereas I think it's been a good little car. Problem is the people reviewing them have driven things much much more expensive and probably don't appreciate how good it can be. It's probably the same with monitors, if they just reviewed a 1440p IPS panel, then obviously a 1080p TN panel isn't going to look that hot.

I dunno... Any help would be appreciated

 

[Grimezy]

Thanks for the reply I think I'm gonna suck it up and do it! Like I said, people are probably being overly critical and I'm sure with the right settings it can look decent. I don't do much in the desktop at home so it would purely be for gaming.

I can always send it back if it's truly horrible!

 

[Grimezy]

and you've measured this on the 1280x1024 screen? 1080p is 1.6x more pixels meaning those framerates are going to drop a lot....

No, like I said, I used to play on a 32 inch 1080p Hitachi LCD tv.

 

[Grimezy]

Thanks for your input guys, I ordered the XL2411T yesterday and it arrived this morning at 7:55... just as I was about to set off to work. I did have chance to have a quick look in side and it all seemed pretty solid. However, for some reason the VGA cable was plugged into the monitor... is there a reason for this? I haven't bought a monitor for a while but can't remember them coming with a cable already in it, especially one that I won't be using.

And as for the image quality, I'm hoping it will be fine I'm not fussy and I tend to just make do with what I've got but I'll probably end up playing with the settings a bit. I just hope 120hz hasn't been over-hyped for nothing. I'm not getting my hopes up...

 

[Grimezy]

I'm not 100% but I'm pretty sure my XL2420T came with the VGA cable plugged in. If you look at the piece of paper with the wires and stuff on, it's shown as being plugged in by default.

Ah fair enough! I'll have a look at that tonight then. I unplugged it as it was annoying me x) I was started to think it was a returned model that they had boxed back up and had tested beforehand.

Can't fault the service so far though, just hope everything works properly!

 

[Grimezy]

Grimezy any chance you can post your thoughts after a good play around with the settings and some gaming time?

I look forward to hearing more about this monitor as it is one i am really considering!

Yes absolutely, it's one of the things I was craving for when I was deciding about mine. There really is a lack of decent reviews online and then sites like TFT Central and Prad can be too critical in my opinion.. not too critical but they're doing tests that would never affect me as an average consumer. And it's very difficult to find a discussion about one of the benq's without it turning into the old 60hz v 120hz debate.

I shall report back tonight!

 

[Grimezy]

My 2p.

It's a fantastic monitor but don't get it if you don't like fiddling/adjusting to find your sweet spot.

As has been said by a lot of people, out the box it sucks. I think this is where a lot of the negative feedback comes from.
You spend a fair amount of money on a monitor and you're excited to get it. You're excited to unbox it. You're excited to set it up. You plug it in and ..... you're deflated

I think it's on purpose to make sure you take advantage of the monitor's adjust-ability if that makes sense.
Don't forget this monitor has downloadable presets for games etc and is really a gaming monitor with nothing but gaming in mind.

If you want to buy a monitor, turn it on and be amazed by maybe turning the brightness or contrast up or down a bit then don't buy it.
If you like playing with settings and want a really responsive, well built, personalised experience then get it.

I love mine but did suffer from a bit of deflation when I turned it on.

At times I do wish there were less options to adjust

Hmmm, I wonder if my missus could figure out how to configure it for me so I don't have to look at it initially.

One thing I did notice just from picking it up is it feels much better built than I expected, just from feeling the weight of it. The plastic from what I can tell doesn't feel cheap and the stand feels brilliant.

 

[Grimezy]

Just an update on my new Benq XL2411T. It's a fantastic monitor, wish I'd taken reviews with a pinch of salt more than I had done as I was being put off by every little critique. Not sure if I just got amazingly lucky but I see nothing wrong with my colours out of the box, maybe my eyes are just really unaccustomed to what proper colours should look like. I did use the PCMonitors settings guide and tweaked some of the settings slightly which made it look a little bit nicer, however my Red setting keeps resetting itself everytime I turn my monitor off and on, any ideas? Tried saving a profile and it didn't work. At 100 I see a red tint in my top left corner on white screens which goes away when I tweak it down to 96.

I haven't had a huge chance to test it but what I would say is 120hz is not as clear to me as people made it out to be. I know it is down to individual preference but now that I own a monitor I feel I can give my input and say that it's not as game-changing as people make it out. Yes it is very smooth at 120hz, especially on battlefield, I have no issues at all tracking a running target and my gun seems to stay with them as I fire. But I don't feel like I would rip my eyes out going back to 60hz as I was playing Planetside at 40fps at one point due to it being a busy and it still looked perfectly fine with no jolting or stuttering. What I would say is the difference is probably more noticeable if you dropped from 120 down to below 60. But playing a game at a consistent figure seems fine even if you aren't near 120fps and the monitor still performs brilliant with its non-existent input lag and response rate. Don't get me wrong, 120hz is fantastically smooth but better image quality may be more worth while for people who play single player games more.

The build quality is fantastic, was slightly worried at the pure amount of plastic that it appears to have but it really is solid and sturdy, stand is very adjustable and doesn't move at all during normal use. OSD is awkward to navigate as each time you scroll down the picture modes it flicks off to show you the new one rather than you scrolling down quickly and being able to just apply you want. It would not surprise me if benq have done this on purpose to make the S-Switch more appealing in the Benq XL2420T. I would definitely see the benefits of it now.

Overall, I would not hesitate to buy this monitor again, good image quality (even though my settings probably still aren't quite right, good build quality, fantastic responsiveness and smoothness. And at £220-£240 it's only around £60-£70 more than what you'd pay for a 60hz TN or IPS panel unless you go for really cheap. Size is also staggering, I wasn't quite expecting it to be so large, very pleased I didn't go for a 27 inch now, my desk wouldn't have fitted one on! My only other downside is everytime you turn it on you're presented with a lovely bright purple screen with Benq written on it... Minor downside I'm sure I'll learn to live with!

PM me if you still have any queries I may not have covered everything. I have yet to try 3D or the lightboost trick and I did see some flickering when I set my monitor to 144hz so I chose to turn it down! Apparently a common issue but no bothers for me really.

 

[Grimezy]

Im pretty much done with TN panels, the next one is going to be an IPS of some sort or if I wait until my hair is grey enough perhaps even some sort of OLED. Been thinking of a Catleap q270 and OC it to 85-100hz. Thoughts?

Can I ask why you say that? I actually watched someone playing BF3 on my XL2411T from possibly the narrowest angle I could look sensibly from and about 6 feet away and honestly I saw very little difference in colours (I'm not being a new fanboy, these are my genuine observations). I have noticed that sometimes the top of the screen can be a bit dark when sat directly infront of it but I assume that how I'm sat as I'm quite low compared to my screen.

I genuinely am a little baffled as to why I took all of the negative views on board before I purchased mine. I assume it's because I can't miss something that I've never had i.e. 1440p IPS panel.

 

[Grimezy]

Another update from my Benq XL2411T after about 2 weeks of owning it. The screen is still performing very well and makes gaming a pleasure. In hindsight, I probably could have settled with a 60hz monitor as most of the latest games only run at around 60fps on max settings with my GTX670 and still look fantastic. The only games I've really seen 120hz is BF3 and L4D2 which are very smooth and it does seem to improve my performance but I wouldn't say 60hz is obselete in the slightest. I played planetside 2 at a steady 40fps and I think as long as it's a consistent frame rate then you should have no issues with 'laggyness'.

I have come across one problem though. I'm playing Farcry 3 at a steady 60fps using Nvidia's optimise tool and I do notice in fast motion there are lines at the bottom of my screen. I can only really see it on the ground rather than the sky but it's genuinely quite distracting. I'm not the kind of person who normally would pick up on ghosting or input lag or sensitive to flickering and it is still bothering me. I heard of flickering problems when playing at 144hz due to the voltage control or something so I've had my monitor on 120hz since both in my nvidia control panel and on my desktop. I can't for the life of me work out what this flickering is. I don't seem to have it in any other games... I don't think I do anyway, it's almost like the lines you used to get on analog screens.

Other comments are that the vertical viewing angles really are quite poor. Obviously this is to be expecting with the panel type but I was expecting a little better. Horizontal angles seem fine but I was watching something on catch up the other day sitting about 6 feet away from a slightly lower angle and the screen was practically pitch black. It was quite a dark program so I thought it was normal but when I stood up and looked at it straight on it was so much more clear. I personally didn't think I would be using the screen from different angles but it turns out I have done a couple of times and I wouldn't suggest it if you do plan to use it to watch films, etc from anywhere but infront of your screen. I even notice the bad angles sat square-on though especially at the top of the screen.

I have also noticed some backlight bleed on black screens but makes it look very cloudy and blotchy but this is not noticeable when gaming, etc. I only really notice it on the Farcry loading screens. I have yet to play a dark game like amnesia so can't comment on that yet.

The other thing is the menu is a bit of a pain, especially changing presets. If you expect to do it a lot, I'd suggest the XL2420T with the S-Switch. I would quite happily use one now after experiencing the OSD of the XL2411T. I also don't like the restrictiveness of changing the black equalizer in certain presets. I use the standard mode and it won't let me change it and it won't even tell me what it's on. Games have occasionally look a bit washed out in dark areas and I do wonder if this is the cause for it.

Overall it's a very good monitor and good for what it sets out to do. My friends have had a go on it and even though they can't really notice the 120hz they like it as a monitor in general. It is very solid and adjustable although I've barely had to adjust the stand because of my seating position. It's a good feature but a bit of an obsolete one if you don't plan to constantly adjust your position and potentially overkill for somebody like me. The colours are better than expected although do need a slight tweak (not as bad as it sounds) and the responsiveness is very good. Many a time I've had close calls in BF3 and come out on top which I can't help but feel is because of the screen.

A good monitor but with some minor downsides. If you purely plan to play FPS's online then it's fantastic, if you're planning to play a lot of single player campaigns, I would suggest a standard monitor unless you have a rig capable of 120fps on max settings.

P.s. Sorry for the rant but I struggled finding actual user reviews when I was looking to buy mine. Also if anyone could shed some light on the issue I have playing Farcry it would be much appreciated!