BenQ V2400W In Depth Review

Thanks,even the dashboard blades that are yellow and green like dark and dull. I was almost thinking of bringing my xbox into Best Buy and seeing if the Gateway or Samsung 24" look and more coloreful. I measured response time and it is 16-17ms so only 1 frame of lag which I love compared to the 47ms I had on the Samsung 214T. There is so much I like about this monitor, and I am even going to try and get another HDMI cable, but if I don't have vivid or at least normal color I will have to return it to BenQ for a refund. I would give this monitor GLOWING reviews if only the colors Glowed, or had an option in the on screen menu to turn the color up. If you ever played Gears of War you'll know what I mean, everything was just grey and washed out colors. Mirrors and shiny blades of your swords in Devil May Cry or Ninja Gaiden are dull grey, you don't see any of the shine/reflection of them like with my previous monitor or Sony HDTV 40" over HDMI which looks fantastic, but I am sure there is lag and it won't fit on my desktop ;}
 
how did you measure that lag? 16 or 17 ms sounds higher than most have measured. Maybe the G2400W would be a better choice for me if I wanted near 0 lag...
 
Is anyone else having an issue with the colors? I'm thinking of using this for the 360 and PS3 via hdmi. The shots from GTO looked good...

Also 10e would you mind posting your settings for 360 and pc? Brightness, contrast,sharpness etc. What display adjustments can I make in hdmi? With my sony SXRD I use standard on the 360 ...I thought I had read somewhere that using expanded messed up the blacks or something.
 
I used that same stopwatch program and took some hard to see pictures, but 16-17ms is the total lag+response time, which is very good at about 1 frame. For comparison my Samsung PVA panel was at 47ms or about 3 frames behind. Another neat trick is running 3dmark06 cloned and take a picture, you will see the faster panel at say 1200 frames and the slower pannel at 1204 frames!. I don't know if I got a badly lit panel or if the colors just won't get vibrant on this monitor at all. The pc is a little better, but colors are very blah and dingy. Funny thing is there is a color on the OSD, but you can never use it, it is greyed out over DVI and HDMI. All I can say is this panel looks good and is razor sharp and fast, but when in games (PC or XBOX), it looks like someone put a grey cellophane sheet over the screen when you compare it to a crt or my Sony Bravia 40" HDTV, where the colors are vibrant and the steel shines.
 
Correction: The faster panel at 1204 frames and the slower at 1200 in 3dmark06, not scientific but
you can see the difference.
 
colors are very blah and dingy.... when in games (PC or XBOX), it looks like someone put a grey cellophane sheet over the screen when you compare it to a crt or my Sony Bravia 40" HDTV, where the colors are vibrant and the steel shines.


Any other owners who can confirm this ?
 
I really wanted to know if my monitor had a problem or not, so I brought my xbox (easier than PC) to Best Buy and tried it on the Samsung 2493 and Gateway FHD2400. I must say the BenQ V2400W is by far the sharpest picture, but the Gateway had a setting called Saturation, and the Samsung had a setting called Color, and they both actually worked and were not greyed out of the menu! Anyways, I do not believe that any TN monitor will have vibrant colors like on my PVA panel or Sony HDTV. I liked the Gateway's glossy look and complete control of the color saturation, hue, etc., but it had horrible vertical viewing angle problems. So, I guess no TN is going to be perfect for games, BenQ COULD have done it by allowing the user to control the color saturation like Gateway does, but with a far sharper panel. I guess I'll have to hope the future will bring a PVA or IPS panel that is not 2-3 frames behind reality with a 47ms response+lag time (when they advertise it as 6ms, yeah right). Well, I guess as of the present time, you can't have your cake and eat it too with 24" HDMI,DVI monitors. It is a tough choice between fast and dingy or slow and beautifully colored. When shelling out $500, we shouldn't have to compromise (or eat magic mushrooms to make the colors come out), there should just be a color control like on a 50 year old t.v. Why can't any company get it right? I have heard rumors about a Doublesight 24" panel that is a PVA or IPS, does HDMI and DVI, and has been claimed to have low lag, but when I looked at some test sites it showed about a 38ms response/lag, which is what I would have expected. I would return this if I though something better was coming out soon, but I don't think anything will. People playing their XBOX's and PS3s on their new Sony or Samsung 1080p beautiful screens with the "Game" function on and the false 6ms advertising have no clue that they are in reality 3 frames behind me and that puts 3 bullets in them. That is why I don't multiplayer game on my PVS panel or HDTV. I was hoping BenQ would solve all my problems, so close; what I would do for just a color or saturation setting on this thing...
 
Wait, you can change color settings in the standard mode only, and set to user 100,100,100 it helps brighten things up a little.
 
How does it look now? Are you planning on keeping this? Response time is the #1 factor for me and it sounds like this is about as fast as it gets vs CRT.

Im going to be ordering one but the BenQ store has been down the last couple days. I hope it's back up today or tomorrow!!
 
Yes, I am going to keep it. The BenQ store will open Monday, they are moving this weekend.
The V2400W has pro's and con's, but I believe it is the best 24" Multimedia Monitor out as of now. It is a problem that all the bright well colored displays that are best for movies and games are NOT TN panels. You don't see Sony or Samsung making their HDTVs out of TN panels since the viewing angles are poor, there is colorshift, and the colors are just not as bright (or as many, so you see lines in gradiation of colors). But since gaming is a secondary priority on a HDTV, the slower more beautifull PVA, MVA, and IPS screens will be used. Until the figure out how to get those panels quicker, there will always be a 2-3 frame lag, despite their advertising of 6 or 8 ms. Now comparing the V2400W to all other 24" TN monitors I have seen, I must say it has the least color shift and best viewing angles. I prefer the glossy look of the Gateway, but it has HORRENDOUS vertical viewing angle problems. The V2400W is also the sharpest text and works great over DVI on the PC with the RGB setting. The screen has accurate colors and doesn't burn your eyes out. Now the problem comes in when you actually want to use a TN monitor for games and to some extent movies. They are all too dark color wise, and if you turn up the brightness/contrast to the max, you just wash out the colors. I have found that using the four different settings and switching between them is mandatory. As I have said, RGB mode works best for the desktop. Dynamic mode (which is supposed to be bright and colorfull for games, isn't) can be tweaked with a little extra brightness/contrast to be usable in some games and movies. Movie and Photo modes are ok for some t.v./movie watching, yet sometimes are too dark/dull, I don't use them much. The big discovery was that STANDARD mode is the only mode that you can actually go in and change the color saturation! So I set it to USER Mode and brightness 100, contrast 80, sharpness 1, red 94, green 90, and blue 88. This works pretty good for the XBOX 360 and PC games, I would still like more color and brightness (neon look) in games like on a CRT, but it is what it is. Your desktop will look all bright and bleached out, so make sure to go back to RGB mode for computer use. Most games now look pretty good, but dark games are still a huge problem. This is the only con I have found for the monitor. Forget about seeing anything in dark games like Doom 3, Prey, etc. Live with the fact that glowing swords and neon signs in games like Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden will just not look as good as with a CRT or good 1080p LCD HDTV. I love the response time and see no ghosting or lag. I have tried the 2ms AMA feature and can't see any difference at all, so I leave it off, because it does make a little weird ghosting when you move windows around. I also leave the dynamic contrast off, as it is totally useless once you have your STANDARD and DYNAMIC modes set the way you like them. The thin panel of the V2400W doesn't really matter to me since I don't look at the back of my monitor, and I don't like the fact that there is about a 5 degree tilt to the right on my panel. I think it was dumb to make the monitor stand not "standard" so that you can tilt it. I am hoping that the way the stand is too the right, in due time gravity and weight will lower the left side 5 degrees so I have an even panel height. BenQ, put the damn stand in the middle! So, If it is true that the G2400WD is the same exact panel in a more standard casing, for less money, I would get that one. But I always think newer is better and bought the V2400W just in case. All that being said, I have a perfect panel with no dead or stuck pixels or blemishes, so I am keeping it...........Until something better comes along. Now back to Halo 3.
 
Excellent info man...thanks.

I'm going to give it a shot. Color etc. is important to me but I'd rather play with worse color and be competetive than the other way around. By the way did you take the input lag test with or without ams on? Also turning brightness to 100 isn't washing out the 360 image? I just hope I can see enough detail in darkness or that will be a disadvantage too.
 
I did the test without AMA on. I would do it with AMA, but my t.v. and computer are too far apart to take a photo without major moving stuff. When I played games I did not notice any difference with AMA on, so for now I am leaving it off. I don't believe AMA would make any difference in lag (you still will be at 16-17ms, 1 frame lag over a CRT), but it is supposed to help ghosting of greys. Since I see no ghosting of greys I am not going to need AMA, and it makes some weird double imaging when you move a grey windows box around. Unless someone can prove it makes lag+response less than 16ms, I think it is an advertising gimick.
Each panel is probably slightly different, but going from 90 to 100 brightness is not a big deal, it is going from 50 to 80 contrast that washes things out. When I first got the monitor the first thing I noticed was the Xbox 360 blades were not the colorful orange, yellow, green, blue, violet-they were darker, dingier versions of the colors. My changes made them look almost like on a good lcd hdtv, but you do suffer a little wash out and lose some image detail to get the colors you want. It would be nice if future updates on the xbox would let you tweak more than just standard, intermediate, or expanded black levels which seem to do nothing anyways. That is why most of the newer games are coming with a brightness/contrast or gamma slider in them. The developers realize people have different lcd's and need different settings. Guitar Hero and Rock Band realized that with their calibration for lag. Luckily with the V2400W - there is no significant lag and you can play those games right out of the box. Gonna pick up Guitar Hero Aerosmith tomorrow, I should rent it, but I'm a sucker for these band games. I can always ebay it after I beat it, or keep it. Still waiting on the Guitar Hero Beatles, now that will be a game.
 
I checked everywhere, no B&M stores sell the BenQ. But if you kind of want to know what it will look like, look at the Samsung 2493 at Best Buy, but realize the BenQ is going to look sharper. I would have no reservations about ordering directly from BenQ's online store. They will let you return or exchange things for 14 or 30 days for any reason, and you get a 3 year warranty. Plus they have the V2400W special promotion till Monday, so if you ordered monday you would get if for like $409+shipping
 
If bought 3 monitors and returned them all to best buy, all 22", LG, Samsung and Westinghouse. The color on them were decent enough but each one of them had horrible back light bleeding on the top and bottom. How does BenQ's V2400 and G2400WD do with back light bleeding?
 
Backlight bleeding is not bad on the V2400W, a little at the bottom of the panel is all. Should not be a concern at all.
 
What about the bleeding on the 22", cause thats what i'm looking into. 24" is a little too much of a price jump and can't justify the extra 200+ bucks
 
I used that same stopwatch program and took some hard to see pictures, but 16-17ms is the total lag+response time, which is very good at about 1 frame.

I'm assuming you compared it with a CRT hooked on the same PC using the stopwatch program and taking photos correct? 16-17ms sounds too much from what I'm hearing.

This guy herehttp://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1317302 claims 0 or very close to 0 input lag and the photos seem to prove it...
DigitalVersus says average 8ms too...I don't understand how it could be 16-17ms input lag for your case. (I'm not saying you're lying or wrong, I just want clearification as input lag is my #1 factor upon deciding a LCD)
 
Sure,

I generally use sRGB mode with the following:

Brightness: 60
Contrast: 50 to 60 (usually at 50)

BasicColor (my calibration program) asked me to set the following in user mode:

Red: 95
Green: 93
Blue: 82

Brightness: 55
Contrast:48

This was to get the optimum (sRGB colorspace, 140 cdm/2 brightness, gamma 2.2) settings.

I find for general internet use the colors set in sRGB are good, and for gaming I am quite happy with them.

This may be a "taste" thing. Some people prefer more color saturation. This was always the argument in CRTs where Trinitron looked washed out vs. competitors because they eschewed the wow factor with accuracy.

I have never felt the colors on the V2400W were washed out or dead, but that is up to the user and what they want. Many people are getting more used to wide gamut monitors that naturally oversaturate colors. I find it weird that TN monitors are marketed as wide gamut, because a wide gamut monitor is best for Adobe RGB (ie. Photoshop). This is not TN monitors' target market (at all).

Comparatively my NEC 26" is a wide gamut monitor and the differences in Xbox 360 are pretty slight, and the NEC can really saturate reds and greens.

On the 360, the "blacks" setting applies to minimum black level. A setting of expanded sets the black level at RGB 0,0,0. "Standard" is 16,16,16. I think "intermediate" is 8,8,8, and this is the setting I usually recommend. This will ensure blacks are not "grey" and you still get good dark detail.

If you play in the dark a lot then the "expanded" setting is fine too.

Regards,

10e

Is anyone else having an issue with the colors? I'm thinking of using this for the 360 and PS3 via hdmi. The shots from GTO looked good...

Also 10e would you mind posting your settings for 360 and pc? Brightness, contrast,sharpness etc. What display adjustments can I make in hdmi? With my sony SXRD I use standard on the 360 ...I thought I had read somewhere that using expanded messed up the blacks or something.
 
16 to 17ms is not too much. Even well-trained gamers would likely be lying if they said they noticed it, unless at some point it goes very high (to like 30+) in variation.

I'm still finding the whole "clone" the monitor with a stopwatch to be only a good general estimate. I'm thinking of getting a DVI splitter to get this 100% right vs. CRT.

In Vista with nVidia cards the variance can be 20ms easily. I have also found variances with nVidia 8800GTS G92 in XP. ATI doesn't seem to have as much of an issue, but I have stopped testing input lag in Vista altogether, because even with ATI cards, there still seems to be a difference based on which video card port you use.

Regards,

10e


I'm assuming you compared it with a CRT hooked on the same PC using the stopwatch program and taking photos correct? 16-17ms sounds too much from what I'm hearing.

This guy herehttp://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1317302 claims 0 or very close to 0 input lag and the photos seem to prove it...
DigitalVersus says average 8ms too...I don't understand how it could be 16-17ms input lag for your case. (I'm not saying you're lying or wrong, I just want clearification as input lag is my #1 factor upon deciding a LCD)
 
I could be off with my 16ms testing because I only tried it from one dvi port. Some people get it faster out of the other port. I don't even know for sure which one I tested, but it is now plugged into the farthest to the right dvi port on my 8800 ultra, meaning farthest from the s-video output. Is this port 1 or port 2? Does anyone know if it makes a difference, and should I switch it to the port closer to the s-video output or leave it where it is?

thanks
 
I am surprised that 10e says that the viewingangles for this monitor is excellent.

If you ask me they look pretty bad!
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=8

It has enormous input lag also
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=14

and consumes more power.
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=14

G2400W is way better!!!!!

16-17ms is not "enormous" lag.

The power usage is barely increased.

The viewing angle pictures are a bit odd. Everyone seems to say the viewing angles are better than the G2400W but those images look poor compared to the pics they have for the G2400W. What's up with that?
 
The viewing angles are the best I have seen on any TN, but it is a TN. There is not any panels that get less than 1 frame lag. 1ms-16ms will be one frame at 60hz, and there should not be any noticeable lag like PVA, MVA, or IPS panels, or even some TN panels have lag (which is really response time+lag). All TN panels advertise between 2ms-6ms response time and just add about 14ms to those numbers in general for a TN panel and about 35ms for any other type of panel.
 
10e> yes, I use a 8800GTS 512MB too and would like to know which DVI port you refer to as 'port1' and 'port2' in your review. thats strange how 'port1' is slightly faster(less input lag) than 'port2' so I wanna be sure I'm using the faster port.
 
Ok, when I connect the D-Sub cable to my 7600GS it doesn't recognize any input. The DVI works fine, but the VGA does not. I need the VGA for 1:1 pixel mapping right, as display options are disabled with my DVI. Please help
 
The viewing angles are as good as any TN panel out there. The only "color shift free" technology out there is S-IPS. Even *VA has color shifts off-angle and a grey color shift side to side.

Regarding input lag, 20ms was the worst, and the average is 8 ms. Why would you say the input lag is bad? Also this site always has inflated numbers. For example, they list the lowest input lag on the Samsung 245T to be 58.8ms while prad.de says average is 39ms. Who is right?

http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=36&mo1=332&p1=3107&ma2=48&mo2=229&p2=2117&ph=14

http://www.prad.de/en/monitore/review/2007/review-samsung-245t-part14.html

Also, they list the BenQ FP241VW as having between 3 and 4 frames of input lag. This is egregious. I have this monitor. There is no way the input lag is that bad. This is why I continually say the best way to test is via splitter. The whole clone port thing doesn't impress me.

Use this site as a comparison site, not as a hardcore tool. If there are two monitors you want to compare, that's fine, but as an evaluation tool it has some issues.

Regards,

10e

I am surprised that 10e says that the viewingangles for this monitor is excellent.

If you ask me they look pretty bad!
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=8

It has enormous input lag also
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=14

and consumes more power.
http://www.digitalversus.com/duels.php?ty=6&ma1=48&mo1=304&p1=2943&ma2=48&ph=14


G2400W is way better!!!!!
 
Sure,

nVidia is nice enough to label them. Port 1 is the port nearest to the motherboard connector, and port 2 is the one closest to the slot screw. ATI is the opposite, but their ports are not marked.

nVidia under Vista will always be faster out of port 2 in clone mode. There is a 10+ms difference. I have no idea why.

Regards,

10e

10e> yes, I use a 8800GTS 512MB too and would like to know which DVI port you refer to as 'port1' and 'port2' in your review. thats strange how 'port1' is slightly faster(less input lag) than 'port2' so I wanna be sure I'm using the faster port.
 
There should be no difference outside of aesthetics.

The Acer looks like a nice glossy display, but there are no reviews out for it. The only thread I could fnd was here:

http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1232905&highlight=p243

It would be fine for PC methinks, but even though it has an HDMI, it's not seemingly too useful for consoles or BluRay players due to lack of 1:1 support. I believe it stretches every signal/image size to full screen.

Regards,

10e

Thanks so much for the review 10e, I've entered the market recently for a nice 24" monitor. From what I've seen I need to smack down $350-$450 to get a decent one. I was wondering though, how does the V2400W differ from the G2400WD? And how do they compare to this Acer:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824009125
 
Just wanted to say thanks for the reviews on the V2400W. I ordered mine last night and should have it by the end of the week. I'll post pics :)
 
So does anyone know how the 1:1 pixel mapping works on a DVI and/or why my VGA doesn't work? I may be returning if it's just a bad port
 
thanks 10e.
*switches DVI connector to port2, the farthest from motherboard*
Here is what I found:
- On 45% of the photos, the monitor on port 2 was ahead by 1 frame (15ms) whether it was the V2400W or the G2400W
- On 40% of the photos the two monitors were even
- On 10% of the photos the monitor on port 1 was ahead by 1 frame (15ms)

I'm thinking about buying one of these BenQ 2400s but I can grab a G2400 for cheaper so I think I'll go with the G model.
Aside from the appearence, they use the same panel and specifications are exactly the same it seems correct?
 
I ordered the V2400W this morning and should have it later in the week. I'll try to have a full report when I get it. The 360 is down again ( red lights... ) but I should have some PS3 info and some PC info.
 
Just wanted to chime in. I received my V2400W in this morning.

Good lord it's a pretty monitor. Aesthetically I don't think they could have done better. I've played a little Age Of Conan on it and not done much else and haven't noticed any lag whatsoever.

Viewing angles are also not bad.

Love the matte screen, love the design, VERY pleased overall.
 
Sounds good!

Mine is on it's way from only 2 states away so I should see it by tomorrow. Can't wait!
 
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