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Official BenQ FP241W Thread !!! Info, Pictures, Reviews

man this thread has slowed down to a grinding halt!...... cmon guys surely you'd like to share your benQ goodness with the world.. how bout some pics? Xbox 360 pics and PC gaming pics...
 
How about posting some successes in getting through to BenQ's engineers on the 1:1 pixel scaling issues, with some verifications that it will get fixed when the Z model comes out...

Post some contact information, start a petition (to all the monitor manufacturers of the world), find that way to get through to that company of your choice, and get exactly what you want!
 
Gridneo said:
with some verifications that it will get fixed when the Z model comes out...
Click to expand...
Apparently according to tftcentral the Z model won't have 1:1 scaling either :(
tftcentral:
Note: the forthcoming FP241WZ will also be without this option.
Click to expand...
the option referring to said 1:1 scaling.
 
I'm using a monoprice gold plated DVI->HDMI cable form my dish to the FP241W and get blue sparkles even when the DVR is paused. sparkles indicate dropped bits and is a common problem on the westinghouse LCD TVs. An example can be seen here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFHbMGmu43w

My dish box DVI->benq DVI has no issue. It could be the monoprice cable but can't rule out the fact that the HDMI input might be flawed. I have no other HDMI sources to test from. It's not too distracting because it's only a few quick pixel flickers but you might notice it once and a while during dark scenes. I guess these problems are to be expected with first gen technology? HDMI 1.3 is right around the corner too.
 
Honestly ghosting on current monitors don't bother me much at all - if anything I don't notice it if its <16ms and <8ms gtg which most of the newer LCDs are speced at.

The trouble to come up with BFI tech to eliminate ghosting (which to me is suspect tech and may introduce the flicker effect that we've come to know and love so much from low refresh rate CRTs) I think could be better spent elsewhere.

I would have prefered the manufacturers to instead come up with working 1:1 scaling on all resolutions. I could do without spending a an extra 100 bucks for tech I dont need but I'd spend $200 more for a working 1:1 scaling. But noone listens to the consumer :/
 
Argh, in the UK, this screen's release has now be delayed yet again until November 2006.

What the 'frack' is that about??! :eek:
 
I got my FP241W on Friday of last week and have been breaking it in since then. First impressions just blew me away. I am coming from a 6 year-old 19" CRT and the difference in resolution is just phenomenal. The first thing I noticed was how much bigger it was than I thought it was going to be. I had been checking out 23" monitors in the stores, but this one still seemed drastically larger - which is a good thing. The other thing I noticed right off the bat is how friggin' bright this thing is. Viewing it in a dark room was almost painful. The out-of-box settings were on total "torch" mode. I've been calibrating in for the last couple days though and have gotten it to where I feel pretty good about the brightness, contrast and color settings. I feel confident that I'm resolving as much detail as possible and only clipping very minimal amounts in my blacks and whites.

I first hooked the display up with VGA. I had ordered a new DVI cable which hadn't come in yet, so I just went with my old VGA. I was a little upset because things looked a little soft overall, but I attributed this to either the cable or the lack of calibration (waiting on the right cable to do that). When the DVI cable arrived and I hooked it up it was like a haze was lifted from my monitor. Everything was CRYSTAL clear. I could see detail in my new desktop pattern that was totally blurred beforehand. If you're not using DVI (or HDMI) with this monitor you're losing a lot.

1080p Quicktime trailers look AMAZING on this thing. My comp doesn't quite have the horsepower to keep up with the frame rates (gotta upgrade), but the individual frames themselves are just ridiculously good looking.

The PIP function is really cool. I have an S-Video cable running from my cable box to the display and will turn on PIP when I'm playing my Xbox so I can keep watching TV during downtime in matchmaking. I'm using the smallest window size, which in my opinion is the best. It's the least obtrusive and doesn't soften the image as much as the Medium and Large sizes. The PIP window is in a 16x10 aspect ratio, so the TV signal coming in is squeezed from a 4x3 to 16x10. This doesn't bother me at all.

A couple bad things to report. I have two (2) dead pixels. I ran Dead Pixel Identifier and using the solid colored backgrounds located them. Both are not that bad, but for a $800 display and after all the positive reports I read here, I was hoping for none. I have to decide whether or not to try to get a replacement out of Newegg who's dead-pixel policy requires 8 dead-pixels before they'll do a return.

All in all I'm psyched about this monitor. It was a huge step up for me, true, but I've worked with LCDs for years and this one performs better than most. Now, I just need to figure out if I should take a gamble on returning it for one with no dead pixels or keep it and ignore them.
 
[omen] said:
1080p Quicktime trailers look AMAZING on this thing. My comp doesn't quite have the horsepower to keep up with the frame rates (gotta upgrade), but the individual frames themselves are just ridiculously good looking.
Click to expand...

What sort of specs does it take to drive the frame rate for 1080p movie on a monitor of this resolution? Is this more of a graphics card issue or a processor issue?

I'm thinking of using this monitor with a Dual 1Ghz Mac G4 and a Radeon 9000 Pro graphics card. So it's not the newest computer. Thanks for any thoughts.
 
cb474 said:
What sort of specs does it take to drive the frame rate for 1080p movie on a monitor of this resolution? Is this more of a graphics card issue or a processor issue?

I'm thinking of using this monitor with a Dual 1Ghz Mac G4 and a Radeon 9000 Pro graphics card. So it's not the newest computer. Thanks for any thoughts.
Click to expand...


Here's the list of requirements for Quicktime 7 on both Mac and PC. Sounds like you might come up just a bit short of 1080p, but just fine for 720p.

http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/recommendations.html
 
I'm using a monoprice gold plated DVI->HDMI cable form my dish to the FP241W and get blue sparkles even when the DVR is paused. sparkles indicate dropped bits and is a common problem on the Westinghouse LCD TVs. An example can be seen here.
Click to expand...
There is a know issue with the HDMI port on the dish box call tech support to verify
 
Omen, can you post screenshots of VGA and DVI picture, so we can see the quality/sharpness difference?
 
Ill be getting an upconverting DVD player this friday so I can test the 1080i via HDMI. no testing with full 1080p via HDMI yet. but ill post pics then.
 
cb474 said:
What sort of specs does it take to drive the frame rate for 1080p movie on a monitor of this resolution? Is this more of a graphics card issue or a processor issue?

I'm thinking of using this monitor with a Dual 1Ghz Mac G4 and a Radeon 9000 Pro graphics card. So it's not the newest computer. Thanks for any thoughts.
Click to expand...

Dude, I'm in the EXACT same boat as you -- same machine, same card. Apparently, as DarkAngel_ZERO posted, you need either a Dual G5 or a Mac Pro (Intel) to run 1080p @ the full 24 fps. I get about 12 fps when I run them on my machine. I was hoping to use my existing CPU to drive 2 displays - the BenQ 24 and a as-of-yet unpurchased HDTV. I've just realized that with my current hardware it ain't gonna happen.


mysteryman said:
omen,

have you tried the utilities and/or massaging to re-vive your 2 dead pixels?
Click to expand...

What utilities do you mean? I didn't try massaging or anything along those lines because from what I read that only worked with "stuck" pixels and both mine are black and appear to be dead. Is there some utility you can use to actually revive a bonafide dead pixel?


peTeMelster said:
Omen, can you post screenshots of VGA and DVI picture, so we can see the quality/sharpness difference?
Click to expand...

Yeah, sure. I'm off from work so I'll take some screenshots tomorrow.
 
How long is the included cable? I'd like to know so that I have the right length cable ready when I get the display
 
DangerIsGo said:
Ill be getting an upconverting DVD player this friday so I can test the 1080i via HDMI. no testing with full 1080p via HDMI yet. but ill post pics then.
Click to expand...

Thanks and we'll wait for the results, as usual. ;)
 
cb474 said:
Thanks for the link. What about other media players? VLC? Mplayer? Would they have the same specs as Quicktime? Can they display 1080p?
Click to expand...


VLC is one I use for just about anything (Lost in 720p with AC3 is sweeeeet), but remember, almost all HD playback, no matter what player you use, will have some sort of hardware requirement.
 
OK, I tried taking some screenshots of my new BenQ to demonstrate the difference between the VGA and DVI-D connections. Of course, taking detailed pictures of the panel turned out to be next to impossible - the camera doesn't have a macro lens and it has a hard time focusing on the surface of the monitor which is emitting light. Anyway, most of the pictures came out totally out of focus and useless for comparison. I did get two shots, however, that I think come close to demontrating the difference between VGA and DVI-D.

First off, here's a full-shot of my new display (on the DVI input, btw):




Here's a close-up of the right-hand side of the screen using VGA:




Here's a close-up of the right-hand side of the screen using DVI:



Let me just be clear that these pictures are both soft in their focus (due to the problems I noted above). Both connections are a lot more clear than this. But the DVI connection is just a lot more detailed and I think the DVI pic here shows the increased degree of detail. Using DVI is really like lifting a hazy filter off my monitor. It just becomes crystal clear. Edges are more distinct and there is no smearing like there is on the VGA input.

Anyway, I know the pics aren't the best and I wish I couldn't gotten some better ones, but I think I'd need a new camera to do that. Anyway, hope these help.
 
I was thinking of actually pressing the screenshot button on your keyboard, then pasting it into Paint or something instead of taking pics with a camera. Wouldn't that show the true quality of each connection?

Thanks for these pics though.
 
from what i understand if you take a screenshot ur o/s dosent go to your monitor and takes a look at what it is displaying and takes a 'screenshot', it goes your video card and gets all the info on what its putting out and draws up an image internally from that. dvi just transfers that info better than vga to the monitor, and hdmi even better i believe. the only way you'll see the difference is in person or the next best thing a camera.
 
Ah, I see. But DVI and HDMI should be identical unless its HDMI 1.3 with Deep Color I think because both DVI and HDMI should be pure digital.
 
peTeMelster said:
I was thinking of actually pressing the screenshot button on your keyboard, then pasting it into Paint or something instead of taking pics with a camera. Wouldn't that show the true quality of each connection?

Thanks for these pics though.
Click to expand...

that wouldn't work at all since a screen capture would just show whatever your graphics card is outputting. For example you could still do a "print screen" with the monitor turned off and when you looked at the saved image it would show the normal image.....you would need a camera shot to compare VGA vs DVI vs HDMI, but it would probably even be hard to tell a difference from that. Really you'll have to rely on perceived differences in practice from users
 
Yes, Kherezone already mentioned that up there. But I just wanted a comparison I could see for myself, just because I don't have the ability to actually see the screen in person. But my computer only has a VGA connection, and I don't plan on buying a new graphics card for a year or two.
 
cb474 said:
What sort of specs does it take to drive the frame rate for 1080p movie on a monitor of this resolution? Is this more of a graphics card issue or a processor issue?

I'm thinking of using this monitor with a Dual 1Ghz Mac G4 and a Radeon 9000 Pro graphics card. So it's not the newest computer. Thanks for any thoughts.
Click to expand...

to chime in with regards to playback, IMHO, the quicktime hardware requirements stated on their website have not been updated in over a year and due to improvements in HD codecs, their stated requirements are an overkill for contemporary hardware/software.

i'm using a P4 3Ghz northwood running at 3.33GHz...no HD gfx acceleration. it's single core (with HT) and 1080p playback of the spiderman 3 quicktime trailer would start near 22fps, drop to 12fps and at times even lower which is totally unacceptable.

after trying every codec i could think of i finally did a fresh install of windows sp2, installed WMP10, DirectX9c and Nero 7.5 with full updates.

this was when i installed the CoreAVC codec (and AC3 filter for audio), and i can now playback 1920x1088 .mkv, .wmv, .ts, .mov files without dropping a single frame. the spiderman 3 trailer's playback is also flawless in WMP10. (it still drops frames in QT7 - i think this is because WMP10 is using the CoreAVC codec whereas QT7 is using h264 which isn't nearly as efficient on "slower" machines...can someone please confirm this) either way i don't really care cause WMP10 is now my all round player for everything so i feel it's more convenient than switching between two or more players.

nero's built in codec handles the 720p .ts files, with ~20% CPU utilization so i'd guess 1080p in .ts should also be fine.

also, and more to the point, i got the below email from BenQ today, i have also emailed them requesting reconfirmation (in case there was a typo and they meant the FP241W and not the FP241WZ):

Dear Customer

The FP241WZ will be available at the beginning of December.

The launch of the FP241W will be November 6th in the UK. Our preferred
reseller for this product is Overclockers, please see their contact
details below:

Web: www.overclockers.co.uk
Tel: 0870 4430880

Best Regards
 
hi,

has anyone gotten a confirmation of a reliable source wether or not the Z version stretches the images as well ?

what else are the differences between not-Z and Z ? I read BFI, what is BFI ?

sry i'm noob at that.
 
SPEEDMAN said:
hi,

has anyone gotten a confirmation of a reliable source wether or not the Z version stretches the images as well ?

what else are the differences between not-Z and Z ? I read BFI, what is BFI ?

sry i'm noob at that.
Click to expand...

Aspect ratio options and 1:1 pixel mapping are NOT listed in the manual for the FP241WZ and i really don't think the option will be available sadly. The only change is the addition of BFI technology which is their Black Frame Insertion designed to help reduce perceived blur in motion on LCD's. Some more info about the FP241WZ and a section about BFI available here :)
 
Mine came in the mail the other day and I am pleased with its performance, I will be even more pleased when the rest of my system comes in.

Is there a work around to have 1080p displayed correctly on these monitors? Lets say that you configured FFDshow to upscale dvd video to 1920x1080, and then you set your video card to control the aspect ratios, would it show 1920x1080 correctly and add in black lines to fill in the rest?

I was planning on buying an upscaling DVD player, but since someone already said it stretches everything, including HDMI sources, there is really no point in me buying one now. However, by using the video card to scale things, that should let me view 1080p correct? Same goes for when I buy either an HD-DVD or Blu-Ray disk drive in the future right?

As for hooking up consoles to this monitor, has anyone noticed that all games get stretched to widescreen, and when you enable widescreen in games that support it, everything seems stretched out vertically? I did my testing using God of War and Killzone for PS2, and each appeared stretched out vertically when I enabled widescreen. I tested both games using both component connections and s-video. I noticed that s-video displayed the menus clearer than component when in 480i, but in games that support progressive scan, 480p on component looks much better.
 
redman223 said:
As for hooking up consoles to this monitor, has anyone noticed that all games get stretched to widescreen, and when you enable widescreen in games that support it, everything seems stretched out vertically? I did my testing using God of War and Killzone for PS2, and each appeared stretched out vertically when I enabled widescreen. I tested both games using both component connections and s-video. I noticed that s-video displayed the menus clearer than component when in 480i, but in games that support progressive scan, 480p on component looks much better.
Click to expand...
The reason widescreen games are stretched vertically has to do with the difference in aspect ratios. Widescreen content in the video world has an aspect ratio of 16:9, whereas widescreen computer displays have an aspect ratio of 16:10. This subtle difference means that your video source will only be stretched vertically, thus converting the vertical aspect of 9 to 10 (the width aspect of both your video source and the monitor is 16, so there is no need to stretch horizontally). This conversion has been said to lead to characters on screen having "giraffe necks", such image deformation is why discerning users prefer displays which have a 1:1 display capability.
redman223 said:
I was planning on buying an upscaling DVD player, but since someone already said it stretches everything, including HDMI sources, there is really no point in me buying one now. However, by using the video card to scale things, that should let me view 1080p correct? Same goes for when I buy either an HD-DVD or Blu-Ray disk drive in the future right?
Click to expand...
An upscaling DVD player will provide a higher resolution video source, meaning that the image stretching would not be as severe. Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are 1080p video sources, therefore the only stretching that will occur is the purely vertical stretching I described above. The only way your video card could prevent said stretching is if it created a "letterbox" effect to contain the 1080p content and use black bars to fill in the remaining pixels.
 
Badd said:
Aspect ratio options and 1:1 pixel mapping are NOT listed in the manual for the FP241WZ and i really don't think the option will be available sadly. The only change is the addition of BFI technology which is their Black Frame Insertion designed to help reduce perceived blur in motion on LCD's. Some more info about the FP241WZ and a section about BFI available here :)
Click to expand...
thank you, much obliged.

Is there an alternative that does have 1080p and contrast ratio plus good ms (unlike 16ms on the dell) that DOES use 1:1 ?

i was reading about the westhouse, but that's 37" and is not available in europe

I live in Belgium btw ;)
 
Robstafarian said:
An upscaling DVD player will provide a higher resolution video source, meaning that the image stretching would not be as severe. Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are 1080p video sources, therefore the only stretching that will occur is the purely vertical stretching I described above. The only way your video card could prevent said stretching is if it created a "letterbox" effect to contain the 1080p content and use black bars to fill in the remaining pixels.
Click to expand...

After reading a bunch of forums and websites, it seems that if you have a strong computer, you can upscale your DVD's using a program called FFDshow, along with Zoomplayer and a bunch of other plug-ins and codecs. I am waiting for all the parts of my new computer to come in, so that I can experiment and post me results.

The video card I am using is an older Nvidia FX 5200, so it does not support 1920x1200, but in the options there are several choices concerning scaling. Unfortunately my computer that I am using currently is 8 years old...so you can imagine that it is super slow by todays standards, making changes and trying out new things takes forever and is frustrating. My new computer will be here soon and then I can get to tinkering with settings.

Has anyone used this monitor in conjunction with a TV Tuner? I am trying to find ways to "beat the system" and have a 640x480 window that will display the Xbox (not 360) and PS2 correctly, without things looking stretched out. It looks great when I turn on the PIP, but it is a little too small, even with the largest PIP size.
 
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