Blur Busters Forums

Hello,

I have the monitor in question and have recently decided to start investigating and optimizing it for my gaming use. I only play fast paced FPS games such as CS:GO. I have used it with 144hz no blur reduction enabled so far but it has left me some things to wish for. For example I am getting some noticeable tearing while playing. I recently bumped into a thread for setting up blur reduction for 2430T but it seemed to be dead since there were some questions that remained unanswered and no one with knowledge about it had posted there for quite a while. I decided to create a new topic since my questions need answers and maybe some other users with a similar monitor can get something out of this as well. If this post is in the wrong place, I apologize for the inconvenience

So let us begin. I have tried reading some tips and done the following to get my blur reduction optimized:

What I've done:
enabled single strobe from the service menu
currently using the VT1500 tweak at 120hz
enabled blur reduction with intensity 24 and area 48
using the ICC profile for XL2430T final

Questions that I have regarding the subject:

1) Correct me if I'm wrong but I've understood that higher the area and intensity are, the less input lag there is for the cost of brightness am I right?
2) Do I need to run my game (CS:GO) at framerate matching the 120hz, or can I set it for example to 300? I feel like the game "lags" on 120fps and creates tearing every now and then.
3) In UFO test I'm getting some amounts of what I assume is ghosting, little gray outlines tracing the UFO's on these settings. Is it normal or should there not be any ghosting at all? The gray outlines tracing the UFO's naturally get smaller when I lower the speed of the UFO's and are a bit less visible in the middle of the screen and easier to see on the top and the bottom of it. Is there a way to get rid of this completely and how?
4) I have Firmware version 3, does the AMA trick still stand and how does it affect the monitor?
5) In the older thread I saw that people were recommending setting Intensity for example to 24 and Area to 48 or 0. What difference does it make if Area is 48 or 0 and why can 0 be used with any Intensity value?
6) Are there any optimized settings for perfect balance between input lag and blur reduction for CS:GO for the monitor in question?
7) I've seen VT1500 tweak used with values of 1350, 1500 and 1502. Are there differences between these?

Thanks for your answers and help in advance, looking forward to get most out of my monitor. Previously owned 2411Z and to be honest so far I am even a bit disappointed on my XL2430T

I have this monitor, but I haven't used it for a while, so I apologize if I say anything inaccurate.

As far as I know, intensity settings should not affect input lag as they only change the duration of the strobe cycle. The monitor is still fixed to 120 hz, so it's not as if a shorter strobe cycle (higher intensity) will allow for another frame to be displayed within that period. Area, I think, affects the phase of the scanout so maybe that has an effect on the order of some fraction of 8.33 ms, but I'm not sure. Generally you want to adjust the phase so that the middle of the screen is clearest, and this may mean that it is the most "up-to-date."

Locking to 120 fps generally produces more "input lag" than letting it go as high as possible because you lose some frames that may be more "recent," so to speak, but I'm not too sure on the specifics. Vsync is out of the question, though.

The gray outlines you're talking about are due to "strobe crosstalk." What happens is the backlight strobes on and off while the pixels on the screen change in sequence from top to bottom - while the screen "scans out." The pixels at the bottom scan out later and when the strobe turns off they may not have fully switched to their new configuration, and your eyes are left with a snapshot of this improperly formed image, hence the ghosting. Adjusting the area setting/doing the VT tweaks change the phase of the scanout so that the clear area is moved up and down.

Once again, I haven't used my monitor in a while, so I'm not privy to the different firmware versions and tweak values.

I should add that the XL2430T is not significantly different from the XL2411Z according to what we've seen on these forums. If you still have the XL2411Z and can return the XL2430T, it may not be a bad choice to do so, depending on how much you paid for it.

Hi, Oopuz!

I have absolutely NO idea if anything EXCEPT the VT tweaks work on the XL2430T.
"Intensity" is the same thing as "Strobe Duty" aka persistence. Someone said however that the values are inverted in the XL2430T, so I can't verify that, but that would mean Intensity 1 would = strobe duty 025, and intensity 25 would equal strobe duty 001.

You have access to the service menu to change strobe duty and strobe phase (The XL2730Z removed these options) so you can see how Intensity and Strobe Duty are related (they are the same thing):

http://forums.blurbusters.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2590

Area is strobe phase, and still follows a 1:1 value setting.
High Area values will have 1 frame lower input lag than low area values.
The max area value allowed depends on if a VT tweak is active and depends on the current refresh rate and the current refresh rate's persistence.
ALL of that math is in the thread I linked.

The basic formula is:
Maximum Strobe Phase (Area) = Refresh Rate persistence (ms) divided by base Strobe Persistence
or SP = (RP / SP), where refresh persistence is ALWAYS 1000 divided by refresh rate, and Strobe persistence is Refresh rate persistence divided by 100 WITHOUT a VT tweak active, and a FIXED Value of 0.167 with a VT Tweak active. The fixed value is what causes maximum Strobe phase to be reduced (check the math for yourself).

Simple example: 120hz with VT tweak:
Max strobephase = 8.3 ms divided by 0.167
max strobe phase = 49.7

120hz without a VT tweak:
Max strobephase = 8.3 ms divided by 0.083
max strobe phase = 100.

Values at or a few points lower than max strobe phase (which also affects maximum strobe DUTY) have 1 frame lower input lag than a strobe phase (area) of 000.

All of the previous AMA tricks and AMA profile changes and the blur reduction on+AMA toggles work on all of the Z series monitors (excluding the XL2730Z, although someone DID get a lower AMA setting working on that also but then he couldn't get it working again), because they all use the original firmware code and design that goes back to the Lightboost only XL-T series (the XL2430T is not a T series monitor). This includes how Black Equalizer affects the gamma of dark shades only, while leaving light shades alone, and so on.

The VT tweaks all work on the XL2430T just like the previous monitors, because the same hardware scaler is used (Mstar 8556T) so the same firmware code controls that scaler, but that where things start getting messy. The XL2430T made changes to how the options worked as well as adding new options (like the broken Color Vibrance, as I'm sure you know about) and the new Black Equalizer, which came with its own set of bugs. The original release of the XL2430T had a broken black equalizer, as BENQ Was changed to affect *brightness* instead of gamma, and this would cause horrible flickering if used. A firmware update fixed this, however no one has released any firmwares anywhere for the XL2430T, so even people with Mstar ISP devices can't update their XL2430T's if the firmware hasn't been dumped by anyone !

Because of this, I simply don't know if the AMA toggles and overdrive bugs work in the XL2430T. Someone else said they tried my AMA toggle and it didn't work at all. The best option is to try it yourself and see if you can make it work. I SUSPECT it CAN work, as the XL2730Z, which also uses an "Area" and "Intensity" OSD option for Strobe Phase and Strobe Duty, is able to do AMA toggles with blur reduction on (but again no one has actually figured out how to do it consistently).

Remember: no one knew about the XL2420Z/XL2720Z/XL2411Z AMA toggles either. I found out about them by **ACCIDENT** when I was bored and messing around with Photo mode and Movie mode presets randomly, trying to see if somehow I could find a bug that could make blur reduction work. And it turned out to be one of the most important bugs ever exploited, as the default blur reduction off AMA high setting is just horrible and WAY too aggressive on these monitors.

I can only suggest that you try it yourself and see what you can find. I had to do it myself too.
The problem is that I've seen the profiles and Gamer1/2/3 preset settings either seem to work or seem buggy.
Even on Benq's forums, someone complained that when they saved "standard mode" into gamer 1/2/3 on a XL2430T, when they then recalled the profile, the colors were wrong and were using a FPS/RTS based calibration instead of Standard mode's base calibration.
(on all of the Z series monitors, after a firmware reset, Gamer 1 defaults to FPS1, Gamer 2 defaults to FPS2 and Gamer 3 defaults to RTS)
But there have been at LEAST five firmware updates for the XL2430T, with absolutely NO firmware dumps or changelogs anywhere.

Anyway, you might as well be the guinea pig and experiment yourself with what AMA/blur reduction/AMA low toggles work and don't work.

Use the way I mention in these posts as a guide.
http://forums.blurbusters.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=2590

Hello and thank you both for your replies!

The XL2430T seems to be a grey zone for everyone. It seems to have numerous bugs and basically trouble running the blur reduction and tweaks correctly.

I looked into the whole Area and Intensity scaling in the service menu thing, and seems to be that both scale 1:1. When I put my Intensity on 16, I get a strobe duty 016, and Area as you said is the same.

So if I understood correctly, when I'm running the VT1500 tweak best possible settings for lowest amounts of input lag would be as high of an Area I can run while still being able to see something while I game. I have Intensity 24 and Area 48 at the moment. Turning area on 50 makes the screen go black.

I haven't yet had the chance to test the AMA glitch you discovered, it is indeed interesting stuff and getting it to work on my monitor would be great, I'm looking forward to test it. I will look into it more closely tomorrow and come back to you with a result. If the AMA trick indeed worked, how is it visible in the UFO test?

Once more thank you for your time, much appreciated.

OOPUZ wrote:Hello and thank you both for your replies!

The XL2430T seems to be a grey zone for everyone. It seems to have numerous bugs and basically trouble running the blur reduction and tweaks correctly.

I looked into the whole Area and Intensity scaling in the service menu thing, and seems to be that both scale 1:1. When I put my Intensity on 16, I get a strobe duty 016, and Area as you said is the same.

So if I understood correctly, when I'm running the VT1500 tweak best possible settings for lowest amounts of input lag would be as high of an Area I can run while still being able to see something while I game. I have Intensity 24 and Area 48 at the moment. Turning area on 50 makes the screen go black.

I haven't yet had the chance to test the AMA glitch you discovered, it is indeed interesting stuff and getting it to work on my monitor would be great, I'm looking forward to test it. I will look into it more closely tomorrow and come back to you with a result. If the AMA trick indeed worked, how is it visible in the UFO test?

Once more thank you for your time, much appreciated.

1:1 doesn't mean the values are the same.
What happens if you set the strobe duty to 25 (intensity to 25?)
On the XL2411Z, xL2420Z and XL2720Z, this equals a strobe persistence of 0.167 x 25 (with VT tweak active).
Which means a VERY bright screen.

brightness will be higher with blur reduction ON with strobe duty 25 than with blur reduction OFF at brightness 100 ! (this can probably damage the backlight also)

If you set intensity=25 (Strobe duty=25) your monitor will be dim, not bright, am I correct?
this means the values are inverted.

OOPUZ wrote:Hello and thank you both for your replies!

The XL2430T seems to be a grey zone for everyone. It seems to have numerous bugs and basically trouble running the blur reduction and tweaks correctly.

I wouldn't say it has bugs at all, and whether it can run any tweaks particular to other models doesn't really reflect on its inherent functionality. It does its job pretty well, though you can do better for the price given how many older models have already been hacked to achieve the same results.

Edit: You should get the newest version of Display Pilot from the developers' own site, by the way, if you want to switch profiles and all that: http://www.portrait.com/dtune/ben/enu/upgrade.html

Thanks for the link aeliusg! I'll look into that. You are right in that it delivers the basic things it should, but what I mostly mean as you said is that you can get so much more with the same amount of money. Where I live you have to go over 400 euros to get 2430T.

And Falkentyne,

you seem to be correct. The higher I go with Intensity the dimmer screen I get. What would this mean practically?

Is there a way to get in contact with you in a way that we could do this via talking? Teamspeak, Skype or some of the following. I could give you a lot more info without misunderstanding the instructions you give me since I'm really easily confused by this mathematical stuff I also have some wrist pain at the moment and typing a lot is a pain in the ass. If there is no way to do this via talking, I can endure and do it via typing as well. One has to suffer a little to get most out of his monitor

There's nothing I can tell you that isn't already in the forum link I gave you.
I pretty much posted everything I know about the monitor.

And as I said I can't help with the XL2430T. The easiest way to deal with the inverted values of the XL2430T is to pretend that Intensity/Strobe duty 025 is the same as Duty 001 on our other Z monitors and go backwards from there, e.g Strobe duty 024 on XL2430T = strobe duty 002 on XL2420Z.

So if you are using a VT Tweak with the Pixel clock patcher (Make SURE you are using the AMD/Nvidia pixel clock patcher!!! Displayport doesn't require this however), Strobe Duty 025=0.167ms persistence, Strobe duty 24=0.333ms persistence, Strobe duty 23=0.5ms persistence, Strobe duty 022=0.667ms persistence, Strobe duty 021=.83ms persistence, Strobe duty 020=1.0ms (and so on).
(these are the so-called 60hz persistence values since 60hz is based on 16.7ms. 16.7 divided by 100 is 0.167, so you can see where the 0.167ms came from).

Trust me on this.

you'll learn far more if you experiment by yourself and see what works and doesn't.
You're also asking me to talk about a monitor that I don't physically own. It's easy to do with an XL2420Z vs an XL2720Z because the firmwares are literally identical including what all the options do and where they are placed (you can actually flash an XL2420Z firmware into an XL2720Z and have the OSD work and touch buttons fully work, but the display image will be extremely and badly corrupted). The main difference is the "AMA low toggle" on the XL2720Z reduces the AMA intensity by a much larger amount than on the XL2420Z and XL2411Z, and since the panel size is different, voltage timings sent to the panel are different (even though their resolutions and display ranges are the same).

I'm not trying to be rude or anything but first, I do have other things I need to do with my time, I have issues to deal with IRL, and also ---everything--- I found about these monitors were a combination of reading forums and experimenting with options.

I found out about the AMA low toggle because I remember Chief and masterotaku telling people not to set AMA AFTER blur reduction was enabled, because blur reduction has its own AMA, and it would overwrite the blur reduction AMA with the one intended for blur reduction off, making things FAR FAR worse, but that was back on V2 firmware. So when V4 was dumped (no one had posted V3 for XL2720Z on these forums), I figured "hey let's see what happens if you set AMA after enabling blur reduction."

I wasn't the first person to find out about that. There was a youtube video of someone with an XL2720Z V3 firmware doing a review of it and he said "if you want to improve AMA even more, move the AMA slider back and forth back to high after enabling blur reduction", and that was before V4 was even posted.

On V3 firmware, which Benq told no one about as far as change logs (except there were low blue light profile save fixes), Benq added that changing AMA after blur reduction was enabled would neither use the "blur reduction off" AMA high value, nor the original blur reduction on AMA high preset, but would use a new undocumented value that was even lower. On the XL2420Z and XL2411Z, it was slightly lower than the original MBR ON+AMA high setting. On the XL2720Z, it was drastically lower. I have no idea why all three monitors didn't get the XL2720Z's setting.

This 'new' AMA was not a bug but was clearly done on purpose (as if you tried it in V002, it just made the purple trails twice as intense and horrible). Plus ANY change to brightness, strobe duty, strobe phase and Single Strobe would revert the AMA right away, which means quite logically that the overdrive value is probably re-calculated based on what the current brightness and strobe settings are.

However, applying the "new" blur reduction AMA to blur reduction *OFF* is just a complete profile bug, and I found out about that on total accident when I was bored, messing with stuff. And AMA high with MBR off is a total mess on these monitors--purple trails and ghosting trails EVERYWHERE. The profile switch bug that I mentioned in my linked thread fixes that in a jiffy.

And I don't know if the same things would work on the XL2430T, since the gamer presets were already changed to begin with and originally used the FPS1/2/RTS color values, even if you saved standard mode over them. Someone said this no longer happens, but on the Z monitors, if you overwrite Gamer 1 with "standard mode" then recall it, standard mode's low level (you can't change low level settings) color gain settings are used and recalled. On at least one firmware version on the XL2430T, if you did this, you would get FPS1 mode's low level color settings (Benq even said on their own support forums this was "by design") --translation: "this was a bug and we don't want to admit it" :/

I absolutely understand that you have IRL duties like all of us and I hugely appreciate the answers I have got in this thread. I will keep on experimenting with the stuff, but so far it seems the AMA trick is not working for me. I haven't given up yet tho. As you said, I know its hard to you to say anything since you don't physically own this monitor. Only way to figure stuff out is to read the forums and experiment. Thank you for your time and effort, I hope I achieve some results when I experiment and don't fuck my monitor up