Blur Busters Forums

I got my XL2420z in last night. Unpacked and setup without many hitches. Disappointingly there is only a dvi and vga cable in the box. No DP cable so you might end up having to buy your own cable depending on the video outs on your card and how many monitors you are running. Its a little disappointing to see them cheap out on a $2 cable on a $400 monitor. Plenty of connections on the back for all your various signal types. It even has a headphone jack on the side. I'm assuming thats for if you use HDMI, but I'm wondering if it can be made to carry the on board sound over USB? Its an okay monitor look wise. Range of adjustment is fine. I'm not a fan of the base shape as it blocks putting anything under the monitor. My last one had a hollow loop on the base that was great for tossing loose memory cards, etc in. This one is just dead space on your desktop. Setup isn't anything special, just make sure you set the refresh rate up to 144hz on the desktop.

So after playing with the monitor for a few hours I have to say this monitor the worst monitor I have owned color-wise. To the point that I thought it had booted up into a 256 color mode when I first turned it on. That's how weird and blown out the default colors look. Calibrated its passable, but just. I tried the icc srsbsns generated, and I have a xrite i1 color puck as well. They got the monitor into a tolerable calibration, but if you care at all about color it's still not the monitor for you. The worst part is all the modes keep blowing away your settings if you're not careful. The buttons on the side and the little hotkey thing it comes with are easily to accidently brush and change something accidently. Make sure you save your settings to the gamer buttons once you get it set up or you'll inevitably lose them when you hit that puck. The benq Black eQualizer is on fairly strongly be default. You have to hunt it down and kill it if you don't want your desktop to look all glowy. I serious can't believe BENQ shipped this monitor with this bad of calibration. Its like they are trying to sear your retinas with the brightness and gamma. TN color shifts were clearly visible even on this modest panel size.

Motion however is great. When loading a game, the low persistence has made be a believer. Coming from a s-ips 60hz(aRGB) monitor its kind of like the first time you get glasses and realize how much of the world you've been missing. Loaded up BF4 and was easily able to track objects while moving quickly. The test UFO looks pretty much perfect on the top half of the monitor- yah it has the bug that is mis-timing the bottom half. Alien eyes easy to see? Check. Text readable on the scrolling map? Check. Even with the bug its still far better than my old monitor on motion. Even the desktop feels more responsive than it did before. Kind of like a visual SSD upgrade.

I was kind of hoping that I could get rid of my older monitor, but I think it'll have to stay around for everything but gaming. I'll have to see if I can find a vesa mount that allows me to swing which one is directly in front of me easily. If you buy this one, buy it for gaming. Look elsewhere if other stuff is important.

Question-
Anyone know how to enable the 75-144hz strobe modes? They aren't available be default. Just 100,110,120.

TheRulesLawyer wrote:Motion however is great. When loading a game, the low persistence has made be a believer. Coming from a s-ips 60hz(aRGB) monitor its kind of like the first time you get glasses and realize how much of the world you've been missing. Loaded up BF4 and was easily able to track objects while moving quickly. The test UFO looks pretty much perfect on the top half of the monitor- yah it has the bug that is mis-timing the bottom half. Alien eyes easy to see? Check. Text readable on the scrolling map? Check. Even with the bug its still far better than my old monitor on motion. Even the desktop feels more responsive than it did before. Kind of like a visual SSD upgrade.

Yep -- Strobe backlights are how Blur Busters came into existence!

Low-persistence LCDs (via motion blur reduction strobe backlights) are finally arriving in larger numbers (NVIDIA LightBoost, NVIDIA ULMB found in G-SYNC monitors, BENQ Blur Reduction, and EIZO Turbo240). We are looking forward to the era where that a strobe mode is a far more common feature of gaming monitors, including IPS models eventually in the future.

P.S. If cost is no object ($600 USD), don't mind a smaller monitor, and you want strobing, good brightness, and good colors, it's currently hard to beat EIZO Foris FG2421 at the moment, with their LightBoost equivalent, Turbo240. Darn near IPS colors, combined with strobing. A smidgen more input lag than ASUS/BENQ monitors, however.

Wish you have had the new firmware of the BENQ XL2720Z though, as a new Blur Busters persistence adjustment utility is coming for the firmware-fixed Z series monitors! (kind of like a ToastyX utility, but specific to Z series monitors)

Anyone know how to enable the 75-144hz strobe modes? They aren't available be default. Just 100,110,120.

Create a custom resolution, either via ToastyX CRU or NVIDIA "Create Custom Resolution" button. Use the same resolution you are using now, but manually type in a custom refresh rate.

Also, optimal strobe motion clarity occurs at framerate matching stroberate matching refreshrate. And if you are optimizing for reduced tearing, framerate near/higher than stroberate is better than framerate significantly less than stroberate. (TestUFO 'perfect motion effect' effect only occurs during VSYNC ON, so use that for solo gaming where input lag doesn't matter)

Chief Blur Buster wrote:

TheRulesLawyer wrote:Motion however is great. When loading a game, the low persistence has made be a believer. Coming from a s-ips 60hz(aRGB) monitor its kind of like the first time you get glasses and realize how much of the world you've been missing. Loaded up BF4 and was easily able to track objects while moving quickly. The test UFO looks pretty much perfect on the top half of the monitor- yah it has the bug that is mis-timing the bottom half. Alien eyes easy to see? Check. Text readable on the scrolling map? Check. Even with the bug its still far better than my old monitor on motion. Even the desktop feels more responsive than it did before. Kind of like a visual SSD upgrade.

Yep -- Strobe backlights are how Blur Busters came into existence!

Low-persistence LCDs (via motion blur reduction strobe backlights) are finally arriving in larger numbers (NVIDIA LightBoost, NVIDIA ULMB found in G-SYNC monitors, BENQ Blur Reduction, and EIZO Turbo240). We are looking forward to the era where that a strobe mode is a far more common feature of gaming monitors, including IPS models eventually in the future.

P.S. If cost is no object ($600 USD), don't mind a smaller monitor, and you want strobing, good brightness, and good colors, it's currently hard to beat EIZO Foris FG2421 at the moment, with their LightBoost equivalent, Turbo240. Darn near IPS colors, combined with strobing. A smidgen more input lag than ASUS/BENQ monitors, however.

Wish you have had the new firmware of the BENQ XL2720Z though, as a new Blur Busters persistence adjustment utility is coming for the firmware-fixed Z series monitors! (kind of like a ToastyX utility, but specific to Z series monitors)

Anyone know how to enable the 75-144hz strobe modes? They aren't available be default. Just 100,110,120.

Create a custom resolution, either via ToastyX CRU or NVIDIA "Create Custom Resolution" button. Use the same resolution you are using now, but manually type in a custom refresh rate.

Also, optimal strobe motion clarity occurs at framerate matching stroberate matching refreshrate. And if you are optimizing for reduced tearing, framerate near/higher than stroberate is better than framerate significantly less than stroberate. (TestUFO 'perfect motion effect' effect only occurs during VSYNC ON, so use that for solo gaming where input lag doesn't matter)

Hello! Do you think the xl2420z with the coming firmware will have better motion clarity than the Foris?

ballen123 wrote:Hello! Do you think the xl2420z with the coming firmware will have better motion clarity than the Foris?

Persistence is as follows:
(lower numbers are clearer motion)

LightBoost: 1.4ms to 2.4ms (Brightness ~50cd/m2 to 80cd/m2)
ULMB: 2ms (Brightness similar)
Turbo240: 2ms (Much brighter at 250cd/m2)
BENQ Blur Reduction, old firmware: 2ms
BENQ Blur Reduction, new firmware: 0.5ms to 3ms (adjustable via upcoming Blur Busters utility) (25cd/m2 to 100cd/m2)

On strobe backlight monitors, persistence is the same as strobe length. Lower persistence is unavoidably often much darker though, so keep this in mind. If you want a bright picture AND bright color quality AND having strobing, there's really little other choice but to go with an EIZO FG2421 which I love when playing solo games such as Bioshock Infinite (VSYNC ON 120fps@120Hz).

1ms of persistence (length of strobe flash) translates to 1 pixel of motion blurring during 1000 pixels/second motion. (I now call this the Blur Busters Law of Persistence). It's been remarkably consistent in TestUFO testing. For example, 3000 pixels/second at 2ms persistence, translates to 6 pixels of motion blurring. A good test is TestUFO Moving Photo, http://www.testufo.com/photo and watching fine details such as window frames, or text on moving maps, or the tiny alien eyes on moving UFOs. Basically, fine details where a single pixel of motion blurring becomes noticeable.

The relationship between strobe length and motion blur is remarkably linear in testing. Once motion blur is less than 1 pixel during your fast eye-tracking speed (Varies from human to human, e.g. 2000 pixels/second from arms length from a 1080p monitor), that's your diminishing point of return. Mine seems to be occuring at roughly ~0.5ms. I am still able to barely able to tell apart 1ms persistence and 0.5ms persistence (you need really fast perfect-synchronized VSYNC ON motion to tell the difference).

If you wanted the least motion blur (even when having a dark image), then the new-firmware version of the BENQ Z-series is a big winner at this stage, being the world's first LCD to have a 0.5ms real-world measured persistence (once calibrated with a Blur Busters strobe adjustment utility, and when combined with larger blanking intervals in Custom Resolution Utility for more LCD GtG settlement time for mostly crosstalk-free strobing).

Obviously, I'm hoping NVIDIA adds strobe length adjustability to GSYNC's ULMB.

Chief Blur Buster wrote: P.S. If cost is no object ($600 USD), don't mind a smaller monitor, and you want strobing, good brightness, and good colors, it's currently hard to beat EIZO Foris FG2421 at the moment, with their LightBoost equivalent, Turbo240. Darn near IPS colors, combined with strobing. A smidgen more input lag than ASUS/BENQ monitors, however.

The issue with that one is the high minimum strobe rate. On top of the premium price, I'm looking at a GPU upgrade to hit what it needs.

Wish you have had the new firmware of the BENQ XL2720Z though, as a new Blur Busters persistence adjustment utility is coming for the firmware-fixed Z series monitors! (kind of like a ToastyX utility, but specific to Z series monitors)

You and me both. Hopefully they'll have it soon and I can just to an exchange. It'll be going back otherwise. Figured with the delay they would have fixed the bug, but nope.

Create a custom resolution, either via ToastyX CRU or NVIDIA "Create Custom Resolution" button. Use the same resolution you are using now, but manually type in a custom refresh rate.

Yah, the toasyX CRU gets stuck when loading on some counter. Never finishes loading. I let it run into the thousands and nothing.

Yah, the toasyX CRU gets stuck when loading on some counter. Never finishes loading. I let it run into the thousands and nothing.

Don't use ToastyX Strobelight with XL2720Z.
Use use ToastyX Custom Resolution Utility.

Are you sure you installed the correct ToastyX software application from http://www.monitortests.com?

Chief Blur Buster wrote:

Yah, the toasyX CRU gets stuck when loading on some counter. Never finishes loading. I let it run into the thousands and nothing.

Don't use ToastyX Strobelight with XL2720Z.
Use use ToastyX Custom Resolution Utility.

Are you sure you installed the correct ToastyX software application from http://www.monitortests.com?

Well I feel dumb. This was it. I just assumed it was one utility all the links took me the strobelight one.

Thanks for the review. Mine is actually out for delivery today!
Its good to see that when playing BF4 its not too bad with the bug. I'm sure mine will have it as well.

One thing that potential buyers should keep in mind, is that I am releasing a Blur Busters Strobe Utility which will only work on the Z-series monitors with the newer firmware.

People who would like to be able to adjust persistence (0.5ms persistence to 3ms) will be very interested in this utility coming soon. This is a much wider adjustment range than LightBoost 10% versus 100% -- it's like getting LightBoost less than 10%, and LightBoost above 100%. This utility, however, will only work on newer shipments of BENQ Z-Series (not yet shipping, but almost).

Chief Blur Buster wrote:One thing that potential buyers should keep in mind, is that I am releasing a Blur Busters Strobe Utility which will only work on the Z-series monitors with the newer firmware.

People who would like to be able to adjust persistence (0.5ms persistence to 3ms) will be very interested in this utility coming soon. This is a much wider adjustment range than LightBoost 10% versus 100% -- it's like getting LightBoost less than 10%, and LightBoost above 100%. This utility, however, will only work on newer shipments of BENQ Z-Series (not yet shipping, but almost).

Hello again Mr Buster. Will the upcoming BenQ xl2420G have both g-sync and Lightboosting?