BenQ Zowie XL2566K review – the ultimate CS2 gaming monitor

BenQ’s Zowie model has lengthy held favor within the aggressive gaming scene for its give attention to no-frills gaming efficiency, with its mice and displays typically seen as the most effective of their class. A number of of its previous gaming screens have been go-to choices for main tournaments for all method of video games and its newest top-tier FPS display, the BenQ Zowie XL2566K has been chosen for the PGL CS2 Main. Is this display worthy of its event placement? Let’s have a look.

In line for a spot on our greatest gaming monitor checklist as the most effective gaming monitor for CS2, the BenQ Zowie XL2566K has some stiff competitors from the newest OLED panels on the subject of pure responsiveness. The likes of the MSI MPG 271QRK supply tremendous quick response instances, a better decision, and a lot better picture high quality total. However, though this panel is pricey, OLEDs price much more, so this could nonetheless be a best choice for these looking for a pure gaming display.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K specs

BenQ Zowie XL2566K options

Apart from its display, which we’ll cowl in additional element in a second, the BenQ Zowie XL2566K has a reasonably fundamental characteristic set, however it’s enhanced by a few helpful sensible extras.

The again of the panel is residence to a flip-down headphone arm that gives a genuinely handy place to stow your headset between gaming classes. The precise arm is fairly delicate, although, so that you’ll need to be sure to don’t rage-stow your headset to keep away from the danger of snapping it.

One other helpful addition is a carry deal with on the highest of the principle stand. The show isn’t significantly giant or heavy anyway, however this makes it simply that bit simpler to cart round, which is a real consideration for a tournament-grade show similar to this one.

Equally, the big opening within the stand for cable routing makes the setup course of fast and straightforward – there are not one of the rather more fiddly cable preparations you discover on some displays.

Alongside comparable strains, the stand itself presents a full collection of changes, so you possibly can pivot the show into portrait mode for straightforward entry to the ports, in addition to rotate it left to proper, regulate the peak of the panel, and tilt it up and down too.

But extra usefulness comes from the addition of a wired distant management. This protects you from fumbling across the again of the show for the onscreen menu controls, and it even provides a scroll wheel for faster navigation and altering of some settings. It additionally has shortcut keys for 3 presets and a button for rapidly altering the enter.

These inputs include an ordinary DisplayPort 1.4 connector and two HDMI 2.0 ports. Notably, you don’t get both a USB-C port for simply hooking up a laptop computer or – extra damningly – any kind of USB hub. Monitor-mounted USB hubs usually supply a handy method to prepare your peripheral cables, and it’s a disgrace to see it omitted on an costly show. No less than the monitor consists of an inner energy provide, so that you don’t have to fret a few energy brick cluttering your desk.

Additionally included with this show are wings that connect to the aspect of the display. These supply a level of privateness to dam gamers from with the ability to see one another’s screens in LANs, and may present some distraction/glare mitigation. Nevertheless, there’s no high panel to cut back glare from above, as you generally see on professional-grade picture/movie modifying shows.

As for the panel itself, that is after all the center of this show. It’s only a fundamental TN LCD, which suggests it has the poor viewing angles, middling picture high quality, and fundamental coloration copy for which this panel expertise is understood. However, with its most 360Hz refresh price and the quick response time of TN (apparently, BenQ Zowie doesn’t make a declare in regards to the particular response time of the panel), you get a powerful place to begin for a speedy gaming panel.

The 24.5-inch measurement and 1080p decision are customary specs for the kind of video games this show targets, however it’s a far cry from the bigger, higher-resolution screens you may count on to get for the value of this panel.

The added secret sauce with this show is its DyAc or Dynamic Accuracy characteristic, which is the corporate’s time period for a mode that strobes the LCD’s backlight on and off. This helps to cut back eye monitoring movement blur, in flip making it simpler to trace shifting targets. No less than that’s the speculation. We’ll come to the observe later.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K design

It is a very utilitarian wanting monitor. Apart from the signature purple accents of the BenQ Zowie model, the entire display is completed in a really plain matte black plastic with chunky bezels which are a far cry from the modern edges of the newest OLED panels.

As for these purple accents, there’s a big purple plastic oval form inset into the upright part of the stand, surrounding the cable tidying gap. Then there are purple arrows on the stand’s base that supply up a hilariously pointless angle indicator. There’s a barely extra helpful purple peak indicator dial on the stand you can set to your most popular stage, which then makes it simple to line up the show with this mark.

Additionally around the again is a purple Zowie emblem – not backlit, as there’s no RGB right here – and eventually the scroll wheel on the distant management is completed in purple too. As comparatively simply seen markers for helpful features, the accents are a considerably welcome addition, although as an total aesthetic, it’s not a lot to put in writing residence about.

When it comes to ruggedness, although, the chunky bezels make sure the display will get numerous help and safety. Typically, the entire unit is inbuilt a means that makes it simple to maneuver round, and it feels just like the display will survive the trials of that transfer.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K menus

The XL2566K’s menus are complete, with lots of gaming tweaks out there, together with turning on/off DyAc (with Excessive and Premium ranges), adjusting response time (which BenQ Zowie calls Superior Movement Accelerator [AMA]), and loads of choices for adjusting the picture high quality of the panel too.

As is so typically the case lately, the show ships in an Eco mode that limits the brightness, however when you’ve accepted that you just’re joyful to crank up the watts, the show opens as much as supply a complete host of preset recreation modes, with the default setting of the show being FPS1. That is the mode supposedly optimized for CS:GO, however it’s not the most effective on the subject of total picture high quality, so that you’ll need to be sure to mess around to seek out the settings that you just want for non-gaming eventualities.

Notably, the distant management actually does make it a lot simpler to arrange the show and alter settings on the fly. The scroll wheel, which additionally tilts left and proper to behave as a D-pad, makes navigation quick, and the 1/2/3 preset buttons imply that, when you’ve arrange the show to your liking, switching between modes is as simple as doable.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K picture high quality

Let’s face it, dazzling picture high quality isn’t the principle pursuit of this show. Not solely does it have a modest decision, however the TN tech utilized in its LCD panel is infamous for having poor viewing angles, middling distinction, and mediocre coloration copy. This monitor is concentrated on gaming efficiency over all else, so it merely isn’t going to have thrilling picture high quality.

Nevertheless, its picture nonetheless must be ok to supply that each one necessary aggressive benefit, and if it might no less than produce a half first rate wanting picture when getting used for something apart from esports, then that’s a particular bonus.

With its 24-inch display and 1,920 x 1,080 decision, you get a pixel density of round 92ppi. That’s fairly low, and makes for seen particular person pixels at a traditional desk viewing distance. Which means textual content can look a contact blocky – particularly smaller fonts similar to these discovered on browser navbars – and also you usually don’t get the pin sharpness that we frequently count on from trendy screens.

Nevertheless, this lack of sharpness is in some methods why this display is so valued for sure video games similar to CS:GO/CS2. In these twitch shooters, it’s the visible cues of enormous, simply discernible pixels altering coloration that may make it simpler to register what’s taking place on display. The decrease decision additionally helps to make sure the latency of the sport is as little as doable, however visually it’s not a hindrance both.

Nevertheless, for video games the place there’s rather more visible litter or longer viewing distances, the dearth of pixels and sharpness is an issue. There merely isn’t the element to make out whether or not that distant object is a wavering little bit of grass or a head.

In any other case, this show is as mediocre as you’ll count on from its TN LCD. Viewing angles are certainly poor, which doesn’t a lot imply the picture disappears if you happen to barely transfer your head in entrance of it, however it does imply you will get slight shimmering results, and that sure refined coloration transitions might be misplaced from one nook of the display to the opposite.

As for HDR, it’s not even a characteristic you possibly can allow in Home windows with this show. This panel has a most claimed distinction ratio of 1,000:1 (the very best we measured was 955:1) and it has no prolonged coloration vary in any respect. Which means it’ll cowl 100% of the sRGB coloration house (as excessive as 96.5% protection and 115.4 quantity by our depend), however solely 70% Adobe RGB and 75% DCI P3 – the colour house utilized in many HDR requirements.

The tip result’s a picture that simply appears a bit boring. There’s not a lot punch to the colours, or depth to black ranges. The picture high quality is not any higher than what we’ve seen on LCDs from 20 years in the past when it comes to uncooked efficiency. Notably, Asus’ 540Hz TN LCD panel does really embody an prolonged coloration gamut, so it’s not like BenQ Zowie couldn’t have included this characteristic. As a substitute, it selected to only nail down the gaming efficiency options for non-HDR video games.

Out of the field, this monitor is about to an Eco mode that lacks brightness (172nits max) and has a really low gamma quantity (1.96), leading to a uninteresting and washed out picture. Flip this off and the default mode is FPS1 (image above), which the producer claims is the mode optimized for CS:GO. This mode units the brightness to 75/100, cranks up the Black Equalizer setting to five/10 (this brightens darkish colours to make it simpler to see in darker areas), and activates the all necessary Dynamic Accuracy mode.

The resultant picture isn’t visually significantly pleasing for many duties. The colour temperature is much too excessive at 8,283K, distinction is decrease than it may very well be (835:1), gamma is simply too excessive, and colours are oversaturated, making for a blue-tinged picture, unnatural-looking picture with total vibrant darkish colours.

Nevertheless, there’s no denying it helps key particulars standout in aggressive video games. Darkish particulars are extra seen and the unnatural coloration saturation and blue tinge helps emphasise variations in coloration (to make object extra seen). In the meantime, for non-competitive gaming, there are modes that look lots higher.

Swap DyAc off, allow the Person coloration mode, and go for gamma 4 (moderately than the default 3) and also you get as near a really perfect picture as this show will produce (as above). The colour temp hits 6,682K, which is way nearer to the best of 6,500K that’s desired for many customers, distinction improves, and gamma is best. On our check pattern, we tweaked the person coloration stability from 100 x 100 x 100 to 100 x 98 x 98, and this setting received us a close to excellent 6,541K coloration temp.

The resultant picture nonetheless isn’t superb, however it appears fairly balanced and pure, with a bit extra distinction and dynamism than the default. You possibly can see the distinction between the default FPS1 mode and the calibrated picture above.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K gaming efficiency

As you’ll hope, the XL2566K presents glorious gaming efficiency typically, with its 360Hz refresh price inherently which means that, even if this panel’s response time had been very poor, you’ll nonetheless get a rapidly-updated picture. Fortunately, although, this panel’s response time is first rate, although not fairly as blazingly quick as you may count on.

Utilizing our OSRTT response time tester, the panel averaged an preliminary response time of solely 6.02ms with AMA turned off, which isn’t underwhelming for a TN panel, although this did lead to practically no coloration overshoot, so the show’s colours keep correct. Crank up the AMA/response time setting to Excessive, and the preliminary response time greater than halves to 2.44ms, although coloration overshoot did leap up, leading to some inverse ghosting (the place you get ghostly trails of reverse coloration round shifting components of the picture).

With AMA set to Premium – the default mode for the panel’s default FPS1 Counter-Strike mode – the panel response time drops a bit of additional to 2.11ms, although once more coloration overshoot ramps up additional. Regardless of the overshoot, although, the show doesn’t exhibit actually distracting inverse ghosting. It’s simply stored in test sufficient.

As some extent of comparability, the MSI MPG 271QRX QD-OLED measured a median response time of 0.93ms, showcasing the response time benefit of OLED panel expertise, and that’s with mainly no inverse ghosting.

Because of this, even with out DyAc, this panel delivers glorious gaming efficiency in CS2 and Valorant. Nevertheless, as talked about earlier, the dearth of decision signifies that, whereas Apex Legends is playable, we wouldn’t need to play Warzone and even PUBG on this show, as an excessive amount of distant element is misplaced, ruining your probabilities of sniping and usually monitoring what’s taking place throughout these giant maps.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K DyAc

Dynamic Accuracy is in some ways only a rebranded model of the backlight strobing modes which have existed on varied gaming displays for a few years. Nevertheless, BenQ Zowie insists that its tech is among the many greatest on the market.

The speculation is that by turning off the backlight momentarily – not sufficient to be noticeable as any sort of flickering – the mind/eye is tricked into primarily refreshing itself, decreasing the retention of the earlier picture that was delivered to your eye. This course of primes the attention to register probably the most up-to-date picture because it arrives. It additionally has the additional advantage that the momentary blackness masks any blur/ghosting or inverse ghosting from a sluggish pixel response time.

The tip result’s that shows with this kind of expertise can present a lot better readability in moments of very quick motion. It might probably much more than bridge the perceived sense of movement readability throughout giant gaps in refresh price, with 240Hz screens utilizing backlight strobing showing to be faster and sharper than 360Hz fashions.

Certain sufficient, activate DyAc on this show and the movement readability is unbelievable. You possibly can monitor micro changes of your crosshairs or different participant actions in a means that’s simply a lot tougher on shows with out some kind of backlight strobing/black body insertion. It actually does add as much as PGL being greater than justified in selecting this show for the March 2024 CS2 Main.

What’s extra, not like some fundamental implementations of this expertise, DyAc doesn’t lead to a major drop within the brightness of the display.

One issue to notice about DyAc typically and this show particularly, nevertheless, is that it might’t help adaptive sync tech similar to FreeSync or G-Sync. As such, you’ll must depend on Vsync or simply enjoying video games with display tearing. That’s nice for aggressive gaming, however it’s good to have the ability to get rid of tearing and stuttering in different gaming eventualities, the place picture high quality issues extra.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K worth

The BenQ Zowie XL2566K worth is $599, making it a really costly 1080p gaming monitor, even with its 360Hz refresh price. You will get shows that supply the identical resolutoin/refresh price combo for half the value. Nevertheless, they don’t embody DyAc or the opposite tournament-grade additions to this panel. Nonetheless, it’s onerous to completely justify the premium right here.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K assessment conclusion

The BenQ Zowie XL2566K absolutely deserves its place because the go-to gaming monitor for Counter-Strike, with its mixture of lightning-fast response instances and extremely fast motion readability, because of DyAc. It merely presents probably the most responsive gaming experiences round, whereas offering a CS2/Valorant-optimized decision and display measurement, together with additional options which are helpful for tournaments and common aggressive gaming.

Nevertheless, this display is categorically not a jack of all trades. In order for you any of the options you in any other case may count on from a $600 display, similar to a bigger display measurement, a better decision, excessive distinction, a large coloration gamut, any semblance of HDR help, or a modern, low-profile design, properly, you don’t get that right here. It’s completely usable for work, video, and enjoying different forms of video games, however numerous screens that price half the value will get you a greater expertise.

BenQ Zowie XL2566K options

LG 27GR95QE

In case you’re after blazing quick response instances, however desire a higher stability of picture high quality, design, and efficiency, the LG 27GR95QE is a strong guess. Its 240Hz OLED panel ensures gaming efficiency is great, plus you get a 27-inch measurement and 1440p decision. It undoubtedly nonetheless has its points, however it’s a extra properly rounded show, and it’s the most affordable OLED gaming panel out there proper now.

Samsung Odyssey G4 24.5inch

At fully the opposite finish of the size, this Samsung display presents the identical display measurement and backbone because the XL2566K however with a 240Hz refresh price, and you’ll typically get it for simply $230 when it’s on supply. It additionally presents the superior viewing angles and coloration copy that you just get from an IPS panel, in addition to G-Sync help.