Benq Aq Colour Monitors

We have been BenQ's key supporter in Australia for the last 5 years and see only a very bright future ahead. We have an unmatched relationship with both BenQ Australia, but also right back to the key BenQ engineers who develop these products - so you can be sure if you buy a BenQ monitor from Image Science you will simply get the best advice and support available - both before and after your purchase.

BenQ arrived relatively late (around 2013) to the Colour Accurate monitors market but their ability to handle more of the process in house gives them a substantial price advantage over their competitors.

In 2019 they've fully fleshed out their range with larger sizes and now offer a number of attractive, high performing screens at very competitive prices. BenQ colour accurate monitors are now internationally known as BenQ AQ Colour Monitors (in some markets you may still see BenQ PhotoGenic/PhotoVue referred to.

It is fair to say at this point that BenQ are more than likely the market leaders in colour accurate monitors worldwide. Thanks to their excellent relationship with us, BenQ have in particular seen massive growth in the Australian market with thousands of their SW and PV monitors now out in the field and in daily use with both professional and amateur users.

The PV Series has traditionally been BenQ's flagship colour accurate series - targeted specifically at high end content production work in the Photo, Print, Video, VFX, and Rendering areas.  However in recent times it is increasingly hard to tell the difference with the latest, much improved, SW series models (originally the 'prosumer' range).

Both these ranges now offer the same features as the better known options from Eizo and NEC - 10 bit input/panels, high bit depth/3D Look Up Tables (LUTs), Direct Hardware Calibration support, and excellent colour accurate quality and general ergonomics.

The PV270 model is a real, battle tested winner - excellent size and image quality, incredibly good pricing for a complete package (you only need to add an i1Display Pro), and the addition of a number of video editing friendly features mean this one has become very popular with both still image makers and video producers alike.  Overall, it's probably our favourite BenQ model as it's so consistent, and a proven solution.

New on the scene for mid 2019 is the SW270C - this is an upgraded SW2700PT (see below) - that is considerably improved.  Basically, they have very significantly improved uniformity, added USB-C (including power delivery) and HDR/video support.  If you want USB-C in particular, this is the one to go for.

The SW271 arrived in 2018 and has been an enormous success for BenQ - a 27 inch 4K screen with all the features you could want, and an amazingly low price point.  Whilst technically the SW271 is part of a different range, it is so good (and such great value!) that we've put it in this list (read our evaluation to see why!).  This model has become hugely popular - a 4K, colour accurate wide gamut model with great performance at an amazing price - who doesn't want that??

And if you want the biggest bad boy out there, then the BenQ SW321c is the logical choice.  32" of 4K beauty.

The SW Range are aimed squarely at serious amateur and professional photographers.  Perhaps in the early days these were seen more as 'camera club' level monitors, with each new model BenQ have significantly refined their offerings and the three latest - SW240, SW271 and SW270c - are all very popular with professional image makers of all types.

These models have many of the features of the P range - wide gamut, high bit depth processing etc., and while it's not quite up to the P series quality, they're surprisingly close and it's a huge step up for colour accuracy from the pedestrian desktop monitors most people are running (like Apple Cinema Displays and Dell Ultrasharps). 

Well worth considering if you're after significant improvement with your colour but you're on a tighter budget!

In general, for most of our customers - who are typically looking for colour accuracy above all else - we recommend the SW and PV monitors listed above.

But these models from BenQ are so pretty and such good quality, we couldn't resist carrying them.

This is what we call a 'Business Graphics' monitor.  Great colour accuracy, image quality and sharpness, out of the box - but lacking the more powerful direct hardware calibration features of the SW and PV models. 

What you get instead is gorgeous physical design (a near perfect match for Macbooks) - and excellent quality for all sorts of general purpose usages and modest imaging work.  You also get easy USB-C hook-up (for video, data, audio from one cable - and on the bigger model, even power charging to 85W back to your laptop, if your laptop supports it!).

This is perfect for uses like CAD/CAM and graphic design/layout tasks, as well as video cutting or just being a lovely screen to work day to day on, on just about anything!