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

Oh no.. just noticed a blackout! I am running the 8800GT beta drivers on vista x64.. but common!
 
Where can I order online to ensure a September 2007 monitor? NCIXUS.com says they don't know which monitor I'm gonna get and newegg.com has a backlog of some old monitors.

There is no gamble. Just order FP241W online and make sure to tell them you want a September built, shown right on the box.
 
I'm wondering if any kind souls can help me out here.

I want to hook up my 360 through DVI (for proper 1:1 mapping) and my PC through HDMI.

Can anyone tell me the exact adapters I would need? I know I need a VGA>DVI but there are many different "DVI-?" types and im not sure which one I need.

Also, which one would I need for the DVI>HDMI. An adapter or a cable, which works best?

And lastly, is there site that explains how to adjust custom resolutions and timings to get 1920x1200 using HDMI?

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated, thanks.
 
For anyone wondering...
I recently ordered a FP241W from NCIX.com (this site was actually like $30 cheaper than NCIXUS.com and they still ship to the U.S., weird, I know). I ordered on 11/29/07 and just received my monitor today (12/6/07). I received the September 2007 monitor. During the checkout process, there is a text box where you can free-form enter any text (both for the warehouse as well as shipping. I put in there: "I will only accept this monitor if the date of manufacturing is Sept 2007 or newer, please check the box"

It worked! My total price (including Express Coverage - with "ZERO Dead PIXEL" Exchange and shipping with insurance) was $634.75

By the way - I just checked. Base price of the monitor from NCIX.com is: $559.48 and from NCIXUS.com is $582.96. Shipping is the same price. Odd.
 
For anyone wondering...
I recently ordered a FP241W from NCIX.com (this site was actually like $30 cheaper than NCIXUS.com and they still ship to the U.S., weird, I know). I ordered on 11/29/07 and just received my monitor today (12/6/07). I received the September 2007 monitor. During the checkout process, there is a text box where you can free-form enter any text (both for the warehouse as well as shipping. I put in there: "I will only accept this monitor if the date of manufacturing is Sept 2007 or newer, please check the box"

It worked! My total price (including Express Coverage - with "ZERO Dead PIXEL" Exchange and shipping with insurance) was $634.75

By the way - I just checked. Base price of the monitor from NCIX.com is: $559.48 and from NCIXUS.com is $582.96. Shipping is the same price. Odd.

Thanks man! I'll give it a shot.
 
OMG you ordered yours 5 days after I ordered mine and mine still isn't here.
STUPID NCIX.
I'm so upset.

Rawr.

Dang, so someone had a blackout using a newer 8800GT. That's not good, but others with 8800GTS/GTX/Ultra cards aren't experiencing this yet.

Different PCB, so maybe it's just the 8800GTS/GTX/Ultras that are being lucky?

I hope mine doesn't blackout.
 
Anyone want to access the service menu and check which panel they got from NCIX's Sept 07 batch?

press

the "POWER", "SELECT" and "MENU" button at the same time.

After on lcd monitor, press the "v" button, now you can login to the

factory service mode.

The bottom Line should state the PANEL info.

I am curious to know which AUO panel this monitor uses before I pull the trigger thanks.
 
Dazog,

Here's what mine states: (not sure if this is what you are looking for)

Q24W5AXX MCEV020 0517 USA

Is this good or bad? What would be different possibilties?

Thanks!
 
OMG you ordered yours 5 days after I ordered mine and mine still isn't here.
STUPID NCIX.
I'm so upset.

Rawr.

Dang, so someone had a blackout using a newer 8800GT. That's not good, but others with 8800GTS/GTX/Ultra cards aren't experiencing this yet.

Different PCB, so maybe it's just the 8800GTS/GTX/Ultras that are being lucky?

I hope mine doesn't blackout.

It's only happened edit: twice.. (may not be isolated).. so far.. hoping this is isolated.. I am going to downgrade to non-beta drivers as well.
 
Anyone want to access the service menu and check which panel they got from NCIX's Sept 07 batch?

press

the "POWER", "SELECT" and "MENU" button at the same time.

After on lcd monitor, press the "v" button, now you can login to the

factory service mode.

The bottom Line should state the PANEL info.

I am curious to know which AUO panel this monitor uses before I pull the trigger thanks.

Is the monitor has to be off or on when pressing 3 buttons at once?

How long do I have to hold them for?

Is the SELECT button you are referring to same as ENTER button?
 
RB30,

I had my monitor off, then held Power, Enter and Menu until the screen came on (a few seconds)... once on, I hit the "i" for information... then it gave me the display.
 
Dazog,

Here's what mine states: (not sure if this is what you are looking for)

Q24W5AXX MCEV020 0517 USA


As far as I can deduct 0517 means May 17, USA market.

A Japanese website has WJ models and their spec:

Q24W5AXX MCEV020 0302 ASA
Q24W5AXX MCEV020 0206 ASA

I assume ASA means Asia market. Their WJ's HDMI and component suffers from 5% or 10% cropping left and right due to forcing 3:2 HDMI ⇔ DVI conversion.

http://www.23ch.info/test/read.cgi/hard/1189267953/

Since your W model is newer, 0517, so that overscan option is added.

My Jan 07 built WZ is shown:

Q24W5 BFI MCEV01E 1212 ASA

1212 is probably meant December 12, Asia market

I don't know why my WZ has MCEV01E, rather than MCEV020, but according to this Japanese website WZ is confirmed to have A-MVA panel:

Q24W5 BFI MCEV01E 0302 ASA

HDMI cropping 10% left, right, top and bottom

VW model: HDMI cropping 5% left, right, top and bottom. This actually confirms what people were saying about VW has smaller overscan problem.
 
Do you have the ViDigi cable with you? It should have come with instructions.

The cable has one green striped component plug. Put that into the corresponding component input. Switch your monitor to component input and switch the wii on. The image should come up as black and white. Then go into the wii menu and set the Wii to 480P and 16:9 aspect ratio.

You can take the component plug out. Since the wiiga cable ends with a female vga end, you will need to get an adapter or another regular vga cable and hook it up between your Wii cable and monitor.

Here comes some weird stuff. On the end of the Wii cable where the blue led is should be a little switch box. There are either 4 or 5 switches. There should be a sticker there that shows various settings and tells you witch switches need to be on or off.

The default config should be fine. Turn your Wii on and the wii menu should come up and should display in 640x480 resolution.

The menu may show up off center. Just hit your auto adjustment once and you should be fine. Don't hit it too many times or it go off center again.

Hopefully this helps you out. One thing I noticed with my cable is some sharpness artifacts in the Wii menu (not in game). If you have a sharpness adjust I would tone it down a little.

Yep that's the one. I had basically done what you said but my image get pasted to the top of the monitor with a big black bar on the bottom. I have to use the "FULL" mode aswell. Wth won't it work with aspect?
 
Anybody got any photos of 480p source running on BenQ? I wanna compare.

Personally using 480p PS2 over component. TBH 480p stuff looks like Duke Nukem 3D. Pixelized to death.
 
Hey guys just got my monitor in from the Purolator man this morning!

Holy, you guys should've seen the size of the Heavy Duty box from NCIX. BIG.

So I hooked everything up and WOW, whites are white, not yellow, after setting 47,49,50 Standard User settings, for colour.

I am impressed. Tried my 360 over VGA and after I hit the auto adjust button the monitor it just worked!

I know another member, I think branana, mentioned he had to manually adjust, but I had the same problem on my BenQ FP202W and after flipping back and forth a few times from different resolutions you SHOULD hit the sweet spot and get lucky. Took me one try.

The display is really gorgeous, MUCH better looking than the FP241VW I saw at bestbuy. Even over VGA just like the one there. Viewing angle seems to be better as well, but this is all subjective observations, since the one at Bestbuy was probably not setup right at all, plus the resolution of their typical ads at the store is probably low.

I've noticed this monitor doesn't handle lower resolution movies quite so well. Lots of noise, but I guess this is expected, considering the size of the monitor and its high resolution of 1920x1200.

It's not so bad if you sit back a bit.

I really like the base. It's sturdy and feels expensive. For those of you that believe your monitor is sitting crooked, just keep playing with it by forcing it a bit to the left and so on to get it right.

Blacks are BLACK, whites and WHITE, REDS are red, etc.

The viewing angle is fantastic. Just like a dang TV.

Quick question about the 1:1 pixel mapping. There is NO option for it correct? It just does it?

I'll post back with my panel information in a bit, just gotta take the dog out for a walk.

No blackouts for the past couple hours since operation.

Cheers,
Mike
 
Yep that's the one. I had basically done what you said but my image get pasted to the top of the monitor with a big black bar on the bottom. I have to use the "FULL" mode aswell. Wth won't it work with aspect?

I had that problem a few times. When I hit auto adjust once in the regular wii menu I got it to show up correctly. If I try to hit auto adjust in a game (Mario Galaxy, Metroid Prime 3) I would get the same problem you run into.

I tried the vga cable on the FHD2400. I no longer have it anymore but Ill see what I can remember. I got aspect to work, however, If my memory serves me right the picture was horizontally squished. I think that setting your Benq to FULL is your best bet. I think it will give you better proportions (not 100% but close enough) .

If I am saying anything wrong please correct me. 480P 16:9 is a 720*480 resolution. I think that the wii cable converts the image into VGA 640*480. That may be where some of the issues come from. If my analysis is correct. The 640x480 resolution squishes the image horizontally if you were able to use aspect. By using FULL mode I think you will have the correct horizontal image but the vertical image will be stretched slightly because of the 16:10 screen you are displaying on.
I think FULL is the lesser of two evils. Sorry guys. I hope Im not derailing the thread or anything. Just trying to help.
 
Okay I'm an idiot, figured out the 1:1.

Haha.
LOOKS AWESOME!

strange though, that service menu only shows up in VGA mode and I can't turn it off now.

Edit:: Correction, it shows up in each source. Weird though, you hold the 3 buttons, but you don't get any notice of it being on. I figured it out by accident. I basically just gave up, then I pressed the Down arrow on the monitor and then it just popped up.

How do I turn it off?
 
Just wondering which AUO A-MVA panel is used Sept 07 built FP241W? On AUO website, there are 3 24" panels currently in production, 2 A-MVA and 1 TN:

http://auo.com/auoDEV/products.php?sec=monitor&func=items&items_id=1&ls=en

Model M240UW01 V2 Resolution (pixel)WUXGA (1920 x 1200)Aspect Ratio16 : 10Active Area (mm)518.4 x 324.0Pixel Pitch (mm)0.27ModeAMVANumber of Colors16.7MColor Saturation (NTSC %)72View Angle (H/V)178 / 178Brightness (cd/m²)300 (ASPD on)Contrast Ratio1000 : 1Response Time (ms) (at 25°C)10 (MRPT)(ASPD on)Power Consumption (W)(typ)80Interface2ch LVDSSupply Voltage (V)5Backlight12 CCFLOutline Dimensions (mm)546.4 x 352 x 35.8Weight (g)3250ProductionNowRemarkLow Color Washout

V2 is reportedly used in FP241WZ (some Chinese website has opened up a FP241WZ while back:
http://img3.pconline.com.cn/pconline/0612/12/923665_20061212BenQFP241WZ_26.jpg

V2 is used in FP241WZ because it can support BFI (Perfection Motion), while V0 is originally used in pre-production FP241W. Since V0 is no longer show up in AUO website for long long time now, so we can safely assume all production FP241 also uses V2 panel. Just that yesterday, I notice AUO has 2 24" panels posted that weren't there couple months ago:

Model M240UW01 V4 Resolution (pixel)WUXGA (1920 x 1200)Aspect Ratio16:10Active Area (mm)518.4 x 324Pixel Pitch (mm)0.270ModeAMVANumber of Colors16.7MColor Saturation (NTSC %)92View Angle (H/V)178 / 178Brightness (cd/m²)400Contrast Ratio1000:1Response Time (ms) (at 25°C)6 (gray to gray)Power Consumption (W)(typ)74Interface2ch LVDSSupply Voltage (V)5Backlight6 CCFL (U-type)Outline Dimensions (mm)546.4 x 352 x 35.8Weight (g)2720ProductionQ2, 2007RemarkSPD, Low Color Washout

V4's specs look a lot better than V2: 92% NTSC color saturation, 400 CM/m brightness, 6 ms response time (G-to-G) [in FP241W/WZ/VW specs is always 6 ms G-G so I don't this is an improvement], 74 watts, 2720g weight. One interesting thing is V4 only uses 6 CCFL (U-type) backlighting opposed to V2 uses 12 CCFL. It is supposedly be in production Q2 2007, so I am just wondering if the new Sept 07 built FP241W are using V4. Anyone care to open up?

M240UW04 V1 is a TN panel. It is probably used in the BenQ economy line Q2400.
 
Okay I'm an idiot, figured out the 1:1.

Haha.
LOOKS AWESOME!

Hey Mike, I hope you're enjoying your new toy. Would you be kind enough to confirm a few things for us: you're in the states, just purchased from NCIX, got a Sept 2007 build, and you've got the "overscan" item in your menu with on/off options? Thanks!
 
Hey guys, just got in from drinking with the gf's cousins.

:D

No blackouts yet, I've got an 8800GTS 640MB, vista OS, Asus P5N-E SLI, 4GB OCZ Titanium EPP ram, OCZ GameXStream 700watt PSU.

I'm in Canada, (toronto), NCIX was late as hell with the delivery (order processing), September 07 build, I believe they have no old stock and all are sept 07 builds.

Overscan and 1:1 everything works.

VGA, DVI, I haven't tried component yet. Gonna try that now with my 360. Using my 360 over VGA right now.

Going to try to talk my cousin into trading 360's with me since he never uses his other than for its HD DVD player.

So far so good guys! So nice to have a monitor that displays colours correctly. People are too obessesed with response times lately that colour reproduction is overlooked.

Let's just say like my previous posts suggest, whites and white and blacks are black, and other colours come out nicely.

I'm using my monitor in Standard mode with reds reduced from 50 to 47 and greens reduced to 49 and blues default at 50.

Sharpness is at 3.

The preset Movie and Dynamic modes are warmer in colour and I don't think they're quite as pleasing to the eyes as changing the colours youself.

My panel according to the service mode is Q24W5AXX MCEV020 051USA.

Any other questions let me know!

No dead pixels that i can detect yet! Not going to look for any either since I can't see them.

Very impressed with BenQ's QC (quality control) since my coworker's monitor doesn't have any irregularities either.

I noticed that all 4 corners are a little 'lighter' (brighter) than the rest of the screen though.

Might be because the panel hasn't been worked in yet.

Will get back to you guys on that.

Cheers,
Mike
 
Can you check for sound on the right back side? Right when you turn it on, do you hear anything? If you do does it go away?

Thanks,
Joshua
 
Sound?

Whatever sound you are hearing (probably high pitched chirping, buzzing sound) unless you can hear it from normal seating distance from the monitor you can ignore it.

Especially if it isn't affecting the monitor's ability to display a picture properly since it's in PCBs (printed circuit board) nature to emit noise.

Remember there are electric currents running through them.

If it's bothering you, return it. I remember reading about weird noises from BenQ monitors back when I was in the market for my FP202W.

Oh yeah, no noise so far.

Cheers,
Mike
 
I think your noisy LCD is an isolated case. Try bumping the brightness to max to see if it still persists.
 
Do NCIX.com and NCIXUS.com get stock from the same warehouse? I want to ensure a Sep2007 monitor but NCIX.com doesn't accept US credit cards only paypal (sucks). Should I get a crappy paypal account or just order from the US site?
 
Do NCIX.com and NCIXUS.com get stock from the same warehouse? I want to ensure a Sep2007 monitor but NCIX.com doesn't accept US credit cards only paypal (sucks). Should I get a crappy paypal account or just order from the US site?

I think the whole point of NCIXUS is that some Americans never bother looking at Canadian retailers. There's zero difference, just a different web front so they can get in on the Newegg customer base.
 
I hope NCIX has a place to send back replacements and such for monitors in the US. I do not like getting slammed by custom fee's, brokerage fee's, and whatever other fee's Canada can cook up. One of the reasons I hate sending things to Canada, unfortunately. :(

EDIT: I am confused. On the NCIXUS page it gives you a specific address for US customers to send in your replacements. On the NCIX page, it doesn't say anything so I would assume you would send back the old monitor to Canada and NOT the US place IF you order from NCIX instead of NCIXUS. Anyone verify?
 
alright guys, this is really, REALLY strange.

My co-worker's blackout has been narrowed down to his usage of Internet Explorer.

When it is in windowed mode. When IE6 windows are maximized everything is fine.

So he can MAKE the blackouts happen at will.

He'll have an IE6 window in the background and a maximized one in the foreground. As soon as he alt-tabs the background window to the foreground it blacks out. Same thing if he uses his mouse cursor. So as soon as it's in the foreground, POOF, blackout.

To revert back he just alt-tabs and then it comes back on.

Very strange.

I told him to try IE7, or firefox, but he's too lazy for the time being.

He also said it hasn't happened, to his knowledge, during any other computer usage.

I'll get back to you guys after I get him to try different browsers and try to notice if it happens during other activities.

Cheers,
Mike

Oh yeah did I mention I'm in love with my monitor?
 
Yup. I have my 360 hooked up via VGA. Gonna try Component to see how it looks compared to VGA when I get home.

I probably won't notice a difference.

Thinking about getting a PS3 over the holidays, but trying to look for a 60GB version since the newer 80GB versions don't have the PS2 emotion chip anymore, so no hardware acceleration for PS2 games.

Kind of want it for the blueray player since I don't play many games as of late.

So far I'm really impressed with BenQ's quality control. This is the third BenQ monitor I've had my hands on that hasn't had a dead pixel.

BenQ FP202W V1, FP202W V2 (returned), and FP241W.

I still can't get over how good the colours are reproduced and the viewing angle.
 
I have a PS3 hooked up to my BenQ FP241W with an HDMI cable at 1080p and there is a setting for having the RGB set at Full or Limited.

The default is limited but on some displays, it apparantly should be set to Full.

This is from the PS3 manual:
-Limited is for when RGB output signal is output in the range from 16 to 235.
-Full is for when RGB output signal is output in the range from 0 to 255.
-Hints: If black sometimes appears bright and sometimes appears pale on the screen when [Limited] is selected, set this option to [Full]. If black appears dull on the screen when [Full] is selected, set this option to [Limited].

Does anyone know what setting I should pick for my PS3?

I also have another more complicated question re: a PS3 setting when using the PS3 on this monitor. There is an option called "Y Pb / Cb Pr / Cr Super-White (HDMI)" that is described as follows "Adjust output settings for TVs that support Y Pb / Cb Pr / Cr input signals. Super-white signal can be output when playing a DVD, Blu-ray Disc (BD), or AVCHD-format video. This setting is for use when the TV is connected to the PS3 system using an HDMI cable." The setting options are as follows "Off = Disable super-white output and On = Enable super-white output." Finally, here is some further description in the manual: "When this function is set to [On], content from AVCHD-format video files recorded in x.v.Color / x.v.Colour can be played with a wide color scale. x.v.Color / x.v.Colour is a trademark proposed by Sony as the name to be assigned to devices that support "xvYCC," which is an international standard for color space in moving images. An advantage of x.v.Color / x.v.Colour is that it can reproduce a wider color scale than the conventional standard."

Thanks for any help.
 
I have a PS3 hooked up to my BenQ FP241W with an HDMI cable at 1080p and there is a setting for having the RGB set at Full or Limited.

The default is limited but on some displays, it apparantly should be set to Full.

This is from the PS3 manual:
-Limited is for when RGB output signal is output in the range from 16 to 235.
-Full is for when RGB output signal is output in the range from 0 to 255.
-Hints: If black sometimes appears bright and sometimes appears pale on the screen when [Limited] is selected, set this option to [Full]. If black appears dull on the screen when [Full] is selected, set this option to [Limited].

Does anyone know what setting I should pick for my PS3?

I also have another more complicated question re: a PS3 setting when using the PS3 on this monitor. There is an option called "Y Pb / Cb Pr / Cr Super-White (HDMI)" that is described as follows "Adjust output settings for TVs that support Y Pb / Cb Pr / Cr input signals. Super-white signal can be output when playing a DVD, Blu-ray Disc (BD), or AVCHD-format video. This setting is for use when the TV is connected to the PS3 system using an HDMI cable." The setting options are as follows "Off = Disable super-white output and On = Enable super-white output." Finally, here is some further description in the manual: "When this function is set to [On], content from AVCHD-format video files recorded in x.v.Color / x.v.Colour can be played with a wide color scale. x.v.Color / x.v.Colour is a trademark proposed by Sony as the name to be assigned to devices that support "xvYCC," which is an international standard for color space in moving images. An advantage of x.v.Color / x.v.Colour is that it can reproduce a wider color scale than the conventional standard."

Thanks for any help.

Seeing how this is a computer LCD, go ahead and set RGB output to full. It will look better.

As for the "Y Pb / Cb Pr / Cr Super-White (HDMI)" option, that's the kind of signal that runs over HDMI (the same as Component basically). That's the only choice you have, why are you asking about it?


@shampoo, component bleeds ever so slightly but the colors are fuller. VGA has zero bleed but the colors are not as vibrant. I personally prefer duller picture over slight bleeding. In either case, the quality difference is so subtle anyhow. They are not problems at all and hard to notice in the first place.
 
Hi RB30- I have the same display as you. Is this a A-MVA model? I bought this in october. and love it. The only downfall which is amazing comparing to any other LCD's ive seen, is I get a little viewing angle change horizontally on the right side of the screen. Ive seen two other 241 W's in store @ NCIX with the same problem. But its aweosme because i had the Samsung 245B which sucked for Viewing angle.

If anyone wants to test there viewing angle use this site for testing

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/

And then click on GREYSCALE ANGLE TESTING in the red box at the top.

On the Samsung 245B half the screen was different color'd and with my 241WZ vertically the colors are always the same!!
 
btdvox> I don't know what you mean by horizontal viewing angle, but that's just normal for LCDs. This monitor's viewing angles are spectacular. It's more pronounced in widescreen LCDs, because their sheer width, but like I said, amazing.

branana> Yeah I think I'll stick to my VGA setup, since I got it to fit perfectly using auto adjust. Don't wanna mess with it haha. I'm very pleased with the sharpness and the colour actually, so yeah. No messing with it for me. :)

I like how 24" monitor's scale in terms of text size and physical size of the monitor.

It's like my 20", but just more of it, instead of the bloated look of 22" monitors.

That's just my preference though.

I've always been used to high resolution screens.

My notebook, Asus Z70Va, has a WSXGA+ screen with a resolution of 1680x1050 on a 15.4" screen size.

Pretty big for such a small screen, but I love the screen real estate. You can fit so much more.

I just gasp when I use other people's systems with resolutions of 800x600 or even 1280x1024.

Yes some people still have their modern monitors set to such a low resolution as 800x600.
 
Sorry bud, but no noise.

I've been to that site.

I would say check the outlet you're using or something.

Try a different source as well, like different computer.

I hear nothing.

The chances of two screwy ones is not very likely, unless a whole batch of them were bad and you are receiving the same batch.

Sept 07 build for you or not?

My coworker's monitor and mine are not making any noises at all.
 
VGA does the same thing, and text isn't as clear compared to DVI. It is Semtember 2007.. I will try another system tommorow.
 
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