BenQ XL2540 eSports Gaming Monitor Review

Update: It’s come to my attention that due to a graphics card issue this review of the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor was performed at 60Hz instead of the full 240Hz, leading to comparisons being incorrect. So treat this review more on features rather than full power.

The BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor is a great little addition to the BenQ ZOWIE line up, it’s crisper and clearer than the previous RL series of monitors (One of which I own), but to be honest with you, it’s not the type of thing you are going to notice if you already own a BenQ ZOWIE monitor. Yes, the tech is better, but the performance is the same as always. Which is a shame because I love the BenQ ZOWIE brand and I want to praise the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor higher, but unless you don’t own one of these products you are not going to notice any difference.

Product Name: BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor 
Manufacturer: BenQ 
Price: US$499 | AU$699
Release Date: Available now

Before I get into what the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor does exactly and what it means to you, it’s time to throw some numbers up into the review so we sound all techy and fancy… Like we actually know something about what all the stuff below actually means. (I’m not Keith, I don’t do numbers, I do experiences.)

Display‎ LCD Size (inch):‎ 24.5‎
Aspect Ratio:‎ 16:9‎
Max.Resolution: ‎ 1920 x1080‎
Display Area(mm):‎ 543.744 x 302.616‎
‎Response time:‎ 1ms (GtG)‎‎‎
Connectivity‎ Input/Output: Connector‎ DVI- DL / HDMI x2 / DP1.2 / headphone jack / microphone jack‎‎‎ / USB‎ Downstream x3 Upstream x1‎‎‎

So what does all this mean? Well simply put, it does a good job at outputting a clean and crisp 1080p picture no problems; and when you click that mouse button to shoot someone in the head, you’re going to see the animation happen almost instantly. Outside of that, there’s not much more to the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor. Sure, there’s settings for other modes, but all it really does is make those game look better, it doesn’t have any difference in performance to any other BenQ ZOWIE Gaming Monitor you’ve seen in the last couple of years.

Don’t get me wrong, going from an older Samsung monitor to the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor would be a great experience, the games are sharper and motion happens so much more fluidly it makes one wonder why we don’t upgrade our monitors as often as we do our graphics cards. Playing a game of Overwatch or PUBG is a much better experience with the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor than my older Samsung (Not so much my newer BenQ ZOWIE RL2755) was because of the base settings of the monitor itself. Where most monitors have standard Dynamic, Standard, Low Light, etc in color settings, the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor has setting built exclusively around the type of game that you are playing. Playing PUBG? Use the FPS settings. Playing Street Fighter V? Use the Fighting settings. It’s all done with a simple press of a few buttons on the front face of the monitor itself, or if you have the S-Switch attached, you can do it with a simple press of a single button without interrupting gameplay! Bonus!

Speaking of bonus, there are a lot of little features under the hood besides the game settings that make the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor a worthy monitor to buy. The Black eQualizer, which you can see in the image below, fixes the bleeding effect that black tends to have in some video games. It balances the blacks down enough that they don’t blend completely, but enough that they don’t shadow players in the distance for example. The Color Vibrant settings on the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor are really good too, with 20 different levels to choose from you will be able to find that color pallet that will suit your eyesight more easily than you do with other monitors.

The final thing to love about the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor is that it’s not just for PC use. If you noticed back at EVO 2017, most of the Street Fighter V tournament, if not all tournaments, were played on BenQ monitors (Not the XL series specifically, but the RL series). The reason being is that with the 1ms response time that these monitors have, the inputs are seen much sooner than even most TVs that were used in the past. Luckily you are not locked to the PC with the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor or any other BenQ ZOWIE monitor, you can use your consoles on them too, so no matter what your gaming preference, you can use a BenQ ZOWIE monitor for whatever you want.

The only thing that I see as a negative for the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor is that if you already own anything in the BenQ brand, especially the previous RL series of monitors, you don’t need to upgrade at this point unless you can actually see a difference between 60Hz and 240Hz. Previous generations of BenQ monitors, at a cheaper price, are still worth keeping. But that’s more of a personal thing then something specifically against the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor. With the basic BenQ monitor being miles ahead of the pack in terms of performance, it’s going to take a lot more to win me over to buying the next generation. I need 4K minimum and keep all the base features that BenQ offers.

At the end of the day, if you’re going to upgrade to the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor, I’d recommend it only if you aren’t running a recent BenQ monitor. Otherwise, if you already own a BenQ monitor, it’s not really worth the investment. Which is more of an incitement to the progress of technology than anything else? I would, however, advise that instead of the BenQ ZOWIE XL2540 24.5″ 240Hz PC e-Sports Monitor specifically, you shell out an extra few hundred and get something in the 27inch or bigger range to truly appreciate the amazing features BenQ ZOWIE products present.