BenQ PhotoVue SW271 27in LCD monitor
Edward Chester tries out a high-end 4K monitor
Image quality should always trump resolution when it comes to choosing a monitor for photo editing. With the SW271 from BenQ, though, you don’t need to compromise on either front. This 27in monitor combines the utmost in image quality with a pin-sharp 4K resolution to make for a top-notch editing display. Other headline features include 99% AdobeRGB coverage, a 10-bit colour LCD panel with 14-bit 3D LUT, HDR support, full pre- calibration out of the box, and an anti- glare hood. It even has a little wired remote for changing its settings.
All this and the SW271 looks rather nice, too. BenQ has used a low-profile, narrow bezel round the top and sides of the screen, giving the whole display a much lighter, sharper look compared to most professional screens. This sleekness disappears once you attach the hood, but if you work in an environment where light levels are controlled well enough then you can easily get away without using the hood. If you do need to use it then you’ll be pleased to learn that it’s easy to set up and works in both landscape and portrait orientations. It includes a sliding door for feeding through a colorimeter to calibrate the display. You also get a high- quality stand with a huge rectangular base that should ensure the display stays securely planted. A carry handle at the top makes it easy to move the monitor around, and the stand offers all the adjustment you’d expect. The display can be tilted forward 5° and back 20°, rotated 45° to the left and right and pivoted 90° into a portrait orientation. Remove the stand and there’s a 100x100mm VESA mount that allows you to use any compatible monitor arm or stand instead.
Connectivity
Connectivity is another area where this display impresses. As well as one DisplayPort 1.4 and two HDMI 2.0, you also get a USB Type- C input. This makes it easy to use with modern laptops such as the latest MacBooks. There are also a couple of USB 3.0 ports so you can connect a keyboard and mouse, then just use the one cable to plug these into your laptop.
One intriguing addition is the Hotkey Puck. This is a wired remote that attaches to the display via a mini USB cable and provides a quick and easy way to navigate the on-screen menus as well as switch between profiles at the touch of a button. It includes three buttons for profiles as well as a directional pad for navigating the menus. This is a useful addition as the buttons on the front of the monitor for navigating the menus aren’t easy to see against the black bezel. Indeed if you’ve got the hood installed the buttons are all but invisible.
Otherwise they work well enough and the menu with which they interact is speedy and
intuitive to use. It includes a full manual set of options for changing colour gamut, brightness, contrast, colour temperature, colour balance and more. But the far easier option is to pick one of the many presets. You get ones for sRGB, AdobeRGB, DCI- P3, Rec. 709, HDR, DICOM and even a black & white mode.
There’s also a picture-by-picture and picture-in-picture mode, plus you can have the monitor operate in two different colour modes for each input, which essentially means you can view an image in both sRGB and AdobeRGB at the same time, for instance.
As for the LCD panel itself, it uses IPS LCD technology which is the best for viewing angles and colour accuracy and is the natural choice here. Its 27in size is also a good option for editing work. Larger displays can come in useful for multi-tasking, but if you’re just concentrating on editing one image, 27in is ample. That applies double when you consider the extra pixels that are packed into this screen. A typical 27in display has a resolution of 2560 x 1440 pixels whereas here you’re getting 3840 x 2160, making it far easier to pick out fine details even while zoomed out from an image.
Colour accuracy and image quality
The proof of any monitor, though, is in its overall image quality and colour accuracy and here the SW271 doesn’t disappoint. Starting with viewing angles, they are excellent with very little shift in colour as you move off the perpendicular. There is a little bit of greying of the image towards the corners – an effect known as IPS glow – but it’s tolerable. The uniformity of the display is also spot on, so you can be certain that colours are even, right across the expanse of the screen. According to our tests colour varied by an average of just 0.9%. On cheaper displays you can expect this figure to rise to 5%, or even 10%.
Colour fidelity and accuracy are also all but perfect, right out of the box. Selecting the sRGB mode it delivered a colour balance of 6569K and gamma of 2.27, both of which are very close to the ideals of 6500K and 2.2, respectively. The display also delivered 98.8% sRGB colour space coverage and 0.35 DeltaE colour accuracy, indicating just how capable it is at picking out fine differences in colour.
Switching over to the wider gamut, and more demanding, AdobeRGB mode and the display didn’t falter with a colour temperature reading of 6576K, gamma of 2.27, Delta E of 0.27 and 99.9% AdobeRGB colour space coverage.
We tested all the other modes too and all delivered exactly the correct colour gamut, gamma and colour balance that is expected of each standard. Notably, unlike some displays, selecting these presets doesn’t also lock out the brightness control so it’s easy to alter this depending on lighting conditions. Meanwhile, all modes delivered a contrast figure of around 900:1, which is typical for a display of this type and ideal for editing duties.
Incidentally, this display’s claimed HDR capabilities don’t extend to contrast. While it can cover the extended colour range of HDR, it doesn’t come close to hitting the 10,000:1 contrast that HDR demands – it’ll only be for colour grading such content.