BenQ GL2450 review

The BenQ GL2450 is a 24-inch TN monitor that provides surprisingly good colour accuracy at a low price. It is basic, though, as can be seen from its design, with its thick, wobbly stand and thick bezel. However, these points are forgivable given the price.

There’s a limited array of inputs, too, with a single DVI and VGA port being the only connectors you’ll find anywhere on the GL2450, power socket aside. This should be enough for those using a desktop PC or an older laptop, but could be a problem if you have newer machines with HDMI and DisplayPort outputs.

The TN panel has surprisingly accurate colours. Out of the box it was able to display 95 per cent of the sRGB colour gamut. Cheap panels don’t often manage to display more than 90 per cent, so we were impressed with this score. We weren’t able to improve this through calibration, however, so what you get out of the box is a monitor at its peak performance.

The only areas of the gamut in which it didn’t excel were reds and pinks, although even these areas weren’t affected too badly. The GL2450 was able to deliver strong blues, greens and yellows, which appeared bright and vibrant in our solid image tests.

We measured the contrast levels at 921:1, which allowed us to see a high level of detail in our darker test images. Black light levels, where a lower score is better, were also fairly deep, with only 0.27cd/m2 of light leaking through. While the blacks aren’t as dark as they would be on an MVA or IPS panel, this is still a good score and the blacks on display are deep enough.

Viewing angles aren’t particularly wide, and the screen adopts a yellow tinge when viewed from an angle. This effect is particularly pronounced when the monitor isn’t tilted at the correct angle, so you’ll have to adjust the stand carefully to ensure you’re getting a good viewing experience.

There are a number of preset image modes available within the GL2450’s on-screen menus, but we found all of them bar “normal” and “sRGB” to be rather unpleasant; the Gaming and Movie modes make colours appear unnatural and grainy, while the Photo setting has an artificial feel to it. You can customise brightness, gamma and red, green and blue colours if you wish, so you can adjust the GL2450 to your preferred settings.

The BenQ GL2450 is a good, albeit basic, monitor. While it has good colour accuracy and the screen is bright, viewing angles, build and the lack of HDMI inputs are drawbacks. However, we think this monitor is a steal, and if you simply need a basic monitor you should buy the BenQ GL2450.