Gadgetory

with its factory tuning and data center DNA and Intel 730 series SSD is an amazing choice for gamers and performance enthusiasts this video is actually going to cover a lot of new ground for me first up is that this is the first a MVA panel that I've had the pleasure of using second is that this is the first 32 inch 2560 by 1440 monitor that I've used and finally this is the first time I've ever seen a truly premium monitor aimed at professionals from BenQ something I wasn't really expecting given their recent focus on gamers so let's kick things off with a physical tour of the BL 3200 PT holy actual balls this my friends is a 32 inch monitor with height adjust tilt swivel and yes pivot a 32 inch monitor with pivot as much as most people won't care about this feature for folks who use multiple ninety-degree monitors in surround or I don't know consume a lot of content on reddit or for whatever reason like pivot this will be an absolute godsend of course if the stands construction wasn't up to snuff this feature wouldn't count for Jack but this is the best built monitor I have ever seen from Ben q and considering it's only $800 I know only $800 it just is straight-up really impressive the screen uses a just right light anti-glare coating and the front bezel is a reasonably thin plastic adorned only by a small thank you logo a Kiwi key badge that sits next to the ambient light sensor and human motion sensor and a row of capacitive touch buttons that illuminate when you put your hand near them the base and back used that brushed plastic I'm so fond of that looks like brushed aluminum but doesn't stain like brushed aluminum and the stand itself oh man that solid piece of curved aluminum adds both strength and beauty to the design in a way that I just wasn't expecting it would feel like a crime to take it off but in case you wanted to there's also a standard base amount hiding back there so you can put it on whatever arm you wanted inputs are mounted on the right a configuration that's becoming more on TVs and one that I really liked compared to digging around under a display and to go along with the included dual link DVI DisplayPort and VGA cables we've got dual link DVI DisplayPort 1.2 and VGA inputs HDMI is also present but it ends up being a bit of a redheaded stepchild since BenQ doesn't include an HDMI cable with the monitor and I can see why since I really wouldn't recommend using it for anything other than maybe like a secondary input for like a game console or something since you'll be stuck at an interpolated 1920 by 1080 resolution due to HDMI bandwidth limitations speaking of limitations this seems like a good time to mention that there is no support for picture in picture or picture by picture so you can just switch between the inputs but that's about it I personally never use these features but your mileage may vary also on the right is an SD card reader 2 USB 3 ports and an almost cleverly positioned headphone jack it's better than putting it on the bottom but given that most headphones have the connector on the left ear cup this solution may need to be routed across your peripherals to reach it oh well baby steps towards perfection right like to see it on the left next time thank you finally on the bottom we've got a USB 3 input 2 USB to ports and a weird little micro B connector that leads to a more stylish variation of the controller that we've seen BenQ include on some of their gaming monitors it allows you to navigate the on-screen display basically speaking of the on-screen display it's fairly intuitive and offers a ton of different options you can toggle auto pivot set the usual picture controls cycle through a wide variety of display profiles including a blue light reduction mode that's supposed to improve comfort but I personally found just looked a bit too oranjee for me to get used to you can set a periodic reminder to look away from your monitor and rest your eyes you can tell the monitor to save power when you're not in front of it or even self adjust its brightness for different ambient light levels with the onboard sensors and more it is a little bit slow to navigate especially when using the display mode controls to emulate different display sizes but fortunately most people will take a set and forget approach here and for those who don't there's always the ability to change the quick access buttons on the control puck for fast access to those frequently used sub menus now it's time to talk panel this monitor is seriously unusual in a way that for some people will be a huge selling point at about 92 pixels per inch its pixel density is only a tiny bit lower than that sweet spot 24 inch 16 by 10 that I'm always talking about but at 32 inches diagonally it offers a ton more real estate both physically and in terms of resolution it's a mva panel with DC backlight control makes it surprisingly comfortable to use in spite of its massive size it delivers clear crisp high contrast text comfortable flicker free performance in bright and dim environments and on top of that very strong viewing angles for a VA with only a noticeable vertical contrast shift at moderate to extreme angles to take marks off for for gamers I measured 27.5 milliseconds of display leg with my brand new Leo Bodnar display leg tester but TFT central brought my attention to one simple tweak turning a NA too high that can bring that down to only 23 milliseconds or about a frame and a half at 60 Hertz that combined with reasonable smearing or ghosting compared to other VA monitors makes it an okay choice for gaming especially if you want a very large display but certainly nowhere near fast 120 or 144 Hertz TN panels speaking of it not being TN this monitors 10 bit panel can handle the entire sRGB color space which is plenty unless you're working on some seriously specialized content but most folks won't use VA monitors for crazy high-end color work anyway due to the slight reduction in contrast when viewing straight on this is really picky stuff though it looked great in day to day use out of the box and running it through a basic color calibration routine with an ex right color monkey only resulted in slightly subdued oranges and boosted Gama revealing some more details in the shadows the before and after looked pretty darn similar so it's great out of the box all of that well deserved positivity aside for some reason it just didn't click for me my daily drivers are 2560 by 1440 27 inch a 34 40 by 1440 34 inch and a 1080p 12 inch and while I did find that I could comfortably read text and whether it was due to the flicker free nhanh pwm backlight or something else I wasn't sure of it wasn't nearly as fatiguing to use as my old 30-inch I think I've just become accustomed to sitting closer to a smaller higher pixel density display and it was too hard for me to go back which isn't to say it's a bad monitor in fact truthfully I can think of a lot of people who would love it it's closer to TV size for a dorm than a monitor size so movie watching is very satisfying even if the built-in speakers are nothing special you can always hook up other speakers to your PC so you turn it this way to watch movie turn it this way back to your chair you sit in it awesome the high contrast with no IPS glow makes reading a treat and the fact that it offers truly class-leading build quality and ergonomics will appeal to many professionals I mean I don't know what else to say the issue with my conclusion here is that I'm saying it doesn't work for me but I can't come up with a better solution at all if you want a massive monitor for productivity use since on Windows anyway right now 4k monitors aside from being very expensive still at this kind of a size have some issues with readability and UI scaling unless you have eagle eyes so let's do this let me know your thoughts in the comments am I just totally off-base here and this is the best thing since sliced bread or would you spend your money on something else either way I want to give kudos to Ben Q for bringing a truly different product to market even if it's not one that floated my personal boat 2560 by 1440 but at the same pixel density as a 24 inch to 1920 by 1200 alright well I think that's pretty much it guys thank you for watching don't forget to like dislike or share this video according to how you felt about it also in the video description we've got the usual support us links so you can go ahead and you can well I guess you can buy this monitor if you wanted with our affiliate code there's pricing and availability down there you can also buy a t-shirt give us a monthly contribution or last but not least I'm sure there's one other one but I can't remember it for the life of me right now so thanks again for watching and as always don't forget to subscribe to Linus tech tips for more unboxings reviews and other computer videos