Laptop monitors even with a desk raiser / laptop stand, were never my thing.

The 15” screen on the Dell G5 5587 doesn’t suit me for long sessions, the real estate on Mac Air is constraining for heavy sessions.

As a value-driven shopper I launched a research project into the best monitor for my needs, evaluating

Befuddling, until I focused on the core driver for my needs

Daisy-chaining, as I re-discovered, is the ability to join multiple monitors and have them function as a single display. Might appeal to a rich European or an equities day-trader, but for poor folk, we can only just afford one display.

OLEDs are expensive, and the cheapest Samsung Odyssey G5 doesn’t support USB-C Power Delivery, at a tag of 47.3 k. Though it had the highest refresh rate in my shortlist at 180Hz.

The LG Smart TV monitor I evaluated had a low refresh rate and no USB-C PD.

Then came the question of screen size & resolution.

I didn’t want something that would leave my eyes sore from travel across the span of a huge screen. At work we get a 21” (poor country), which feels sub-optimal. A 32” television is okay but feels large for a work screen. The reasonable choice felt like a 27”, QHD resolution (2650 x 1440p).

At that pixel resolution, the LLMs say you get,

‘50% more vertical space than FHD (1080p) without the need for scaling (which would be required for a 4K UHD), which is good for IDEs (code editing use cases)’ … and I’d think for the graphics card as it doesn’t need to scale? But who knows, I didn’t bother to ask the LLM that one.

Size, resolution and use-case fixed. I narrowed my shortlist to two, based on:

On paper, the shortlist was very similar in most respects, save the calibration and cost:

  1. BenQ PD2706QN - ~ 31.75 K / 30.3 K – touted as a designer monitor due to its 95% P3 colour calibration
  2. Dell Pro P2725DE - 27 K

Tried asking around and looked up Reddit as suggested.

Reddit had mixed reviews. Some people trash the calibration on BenQs, saying the only reliable calibrator is a hardware calibrator, and these often found them off by a yard. The other factor to consider beforehand (got this from Amazon reviews), is that the BenQ has a 16 Amp power plug (compared to the regular 5 Amp ones). This requires a 16 Amp socket, which is different both in construction and power-drawing requirement from the regular.

Friends recommended the BenQ saying they’ve got decent reviews - via-via. BenQ touts the PD series for content creation involving long periods of use.

In the end I sprung for the BenQ :

  1. BenQ’s live chat support isn’t much to harp about – forces you to share email, and order number before answering your query. Shipping date was within two days, but it said nothing about delivery timelines.
  2. Dell’s site showed the delivery date as one month down the line - a real kill-joy.
  3. my electrician was confident that my existing line could take the extra load of the monitor with just a 16 Amp socket & switch replacement without needing re-cabling.

The BenQ was delivered in 3-4 days, as I discovered largely due to my being within 80 kms of their regional warehouse. Package was shrink-wrapped - nothing special. The box itself pays homage to the design skills of the packaging / corrugated card industry. Simple, but good impact protection with minimal material.

First experiences. Soon as I switched it on, I was transported to the time I wheedled pops into buying an expensive ViewSonic CRT monitor. I experienced a radiating effect that reminded me of that CRT. Weird.

Then I discovered it shipped with brightness at 100%. Who does that? Eh BenQ? Turned that down to minimal. And the default refresh rate when I plugged in the USB-C was at 55 Hz. Got a popup and switched to the only other option - 100 Hz.

Contrast is not something they apparently let you touch in the default mode and I haven’t played with the settings much as yet.

The 90W PD is either not enough to power the clunky brick that is a Dell G5 5587 or I need to tweak some setting.

But all in all the extra real-estate does prove useful, and I think I’ll keep it.

In the hope that this helps a poor sod who’s trying to make his money go further.