BenQ MA320UP

Introduction

Today we’re reviewing one of BenQ’s latest professional-range monitors, targeting especially all the Mac users out there who don’t want to spend all that money on Apple’s own displays, and are looking for an alternative. Whether they’re just looking to more affordable display, or want something more versatile that can be used with other systems (including Windows PC’s) and external devices, the market for Mac-ready monitors seems to be picking up in recent times.

BenQ have actually got two versions of this screen available. The MA320UP is the version we have with us for testing and this model offers a glossy screen coating finish, making it look and feel more like common Apple displays and devices. The MA320U model use the exact same panel and has the same specs, but has a matte anti-glare coating instead. The choice between the two will depend on your personal preferences, ambient light conditions and sensitivity to things like glare and reflections.

Both models offer a 31.5″ screen size and an IPS-type LCD panel. They have a 3840 x 2160 “4K” resolution, 1300:1 contrast ratio, 550 nits brightness (SDR) and a range of features designed to make using the screen with a Mac device more seamless. That includes single-cable connectivity via USB type-C with 90W power delivery, Mac colour matching features, and the ability to sync certain controls like brightness and sound between your MacBook and the screen. Let’s see how the screen performs in our testing.

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Key Specs

• 31.5″ size, flat format
• 3840 x 2160 “4K” resolution, ~140 PPI pixel density
• IPS-type LCD panel technology (BOE MV315QUE)
• ‘Nano Gloss’ panel coating (MA320UP model)
• 60Hz refresh rate
• Wide colour gamut covering 99% sRGB and 97% DCI-P3
• M-book colour matching and preset modes
• Video connectivity: 1x USB type-C (DP Alt mode, data and 90W power delivery), 2x HDMI 2.0
• Other connections: 2x USB-A data ports (7.5W), 1x USB-C (15W)
• Audio: Integrated 2 x 3W speakers and headphone jack
• Fully adjustable stand with tilt, height, swivel and rotate

Design and Features

The MA320UP / MA320U comes in a silver and black design. It has a 3-side “borderless” panel with a thin 2mm black plastic edge and an additional 6mm black panel border along the sides and top. There’s a thicker black plastic bezel along the bottom edge of the screen with a total ~22mm border. The arm and foot of the stand are finished in a light silver plastic and there’s a slightly darker silver faux-leather section on the front of the foot – although we’re not really sure what that is supposed to be for to be honest.

The rear of the screen is encased in the same light silver plastic and has a simple, smooth design. The stand attaches in to the middle of the screen with a quick release mechanism, or can be removed in favour of VESA 100 x 100mm mounting if you’d rather.

There’s a cable tidy clip which can be attached to the arm of the stand, and the connections face outwards as you can see on the images above.

The design is simple, professional and sleek and the materials feel of a decent quality. The glossy panel coating that is used for the UP model offers a clean, clear and crisp image free from any grain and looks nice alongside glossy coated / glass coated Apple devices.

The stand offers a full range of ergonomic adjustments which are all pretty smooth to use, although tilt and rotate adjustments are pretty stiff to operate.

At the lowest height adjustment the bottom edge of the screen is ~7cm from the edge of the desk, and at maximum extension it reaches ~18cm. There’s only a small amount of wobble from the screen as you reposition it, and the stand feels stable and sturdy.

Connectivity

The screen provides a reasonable range of connectivity options, although these are more geared towards Mac users, at the expense of simpler connectivity for PC users unfortunately. The primary connection you’d likely use would be the USB type-C connection, which supports DP-Alt mode, data transfer and 90W power delivery which is decent. There isn’t support for Thunderbolt capabilities, Daisy-chaining and increased data transfer on this screen though which Mac users should keep in mind, but the USB type-C can deliver the necessary single-cable connectivity for most devices.

Also for video are 2x HDMI 2.0 connections which limit the screen a little for some devices. The bandwidth of HDMI 2.0 (14.40 Gbps) is not quite sufficient to support 4K @ 60Hz, 10-bit, and so if you want to connect a PC via HDMI you’re limited to 8-bit colour depth instead of the supported 10-bit. That’s also a bit of a gap for some external devices potentially and it’s a shame HDMI 2.1 was not offered here to overcome that small bandwidth deficit.

Probably most annoying though is the lack of a DisplayPort connection, which makes PC connectivity more complicated as you need to use convertors and different cables to connect up to the USB type-C port. It should have been easy and cheap enough to add DisplayPort as well we think and it’s a shame to see that missing. In an effort to position this as a Mac-friendly monitor, it feels like PC users are being neglected.

Other connections include an additional USB-C data port with 15W charging capabilities on the back of the screen and a USB-A data port as well. On the bottom edge of the screen for quicker access is another USB-A data port and a headphone jack which is handy. The screen also features some simple 2x 3W integrated speakers for audio which is useful for some general office-type uses.

OSD menu and Display Pilot 2 software

One of the strangest things about this screen is its on-screen menu, or rather the lack of one! If you use the joystick toggle on the bottom of the screen you have access to literally only a couple of settings, for brightness, sound and input selection. It’s very strange not to see a fuller OSD menu offered here, especially when there’s a handy and intuitive joystick available to use to navigate around.

Maybe this is a “Mac thing”, but for anyone who wants to use the display for anything else, it leaves you with very limited display controls from the monitor directly. If you want to connect a streaming device, a games console, a Blu-ray player etc you’re left with basically no control over anything other than brightness and audio which feels like a major gap.

For Mac and PC users, to access the rest of the screen settings you are forced to install BenQ’s ‘Display Pilot 2’ software, a utility which runs in your system tray and can quite quickly and easily control the screen modes and settings. Although it’s not without its annoyances of its own unfortunately.

There’s a good range of settings and options available within the software and it’s quite quick and easy to navigate around. One really annoying thing though is that if you click away from the app to another active window or for something else, the app auto-minimises to the tray and when you click it again you have to start from the opening screen again. You can’t leave the window open alongside other windows and apps.

You can choose between a range of different colour and preset modes, and then drill in to each for further adjustments and settings. There’s also additional shortcuts to different features and options on the home screen.

One further annoyance is that some of the adjustment sliders don’t have a number scale on them, so it’s not always easy to see what setting you’ve adjusted it to. The brightness, contrast and sharpness sliders for instance are like that, although the RGB channel adjustments then have a number against them as you can see.

A few tweaks to the software by BenQ we think would make it overall more user-friendly, but we’d really like to have seen full control via the actual monitor OSD as well as that’s a strange ommision.

A small additional utility called ‘Display QuicKit’ is available to check for and install firmware updates as well. Perhaps this could be integrated in to Display Pilot 2 in the future, but it’s good news that FW updates are supported on this model anyway.

Testing Methodology Explained (SDR)

Performance is measured and evaluated with a high degree of accuracy using a range of testing devices and software. The results are carefully selected to provide the most useful and relevant information that can help evaluate the display while filtering out the wide range of information and figures that will be unnecessary. For measurement, we use a UPRtek MK550T spectroradiometer which is particularly accurate for colour gamut and colour spectrum measurements. We also use an X-rite i1 Pro 2 Spectrophotometer and a X-rite i1 Display Pro Plus colorimeter for various measurements. Several other software packages are incorporated including Portrait Displays’ Calman color calibration software – available from Portrait.com.

We measure the screen at default settings (with all ICC profiles deactivated and factory settings used), and any other modes that are of interest such as sRGB emulation presets. We then calibrate and profile the screen before re-measuring the calibrated state.

The results presented can be interpreted as follows:

• Gamma – we aim for 2.2 gamma which is the default for computer monitors in SDR mode. Testing of some modes might be based on a different gamma but we will state that in the commentary if applicable. A graph is provided tracking the 2.2 gamma across different grey shades and ideally the grey line representing the monitor measurements should be horizontal and flat at the 2.2 level, marked by the yellow line. Depending on where the gamma is too low or too high, it can have an impact on the image in certain ways. You can see our gamma explanation graph to help understand that more. Beneath the gamma graph we include the average overall gamma achieved along with the average for dark shades (0 black to 50 grey) and for lighter shades (50 grey to 100 white).
  
  
• RGB Balance and colour temperature – the RGB balance graph shows the relative balance between red, green and blue primaries at each grey shade, from 0 (black) to 100 (white). Ideally all 3 lines should be flat at the 100% level which would represent a balanced 6500K average colour temperature for all grey shades. This is the target colour temperature for desktop monitors, popular colour spaces like sRGB and ‘Display DCI-P3’ and is also the temperature of daylight. It is the most common colour temperature for displays, also sometimes referred to as D65. Where the RGB lines deviate from this 100% flat level the image may become too warm or cool, or show a tint towards a certain colour visually. Beneath this RGB balance graph we provide the average correlated colour temperature for all grey shades measured, along with its percentage deviance from the 6500K target. We also provide the white point colour temperature and its deviance from 6500K, as this is particularly important when viewing lots of white background and office content.
  
  
• Greyscale dE – this graph tracks the accuracy of each greyscale shade measured from 0 (black) to 100 (white). The accuracy of each grey shade will be impacted by the colour temperature and gamma of the display. The lower the dE the better, with differences of <1 being imperceptible (marked by the green line on the graph), and differences between 1 and 3 being small (below the yellow line). Anything over dE 3 needs correcting and causes more obvious differences in appearance relative to what should be shown. In the table beneath the graph we provide the average dE across all grey shades, as well as the white point dE (important when considering using the screen for lots of white background and office content), and the max greyscale dE as well.
  
  
• Luminance, black depth and contrast ratio (static) – measuring the brightness, black depth and resulting contrast ratio of the mode being tested, whether that is at default settings or later after calibration and profiling. We aim for 120 cd/m² luminance which is the recommended luminance for LCD/OLED desktop monitors in normal lighting conditions. Black depth should be as low as possible, and contrast ratio should be as high as possible.
  
  
• Shadow detail – this is evaluated with the screen configured to a 200 nits white luminance for consistency between different monitors, and viewed in a dimly lit room. This first 16 greyscale shades are measured using our UPRTek MK550T spectro device (0.002 nits lower limit) for shades near-black, and the results are plotted on a graph relative to a target gamma curve (usually 2.2 gamma). Where the measurement line crosses the 0.01 nits point on the Y-axis is typically the visual threshold for where we would start to be able to detect luminance compared with black (0.00 nits). We combine these objective measurements with visual tests using a grey shade test pattern to determine the first visible shade, and then rank the shadow detail performance accordingly.
  
  
• Gamut coverage – we provide measurements of the screens colour gamut relative to various reference spaces including sRGB, DCI-P3, Adobe RGB and Rec.2020. Coverage is shown in absolute numbers as well as relative, which helps identify where the coverage extends beyond a given reference space. A CIE-1976 chromaticity diagram (which provides improved accuracy compared with older CIE-1931 methods) is included which provides a visual representation of the monitors colour gamut coverage triangle as compared with sRGB, and if appropriate also relative to a wide gamut reference space such as DCI-P3. The reference triangle will be marked on the CIE diagram as well.
  
  
• dE colour accuracy – a wide range of colours are tested and the colour accuracy dE measured. We compare these produced colours to the sRGB reference space, and if applicable when measuring a wide gamut screen we also provide the accuracy relative to a specific wide gamut reference such as DCI-P3. An average dE and maximum dE is provided along with an overall screen rating. The lower the dE the better, with differences of <1 being imperceptible (marked by the green area on the graph), and differences between 1 and 3 being small (yellow areas). Anything over dE 3 needs correcting and causes more obvious differences in appearance relative to what should be shown. dE 2000 is used for improved accuracy and providing a better representation of what you would see as a user, compared with older dE methods like dE 1994, as it takes into account the human eye’s perceptual sensitivity to different colours. 

Brightness and Contrast

The brightness setting is one of the few settings which you can actually control via the OSD menu joystick, but using the Display Pilot 2 software (herein: “DP2”) gives you some additional flexibility as well, although with that software you only get a simple slider to control, it doesn’t tell you which specific value you’re using which is a bit annoying.

Anyway, the OSD controls give you a wide adjustment range between 591 and 59 nits, reaching a little over the advertised 550 nits maximum for SDR, and offering a good adjustment range at the lower end for darker room conditions. Contrast ratio remains stable across that adjustment range at ~1505:1 average which is good for an IPS-type panel, and a little better than the advertised 1300:1 spec too.

The OSD control gives you hardware level adjustment of the backlight, but when using the DP2 software you also get a little additional room for software dimming which we’ve marked on the table above in blue. You can only use this when using DP2 and there are (as best we can tell) 28 steps available below the starting point of 0% brightness. When you adjust this lower, the luminance reduces, right down to an extremely low 0.9 nits minimum! As these are software-level adjustments the contrast ratio collapses though, as you’re making digital white level adjustments only, and the black point remains the same 0.038 nits minimum that’s possible from the backlight adjustment. Perhaps useful for some small additional wiggle room if needed below the 59 nits minimum available from the hardware-level adjustments.

Default Setup – User Mode

There’s a lot of different preset modes available to select between and we’ll take a look at some of the most common configurations and options here. The User preset mode gives you the most flexibility with settings, with controls available for brightness, contrast, gamma, colour temp, RGB levels and colour space.

We measured that mode first of all. We’re measuring the screens native performance without any ICC profiles active, including those provided by BenQ as part of their “ICCsync” feature, which we will take a look at in a moment too.

The gamma in this mode was very good, tracking 2.2 very closely. RGB balance was also very good, with a slight dip in the blue channel for lighter grey shades and white which lead to a slightly warmer white point (3% error) but nothing really noticeable in practice.

The native colour space of the screen extends a considerable way beyond the sRGB colour space as expected, with ~137% relative coverage measured. As a result we had only moderate accuracy for sRGB colours, but that’s expected on wide gamut screens due to over-saturation and over-coverage compared with that smaller colour space. We’ll see how we can improve SDR / sRGB colours in a moment.

The native gamut is closer to the DCI-P3 reference space, with 97.6% absolute coverage (rounded up to the advertised 97% spec) and a small amount of over-extension to reach 108.9% relative coverage. With a closer match to this colour space, the accuracy of DCI-P3 colours was very good though, with dE 1.0 average. The blue area is where the colour space most extends beyond the DCI-P3 reference space, and so you get some over-saturation and higher dE errors in those shades.

sRGB Emulation

For those wanting to work with a more traditional sRGB colour space, used for SDR content and many applications, there are two approaches you can take. You can switch to the sRGB colour space setting in the User mode, which will continue to offer you full access to all the other settings; or you can use the dedicated ‘sRGB’ preset mode in the menu which is far more locked down. That mode only gives you access to adjust brightness and contrast, everything else is unavailable.

• User > sRGB
• sRGB preset

User > sRGB

sRGB preset

Other than the difference in available OSD controls, the main difference between the two approaches is the default configured gamma. The User preset mode is configured to a 2.2 gamma by default, although you can also switch to 1.8, 2.0, 2.4, 2.6 and sRGB if you want in the DP2 software. The dedicated ‘sRGB’ preset mode on the hand is pre-configured and locked to the sRGB gamma curve, and you can’t change it.

Both modes track the target gamma pretty well overall, being better in darker tones and showing a little over-brightening in lighter near-white shades where the gamma is a little lower than intended. Both modes are a little warmer than intended for the greyscale, but not by a huge amount, but show the larger errors in lighter grey shades.

• User > sRGB
• sRGB preset

User > sRGB

sRGB preset

Both approaches show very good clamping of the native colour space back to the sRGB gamut which is great news and that works really well. The ‘sRGB’ preset mode is factory calibrated a little better and so has slightly better colour accuracy, but both modes are good really. We think the User > sRGB approach is likely to be the preferrable option as it gives you full control over other settings and configurations if you’re wanting to clamp to the sRGB colour space.

DCI-P3 Emulation

Like the sRGB emulation, there are two approaches you can take for DCI-P3 emulation as well. This is a colour space commonly used in HDR content creation and consumption. You can switch to the DCI-P3 colour space setting in the User mode, which will give you full access to all the other settings still; or you can use the dedicated ‘Display P3’ preset mode in the menu which is far more locked down. That mode only gives you access to adjust brightness and contrast, everything else is unavailable.

• User > P3, 2.2 gamma
• Display P3 preset
• User > P3, 2.6 gamma

User > P3, 2.2 gamma

Display P3 preset

User > P3, 2.6 gamma

There’s some fundamental differences between these two approaches to be aware of. When using the User mode and switching to the DCI-P3 colour space (actually labelled simply as “P3” in the DP2 software) this seems to switch to target the ‘DCI-P3 theater’ standard. That standard calls for a 2.6 gamma and a D63 white point (6300K), although in the software the selections still defaults to 2.2 gamma and what is selected as 6500K colour temperature. What we found was that the listed 2.2 gamma was very accurately tracked, but the colour temp was actually configured to D63 instead, despite what the setting label shows. This gives an intended greenish tint to the greyscale, meeting D63 well overall though.

You can see the results as well if you switch to the 2.6 gamma setting to further match the ‘DCI-P3 theater’ targets more closely, again with excellent gamma tracking to 2.6 in this mode.

The alternative approach to working with DCI-P3 colour space content is to use the dedicated ‘Display P3’ preset mode, which is configured to follow the standard of the same name, calling for an sRGB gamma curve and a D65 (6500K) colour temp. You can see that it followed these targets nicely in that preset mode with an accurate setup.

• User > DCI-P3
• Display P3 preset

User > DCI-P3

Display P3 preset

Both approaches show very good clamping of the native colour space back to the DCI-P3 gamut which is great news and that works really well, cutting down on the ~11% over-coverage we’d seen in the native mode. The User mode > P3 approach is factory calibrated a little better and so has slightly better colour accuracy, but both modes are good really. Which mode you want to use probably depends on whether you want a D63 white point or D65 for DCI-P3 content, and if you need more flexibility in other settings or not.

Shadow Detail

We also explored and tested the near-black shadow detail which can sometimes be a challenge on lower contrast LCD panels, although this screen does use an IPS panel with an increased ~1500:1 measured contrast ratio spec so it should offer a better black depth and potentially better near-black detail as a result. The screen was configured to 200 nits white luminance, and we tested the screen in different gamma modes as shown below.

When using a 2.2 gamma the first few shades near-black are measured at the same luminance as the black point and so get crushed to black visually. RGB 4 is the first visible grey shade as the luminance starts to increase which is reasonable. The gamma tracking near-black is excellent and on target, but the fairly weak overall black level holds the panel back a little here.

When switching to the sRGB gamma mode, whether in the ‘User’ mode or any of the other preset modes we discussed earlier where this is used, the shadow detail is improved very nicely. The sRGB gamma curve has adjustments near-black and this helps bring out those darker shades and make them easier to see. We could now make out RGB 1 easily and detail in darker content was now much easier to see in general.

We should say here as well that although this is an IPS-type LCD panel, there was minimal “IPS glow” on this BOE panel. You don’t get the same level of pale / white-ish glow when viewing dark content off-angle. Blacks remain darker, and you get some dark purple tint from wider angles, but we don’t think this is as distracting as the more common white glow you’ll see from many IPS panels.

Calibration

Calibration and profiling can produce some very good overall results and could be useful though if you wanted to operate the screen within its native wide gamut mode, but then map the colour space back to something else like sRGB for instance for colour-aware applications (e.g. Photoshop). You would need a suitable calibration device and software for this, or you could also try our calibrated ICC profile.

The screen was profiled to 2.2 gamma, 6500K colour temp and to the sRGB colour space. The screen was left in its native wide gamut mode, but this profile will be used in colour-aware applications to map back to sRGB in this instance. Overall the calibrated results were excellent as you’d hope.

Get the best settings for this screen

• On our Patreon Insider tier and above you can find our full ‘Best settings guide’ for this screen which includes all our recommended calibrated settings and ICC profile for SDR mode, as well as other best settings guidance for other options and gaming.
• If you only want just our standard SDR settings and calibrated profile, that is available via our ICC database (without all the other best settings guide).

beenhere

ICC Profiles and Monitor Calibration Database

Find the recommended settings and a calibrated ICC profile for your display.
[View here]

BenQ ICCsync

In the DP2 software there’s an option called ICCsync, which is designed to help you link certain ICC profiles to different user modes and simplify the process of having to switch between different configurations. Within each preset mode you can select which profile is allocated as well, and 3 profiles are available when you install the software as shown above – Display P3, MA320UP and sRGB Profile.

We experimented with these a little in different combinations, seeing whether they clamped the colour space appropriately and correctly. Results may perhaps vary, but as best we could tell, here are our findings:

In the User preset mode if you use the MA320UP or DCI-P3 profile, it clamps the colour space back to the DCI-P3 colour space. However, oddly the sRGB profile didn’t seem to clamp back to sRGB at all, it just left the screen with its native colour space for that mode, in this case the full wide gamut of the backlight.

If you’ve set the colour space in DP2 to clamp to sRGB or you’re using the dedicated sRGB preset mode then even without the ICCsync feature active and an ICC profile being used, you’re getting the clamping to the sRGB colour space. If you use the MA320UP or DCI-P3 profiles on top of that (which you shouldn’t!) it clamps that sRGB colour space back even further which is not desirable. Again if you use the sRGB profile, it just leaves it with the native non-ICC performance for that mode too, it doesn’t do anything further.

Same thing with the DCI-P3 clamp modes, using no profile or using the sRGB profile leaves you with the DCI-P3 colour space. If you use the other profiles for MA320UP or DCI-P3 on top of that, it clamps you back further which you don’t want.

Perhaps this ICCsync feature will be useful to some users in some scenarios, but you need to be mindful of which profile you select in which screen mode to avoid double-clamping. We’re not sure why the sRGB profile wasn’t clamping back to sRGB though in our testing, perhaps that needs investigating by BenQ. Most users will probably just want to select a mode and stick to it, and using the standard screen settings and colour gamut options does a decent job of that anyway.

General and Office

The MA320U / UP is well suited to office and professional applications, with a large screen size and high resolution. The fairly large screen size of 31.5″ provides a decent size upgrade from common 27″ screens, and this combined with the 3840 x 2160 “4K” resolution gives you a higher pixel density at 140 PPI. This 4K resolution is probably still a bit too high to use at native scaling (100%) for some people on a screen even of this pretty large size, although some people may find it ok. Text is small but if you’ve got good eye-sight and are up close then it’s still reasonable and does provide you then with a massive screen real estate and very sharp picture.

Windows scaling

Other people will probably want to use operating system scaling to ensure fonts and text are a more sensible and readable size though. 150% is unnecessarily large despite being the “recommended” option detected by Windows, with 125% scaling offering a nice balance on a screen of this size we think. That gives you comfortable text size which is very similar to a 27″ 1440p screen, but does give you the equivalent desktop real-estate area of a 3072 x 1728 resolution. So that’s quite a nice jump up from common 2560 x 1440 resolution screens in this approximate size range. The extra pixel density of the 4K resolution will provide a sharp and clear image for all uses including office and general applications. Just make sure that your software will support scaling effectively as it can sometimes be a bit difficult to get it right.

Keep in mind that not all Windows Operating Systems and applications handle scaling the same. More recent versions of Windows tend to handle it all better. Some applications and games don’t handle scaling correctly and so you can end up with some things with very minute text and fonts and some things which don’t scale completely in every place. Keep this in mind if you’re selecting any super high resolution display as it could be an important factor. You need to ensure you have the necessary operating system and applications to handle scaling effectively for your needs. It does make life a bit more complicated than if you just ran at a native resolution and 100% scaling. If you have the necessary software and operating system then the 4K resolution provides a very sharp and crisp image though.

Mac scaling and resolution complications

For Mac devices the commonly recommended optimal scaling performance is when an integer scaling ratio can be used, so the next step above 100% would be 200% for example. It can of course scale at 125% and 150% like Windows can, but it sometimes doesn’t handle that as well, or look as sharp for some use-cases. Mac users tend to focus on integer scaling wherever possible, which is why even higher resolutions are desirable. We talked a lot more about this situation in our video here, looking at 5K 27″ screens.

If you were to use 200% scaling on a 4K (3840 x 2160) panel like this you’d get the “logical resolution” of only 1080p (1920 x 1080), which would be very low and would leave you with very large text size on a 31.5″ screen for office and general uses. If the panel resolution was higher at say 5K (5120 x 2880), you could scale that at 200% to a logical resolution of 1440p (2560 x 1440) which would be better. Ideally on a 31.5″ sized screen you’d have an even higher 6K resolution (6144 x 3456) which could then be scaled at 200% to 3072 x 1728 for a comfortable and common text size, similar to a 27″ 1440p monitor.

This also leads to another challenge, and that is with pixel density. While 140 PPI is certainly a very good, high pixel density; it isn’t enough to qualify as a “Retina-class” resolution as Apple would call it. For that you need >200 PPI, with common approaches being densities such as 5K resolution on a 27″ screen size for example (218 PPI). That would give you an even sharper and clearer image, which Apple say eliminates the visibility of individual pixels from a typical viewing distance. 4K on a 31.5″ screen already delivers a very sharp image which is likely more than adequate for most users anyway, but taking it to 5K or 6K would be a step further, with 6K being the resolution required to deliver a Retina-class resolution on a screen this size (~224 PPI).

BenQ actually have a 5K resolution 27″ model coming out soon which will offer a better 200% scaling resolution (1440p, which is ideal on a 27″ screen size) and retina-class pixel density (218 PPI) which will address both those limitations. We are not saying that the 4K resolution 31.5″ screen isn’t very good, it’s just Mac OS users are often looking to take this a step further with higher resolutions and pixel densities.

Nano Gloss coating

The UP model offers what BenQ refer to as a “Nano Gloss” panel, a perhaps not-so-coincidental naming scheme similar to Apple’s own “Nano textured glass” finish on some of their own displays. It’s a glossy panel coating which we understand is applied in the factory by panel manufacturer BOE, in place of a traditional matte anti-glare coating. The U model offers that matte AG coating finish if you’d rather.

The glossy finish provides a sharp, clean and clear image with no visible grain and this makes it look more similar to Mac displays and Apple devices. Because it’s glossy you do need to be more mindful of the positioning of your external light sources to avoid problems with glare and reflections. In brighter working environments, and if you have lots of light sources facing the screen, the matte AG coated U model might be a more sensible choice. We liked the finish here though and it provided a very good picture quality.

Mac Color-Tuning Technology

As BenQ explain on their feature page: “Most external monitors simply aren’t built to display colours correctly when connected to a MacBook. The reason is simple: MacBooks follow a unique colour display standard that most monitors don’t automatically adjust to match.” There can be complications with the supported colour space, white point adjustment and colours and this can make it very hard to match visually between Mac displays and external monitors.

BenQ’s ‘Mac Color-Tuning Technology’ featured in the MA Series displays is engineered to bring your external monitor as close as possible to the MacBook’s colour experience, or to other Apple devices like an iPad or iPhone too. This matches colour space, white tone and gamma, and offers an “M-book” setting in the Display Pilot 2 software which can be quickly and easily selected. We unfortunately don’t have a Mac device to be able to test this out, but this feature should make life simpler for Mac users.

MacBook Sync

Another useful feature for Mac users is the Sync capability. You can synchronise controls between your MacBook computer and monitor with simple keystrokes, just like you would on your MacBook Pro and MacBook Air. Simply press the brightness or volume key, and both displays will adjust simultaneously.

Features

	Features	Notes
USB type-C connectivity (DP Alt mode)		1x connection
USB type-C power delivery		90W
Daisy chaining support
KVM switch
PiP and PbP support
USB data ports		2x USB-A and 1x USB-C
Easy access USB data ports		1x USB-A on bottom edge
Integrated speakers		2x 3W
Audio output / headphone out		Quick access on bottom edge
Mic input
Integrated webcam
Ambient light sensor		Brightness + colour
Motion sensor
Stand adjustments		Tilt, height, swivel, rotate
VESA mount support		100 x 100mm
Integrated power supply
Tripod socket
Firmware updates		Via ‘Display QuicKit’ software
Fan-less design

There’s a reasonable range of connectivity offered by this screen which we discussed earlier. Good to see USB type-C for single cable connectivity, along with some additional USB-C and USB-A data ports, although maybe a Thunderbolt 4 or 5 hub could have added some additional capabilities here for modern Apple devices. We’d have definitely liked to have seen HDMI 2.1 available instead of HDMI 2.0 to bring full support for the 4K @ 60Hz, 10-bit spec, and a DisplayPort connection would have made PC connectivity simpler and more versatile. It’s a shame that’s missing.

Although it is not really even mentioned on the product page, the screen does have a built in ambient light sensor on the top of the screen, and this is configurable via the ‘Visual Optimizer’ setting in the DP2 software. You can set it to auto adjust brightness, or brightness + colours if you want, as well as adjust the sensitivity. Potentially useful for controlling brightness at different times of the day.

There’s no KVM switch or PiP/PbP support available here unfortunately, but there are some (simple) integrated speakers which could be useful for some office users. As we talked about earlier, the lack of a proper OSD menu and the need to use their Display Pilot 2 app is also frustrating in general, especially for non-PC / Mac devices without the DP2 app.

Blue light

Blue light output
Blue peak wavelength	450 nm
Blue light portion	28.73%
Low blue light modes available	Levels 1 – 5
Low blue light mode temp	5759K – 3934K

The spectral distribution of the backlight at a calibrated 6500K white point is shown above, with the blue peak at 450 nm wavelength. There are some low blue light settings available via the Display Pilot 2 app, with 5 levels to choose from. Each makes the image progressively warmer and more yellow, while reducing the blue peak. There’s also a handy ‘circadian mode’ setting which lets you set different times for sunrise and sunset, and allows you to auto-adjust the blue light mode depending on the time of day.

Backlight dimming

Flicker
Flicker free verified
PWM / flicker frequency	n/a

The backlight operates with a DC dimming method, and is PWM-free / flicker free at all brightness settings.

Gaming

The MA320U / UP is not a gaming screen, and it has very limited capabilities for gamers. There is a low 60Hz refresh rate for a start which means very limited frame rate support for PC gamers, although that’s arguably adequate for most console gaming situations. There’s no adaptive-sync support either, so no variable refresh rates (VRR). The 4K resolution and glossy screen coating can offer a great picture quality and a high level of detail at least, but it’s only really suitable for occasional slow-paced games.

There’s a single ‘game’ preset mode that you can configure if you want, but no additional game settings like FPS counters, crosshairs etc. No dual-mode function, blur reduction mode or anything like that. There are however 3 overdrive modes available on the screen which are only accessible via the Display Pilot 2 app, under the ‘AMA’ setting (Advanced Motion Accelerator). We measured the response times in each of these modes:

In the ‘off’ mode the response times were very slow, even for a 60Hz panel and in practice there were large amounts of smearing and blurring to moving content. You can especially notice black smearing which looks like what you’d see on some VA technology panels in this mode.

Thankfully, moving up to the ‘high’ mode brought some positive improvements and the dark smearing had now been improved nicely, all without any measurable or visible overshoot which was great news. The maximum ‘premium’ mode pushed things a little further, but in a positive way we felt. G2G speeds were improved nicely, and only minimal overshoot was detected, remaining good in practice. We felt this was the optimal mode as a result.

Input lag was measured at a very low ~1.4ms average, and we can estimate that pretty much of all of that will be made up from the pixel response times, leaving us with a <1ms signal processing lag which was excellent.

Console gaming

	Console Gaming
Native panel resolution	4K (3840 x 2160)
Maximum resolution and refresh rate supported	4K 60Hz (8-bit max)
4K at 24Hz support
4K at 50Hz support
HDMI connection version	2.0
HDMI connection bandwidth	14.40 Gbps
HDMI-CEC auto switch
VRR (variable refresh rates)
Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM)
HDR10 support
Dolby Vision HDR support
Black Frame Insertion (BFI) support
Integrated speakers
Headphone connection
Ultra high speed HDMI 2.1 cable provided

Console support was limited but reasonable given the panel spec. The native 4K resolution panel supports 4K 60Hz content, along with 24Hz and 50Hz movie content if needed. There’s no support for 120Hz console gaming on this screen though as the panel is 60Hz max, and because it only has HDMI 2.0 ports there is a small gap for HDR in that 4K 60Hz at 10-bit is not supported which is a shame. The integrated speakers are quite useful perhaps for some occasional use too.

As we talked about earlier, there’s no real on-screen menu on this display, all you can adjust is the brightness and audio via the joystick toggle. If you were connecting a console alone to the screen that makes it incredibly difficult to configure. You can however configure the screen when a console is connected by using the DP2 app from a PC, you just have to select the relevant input in the app so the console is showing on screen, then you can make adjustments to the settings and mode and thankfully they are remembered per input. So once you’ve set it up first time, you should be ok. But you’ll need a PC or Mac connected to the screen to run and use the app.

play_circle_filled

Console Gaming Monitor Guide

If you’re looking to buy a new monitor for console gaming, this guide should help you understand the specs and features to look out for.
[View here]

HDR capabilities

We will briefly touch on HDR as the screen has very limited capabilities in this area. There is some very basic edge lit local dimming from the backlight available when an HDR source is detected, with 8 vertical zones for the backlight. With this turned on we measured ~595 nits maximum for a 10% APL test so basically the same as in SDR mode, meeting around the 600 nits mark although the screen is not certified under any of the VESA DisplayHDR tiers.

The problem with the very limited local dimming is that there is obvious flashing as the zones light up and change, clearly visible in basic local dimming tests with a white square moving across a black background. In real-world content it’s less obvious but the flashing can still be seen as scenes change, especially between dark and light areas of an image. This is too distracting to make it useful we think.

You can disable local dimming via the DP2 software if you want, offering a slightly higher peak luminance of ~640 nits but you get zero improvements to contrast beyond the panel’s native ~1500:1 performance. Although even with the weak 8 dimming zones, the real-world improvements in contrast are very minimal anyway if you were to use the local dimming. As a result of all this, we wouldn’t say there’s much in the way of HDR hardware capabilities at all, beyond being able to accept an HDR10 input signal, offering a small improvement to brightness and supporting a wide colour gamut.

Conclusion

The MA320U / UP is a versatile and capable monitor for professional and office applications, and an interesting and far more affordable alternative to Apple’s own display range for Mac users. The 31.5″ sized panel and 4K resolution provides a sharp and clear image, and it’s nice to see a choice between glossy (UP model) and matte (U model) coating options available from the same screen. The additional Mac-friendly features for colour matching, syncing controls etc will be welcome for Mac users, but with such a heavy focus on that user base, it did feel like a few things were missing for users of other devices.

The lack of a proper OSD menu is a really strange choice, and although the Display Pilot 2 app is pretty decent, it’s annoying to have to use that for basically everything, and it has some annoying aspects to the user experience in places. But without a proper OSD menu, it’s difficult to configure the screen for any non-PC/Mac input, so streaming sticks, consoles and media players are more difficult to use than they should be. It’s also a shame to leave DisplayPort connectivity off altogether in favour of what we assume is a “Mac focus”, and the limitations of HDMI 2.0 also cause a couple of minor issues too when this could have been solved with HDMI 2.1. While it’s obviously nice to have USB-C, we don’t want that to be at the expense of other more widely used and standard connections.

For professional uses there’s a very good image quality and a good range of well-configured preset modes and colour spaces to work with. We found these to be nice and accurate, and the contrast ratio was also decent for an IPS-type panel. The reduced pale IPS glow on dark content from an angle was also good news thanks to the BOE panel used. Gaming support is very limited with a 60Hz refresh rate, no VRR and no real gaming features to speak of, but that’s not why you’d be buying this screen anyway. Likewise with the very limited HDR capabilities of this screen, it’s really an SDR-only monitor.

Both versions of the screen retail for $649.99 USD at the time of writing in the US, and £549.99 GBP in the UK, and you can check availability and pricing for your region using our affiliate links below.

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