T he full-featured BenQ comes as something of a shock after the Acer S273HL’s minimalist aesthetic. This thing positively bristles with ports, enabling it to handle just about anything you throw at it: from a Mac to a Blu-ray player to a games console. For family entertainment that’s a big plus, of course, but is the M2700HD trying to do too much?

Design-wise this is standard computer monitor/TV fare with a gloss black bezel, matte screen and a low-slung silver speaker unit at the bottom. The monitor sits on a sturdy metal-backed plastic foot to ensure it sits firmly on your desk, which is just as well given the M2700HD’s considerable 9.45kg weight.

Getting the monitor set up and calibrated is fairly straightforward, although the five tiny controls buttons on the monitor’s side can be tricky to use when you’re staring at the screen. The tabbed UI gives you a good range of picture adjustment options with presets for movie, games, photos, etc. The M2700HD is the only monitor here to come with a remote control so you can adjust image and sound settings from the comfort of your armchair. Sounds peachy so far, doesn’t it?

Unfortunately, the picture’s not so rosy when you check out some of the monitor’s key selling points. Like the Acer S273HL, the M2700HD is limited to a maximum screen resolution of 1,920 x 1,080 with a pixel pitch of 0.311mm and 400cm2 brightness – so far, so average.

Also like the Acer, the M2700HD has a 1,000:1 contrast ratio, which isn’t as great as you might think. Since the BenQ uses a standard fluorescent tube arrangement rather than LEDs for backlighting, tweaking the picture so its bright enough to see invariably means that dark areas of the picture turn dark grey rather than black.

The M2700HD also isn’t that good when it comes to colour fidelity: the default and movie settings, in particular, are notable for their very warm presentation with oversaturated reds and unnatural skin tones. It’s also an indifferent performer with first-person shooters. It’s 5ms response time isn’t up to par with the best monitors here. The stereo soundbar across the bottom of the monitor delivers a reasonable performance, but can get wearing if pushed too far.