BenQ MW535A WXGA Business Projector Review – Performance

Posted on September 27, 2018 by Chris Kahl

BenQ MW535A WXGA Business Projector Review – Performance: Brightness, Contrast, Audible Noise

Brightness

Color Mode	Lumens
Bright	2541
Bright ECO	1999
sRGB	1843
Cinema	1821
Presentation	1609

BenQ claims 3,600 lumens for it’s MW535A WXGA Business Projector, and it comes pretty close to the what is considered acceptably below its advertised brightness. Generally speaking, most projectors will measure up to 25% below the brightness claim, and this one measured right around 29% below. We found the brightest mode to be the emergency green mode, which is the Bright color mode with the Normal brightness mode, measuring in at 2,541 lumens. That’s not bad at all, and is certainly bright enough to use in situation where your meeting room or classroom has moderate ambient light.

An image from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, projected by the BenQ MW535A in an environment with no ambient light. Normal brightness in Cinema Mode.

The same image from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, projected by the BenQ MW535A in an environment with moderate ambient light. Normal brightness in Bright Mode.

❮ ❯

Second brightest is the Bright color mode running in Economic brightness mode, which measures in at 1,999. As I stated on the previous page discussing picture quality, if you’re going to use Bright mode, just go for Normal or Smart ECO; it’ll be greenish but at least it will be bright enough to make up for that when the need arises. sRGB comes in third at 1,843 lumens, followed by Cinema mode at 1821; the colors are a little warm in tone but these two modes are pretty good all-around. Presentation Mode came in with the lowest measurement, coming in at 1,609 lumens.

Contrast

BenQ advertises their MW535A WXGA Business Projector as having a contrast ratio of 15,000:1, presenting exceptional readability of text. Unfortunately contrast ratios are not something we able to measure, so what we’ll be discussing instead are black levels. We found the black levels to be decent, and along the lines of what you would expect to find in a lower cost, entry level home entertainment projector. Here’s a photo of a black and white sea slug from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, which will give you an idea of what to expect.

Audible Noise

The BenQ MW535A has an exhaust fan mounted within the left side of the projector (when facing it from the front), and runs on the louder side as far as projector fans go, at least when running in Normal brightness mode. That’s understandable, because the exhaust measures in at 121 degrees Fahrenheit; we don’t usually measure exhaust temperature but after sitting on this side of the projector I became uncomfortable in the heat, and got a little curious. I wouldn’t call the fan noise distracting, except in the High Altitude mode, but it doesn’t make attempting to utilize the internal speaker any easier.

This concludes our assessment of the BenQ MW535A WXGA Business and Education projector. Next is our final page, where we summarize this review and list what we believe to be the pros and cons of this unit. We’ll see you there!

BenQ MW535A WXGA Business Projector Review – Performance: Brightness, Contrast, Audible Noise

Brightness

Color Mode	Lumens
Bright	2541
Bright ECO	1999
sRGB	1843
Cinema	1821
Presentation	1609

BenQ claims 3,600 lumens for it’s MW535A WXGA Business Projector, and it comes pretty close to the what is considered acceptably below its advertised brightness. Generally speaking, most projectors will measure up to 25% below the brightness claim, and this one measured right around 29% below. We found the brightest mode to be the emergency green mode, which is the Bright color mode with the Normal brightness mode, measuring in at 2,541 lumens. That’s not bad at all, and is certainly bright enough to use in situation where your meeting room or classroom has moderate ambient light.

An image from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, projected by the BenQ MW535A in an environment with no ambient light. Normal brightness in Cinema Mode.

The same image from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, projected by the BenQ MW535A in an environment with moderate ambient light. Normal brightness in Bright Mode.

❮ ❯

Second brightest is the Bright color mode running in Economic brightness mode, which measures in at 1,999. As I stated on the previous page discussing picture quality, if you’re going to use Bright mode, just go for Normal or Smart ECO; it’ll be greenish but at least it will be bright enough to make up for that when the need arises. sRGB comes in third at 1,843 lumens, followed by Cinema mode at 1821; the colors are a little warm in tone but these two modes are pretty good all-around. Presentation Mode came in with the lowest measurement, coming in at 1,609 lumens.

Contrast

BenQ advertises their MW535A WXGA Business Projector as having a contrast ratio of 15,000:1, presenting exceptional readability of text. Unfortunately contrast ratios are not something we able to measure, so what we’ll be discussing instead are black levels. We found the black levels to be decent, and along the lines of what you would expect to find in a lower cost, entry level home entertainment projector. Here’s a photo of a black and white sea slug from The Last Reef: Cities Beneath the Sea, which will give you an idea of what to expect.

Audible Noise

The BenQ MW535A has an exhaust fan mounted within the left side of the projector (when facing it from the front), and runs on the louder side as far as projector fans go, at least when running in Normal brightness mode. That’s understandable, because the exhaust measures in at 121 degrees Fahrenheit; we don’t usually measure exhaust temperature but after sitting on this side of the projector I became uncomfortable in the heat, and got a little curious. I wouldn’t call the fan noise distracting, except in the High Altitude mode, but it doesn’t make attempting to utilize the internal speaker any easier.

This concludes our assessment of the BenQ MW535A WXGA Business and Education projector. Next is our final page, where we summarize this review and list what we believe to be the pros and cons of this unit. We’ll see you there!