Gaming Performance

The EIZO FlexScan EV2785 positions itself as a business monitor. As such, it doesn't use any kind of adaptive sync technology (FreeSync or G-Sync) and is limited to a refresh rate of 60 Hz.

Response Time and Overdrive

The EIZO FlexScan EV2785 has a 5 ms GtG response time. The panel uses the Overdrive technology to make the pixel transitions faster, and you will find the option under "Overdrive" in the OSD (Color > Advanced Settings). Overdrive has a grand total of three settings; Off, Standard, and Enhanced.


I extensively tested all Overdrive settings by using the so-called pursuit camera method developed by the good people of Blur Busters, namely Mark D. Rejhon. The idea of the procedure is to use a standard DSLR camera to capture the motion blur exactly like your eyes see it. That's achieved by mounting a camera on a smooth slider, setting the camera exposure to four times the length of the monitor refresh rate, and loading the Ghosting Test Pattern with the Pursuit Camera Sync Track invented by Mark Rejhon of Blur Busters. Then, the camera has to be slid sideways at the same speed as the on-screen motion. The sync track is there to tell you if you're moving the camera too fast or too slow or if it shakes too much. The procedure takes some practice and getting used to, but it yields great results and lets us examine the differences between various overdrive settings at various monitor refresh rates.

I made a series of photos at the only available refresh rate of 60 Hz, with all three available Overdrive settings. Let's look at the results and figure out what the ideal Overdrive setting would be.



These photos tell the whole story—setting Overdrive to "Standard" results in the clearest reproduction of moving objects. With Overdrive turned off, we can easily spot a bit of ghosting, while setting it to "Enhanced" introduces quite a lot of overshoot.

Input Lag

To measure the input lag of a monitor, I use a high-speed camera and modified gaming mouse. Here's a detailed explanation of my testing procedure. It's important that you're aware of it in order to interpret the results properly.

I start by connecting a modified gaming mouse—the Logitech G9x—to my PC. The mouse has a blue LED connected directly to its primary button that instantly illuminates after pressing the button. The USB sample rate is set to 1,000 Hz via the Logitech Gaming Software. I then mount the Nikon 1 J5, a mirrorless camera capable of recording video in 1,200 FPS, in front of the monitor. After that, I run Counter Strike: Global Offensive and load a custom map (Map_Flood, made by a member of the Blur Busters community) consisting of nothing but a huge white square suspended in a black void. The camera is set up in a way that has it record the entire screen.

Every graphics option in CS:GO is either switched to the lowest possible setting or turned off, and the console command "fps_max 0" is used to turn off the built-in FPS limiter and get as many frames per second as possible. The purpose of doing so is to remove input lag caused by the game engine from the equation. My system is equipped with an overclocked Core i7-6700K and a GTX 1080 Ti, so it has no trouble hitting 2,000 FPS in that scenario. Vertical Sync and G-Sync/FreeSync are also turned off if available because we don't want anything delaying the presentation of frames—our goal is to have the first frame reach the screen as fast as the monitor itself lets it, rather than limiting it by various syncing methods. You're probably wondering how much additional input lag can be introduced when G-Sync or FreeSync is used, which is undoubtedly something every user of a monitor that supports it will do—you're buying it for G-Sync or FreeSync in the first place, after all. I tested several different G-Sync and FreeSync monitors extensively with G-Sync/FreeSync on and off and found out that G-Sync/FreeSync introduce an additional 2 ms of input lag on average.

The test is conducted by starting the video recording and pressing the left mouse button, which is bound to the in-game command "Strafe Left", after which the LED blinks and an in-game movement occurs. I repeat this twenty times before opening the recorded videos in QuickTime, which has a nice option of browsing through a video frame-by-frame. I then find the frame where the LED first turned on and carefully look for the frame where the first glimpse of on-screen movement can be seen. The exact number of frames it took between those two events to happen is then multiplied by 0.8333 because I'm recording in 1,200 FPS (1 frame = 0.8333 ms). To get the final result, I subtract 5 ms from the calculated time because that's the average click latency of the Logitech G9x (it measures in at between 4–6 ms). There are a couple of other factors that slightly influence the score, such as the LED's reaction time (1 ms or less), camera lag (1 ms), and USB polling rate (1 ms), but those aren't constant, so I'm not subtracting them from the final calculated result. That's also one of the reasons why I'm doing as many as twenty measurements—the impact of the aforementioned error margins is reduced with each new sample taken.

In the end, we get the so-called button-to-pixel lag value: the time that passes from when you perform an action with your mouse and until said action is first registered on screen. Anything below 16 ms (that equals a frame of lag at 60 Hz) can be considered gaming-grade, and such a monitor is suitable for even the most demanding gamers and eSports professionals. If input lag falls between 16–32 ms (between 1-2 frames of lag at 60 Hz), the monitor is suitable for almost everyone, but the most hardcore gamers, especially if they're playing first-person shooters on a professional level. Finally, if a monitor's input lag is higher than 32 ms (over 2 frames of lag at 60 Hz), even casual gamers should be able to notice it. Will they be bothered by it? Not necessarily, but I can't recommend a screen like that for serious gaming.

Here's how the EIZO FlexScan EV2785 holds up in terms of input lag:



Its measured input lag was very consistent but fairly high, as expected. On average, we're talking about 33 milliseconds, which places this monitor into the category of monitors not suitable for serious gaming and fast-paced games, such as first person shooters.