Introduction

Let me tell you about a piece of hardware, I never thought I needed, but now wouldn’t be without. It’s a ScreenBar from BenQ.

You can watch the video of this review here: https://youtu.be/P4CnC4ZQyo0?si=8UQxaS_yyvjxEeD1

BenQ asked me if I wanted to try out their ScreenBar Pro or ScreenBar Halo. I knew nothing about either, so before committing to anything, I went to check them out on their website… and confusion ensued.

They have a few of these ScreenBars and I wasn’t sure which one would suit my needs. I ended up getting both the ScreeBar Halo, and the ScreenBar Pro sent, so this post is going to cover why you might want each one, and why you probably want either of them in the first place.

Why ScreenBar

The ScreenBar is a lighting bar, that sits on your monitor and, depending on the model, shines light at the physical workspace below, or both the workspace below, and the area behind your monitor, as is the case of the Halo.

Now, if you are a practical minded purpose, and a sceptic like me, you might wonder what the big deal is. Either of these products is over $100 or £100 in his majesty’s money. Why not just point an Ikea lamp at your desk when you need it? But that is the reasoning of a Philistine. The beauty of these products are many. First, as they both attach to the monitor with a simple clamping system, they are always where you need them, and not littering your desktop. If your desk is anything like mine, space is a premium, so this gives me the benefit of light where I want it, without something I need to faff around arranging on my desk.

You also get no glare whatsoever on your screen. It’s hard to overstate how important this is, but you can very comfortably work with either of these as the only source of light in the room, alongside the monitor itself and be entirely comfortable.

Both of these are powered via USB, the connection on both being USB-C. They work on all sorts of monitors. My own is a good test being a 40” ultrawide, so there is a curvature to contend with but both the Pro and Halo dealt with that with no issues. Both can deal with curves from 1000R to 1800R.

Both also offer a variety of light temperatures, so you can bask in a warming 2700K or live like a man in a fridge at 6500K. I typically choose the later as it matches my cold unfeeling heart. Both also have an auto brightness feature so they can adjust the intensity of the light based upon ambient light levels.

So, we’ve covered the essentials of what both of the ScreenBars do, now lets talk about the differences, and why you might want one more than the other. The key thing here is that I can’t really tell you one is better than the other, it’s more a case of which feature set appeals the most. Lets start with the Pro.

Pro

The pro has a very slim ‘claw’ section for hooking onto the monitor. This could be a big deal if you have a monitor with a very thin bezel, or a webcam up top. It also only has the downward facing light, which might be a deal breaker if you are a fan of the projected light behind the monitor. However, the crowning glory, and the thing that sets the Pro apart is it has auto on/off, which is something I love. You set up the bar to your brightness preference and then you never have to think about it again. When you get close to your screen, on it comes. After a short period of time when you are away from the screen, it automatically turns itself off.

One thing that caught me out is if you have auto on/off and auto-brightness on. This causes the bar to kind of come on, then go off, then come on fully. This happens because first it detects your presence to come on, then measures the ambient light, and turns on to the correct brightness. It is working as intended when it does that but it you find that annoying, and I’m old and grumpy enough that it annoyed me, you can just choose a brightness you like, press and hold the heart symbol for 3 seconds and that sets the current levels to your favourite. Then, when you come back, it instantly sets to that level without the breathing effect.

There is no separate controller with the Pro, all the controls are up on the light itself. It’s very straightforward and again, it’s hard to convey just how pleasant it is to have light down on the desk as you work, without shining onto the screen.

Halo

The Halo does not have presence detection so it can’t turn on and off by itself for you. Instead, the Halo has a couple of individual features of its own. Firstly, it comes with a rather nice wireless controller. It takes 3 AAA batteries, that are included but will need replacing at some point. Without any configuration at all, it connects to the Halo light. I understand it can actually control two Halo lights at once, if they are both close enough, so one controller can drive a dual monitor, dual Halo setup. It has a pleasant tilt and a frictionless feel as you spin it. Incredibly tactile.

The other thing that the Halo has, that the Pro doesn’t, is the backlighting. Where the Pro only gives you the downlight, the Halo can give you a downlight, and a backlight and they can be on together, or independently.

I think I quite like the backlight if I’m sat back from the screen a little, maybe when enjoying a game, if you can call getting mashed by sweaty 10 year olds on Fortnite enjoyable. For me the backlight is nice to have rather than an essential but I can totally understand those that would put that feature above the auto on/off of the Pro model.

Comfort

So I mentioned this already but what is so nice about these products is the fact you can get just the right amount of illumination, in just the right position. The fact that your desk area is so well lit, while getting no direct light on your monitor screen feels like a minor miracle.

The quality is also obvious. Wonderful brackets, that hold the bar in the perfect position but without requiring any serious clamping, so it should not make a mark on your screen.

Which one Halo or Pro?

If your monitor has a very thin bezel, you’ll want the Pro. If you want the auto on/off, you’ll want the Pro. In terms of the downlight, in practical use, I don’t find much between them, both let you change colour temperature, both let you adjust brightness, both let you have auto brightness and a favourite setting. If you watch a lot of content on your monitor, I’d say the Halo would swing it for me. The backlight when watching a film or playing games is really pleasant. I’d also say that if you like changing it up, temperature or brightness wise, the control dial of the Halo makes that very easy and incredibly pleasant. I found myself twiddling it, just because it feels nice to twiddle it!

For me, the one that’s going to stay above my monitor is the Pro. My inner sloth just fills with glee at the thought of one less thing to do as the lights effortlessly come on and off as I enter my workspace. It’s like finally having a PA, albeit one that only operates the lights.

That said, I could be perfectly happy with the Halo. These are both lovely surprising products for me, and I hope you find them just as worthwhile.