Comment by kllrnohj
5 years ago
What are you calling "hi-dpi"? There's a ton of 4k monitors in the 27" to 32" range, which are definitely higher DPI than typical. And for a lot less than $5000.
5 years ago
What are you calling "hi-dpi"? There's a ton of 4k monitors in the 27" to 32" range, which are definitely higher DPI than typical. And for a lot less than $5000.
I'm typing this on a 4k, 32" monitor, which is 137.68 DPI, but I also have a Dell XPS 15, which is 4K and 15", 293.72 DPI, and the difference in sharpness is astounding.
The other problem with hidpi scaling (200%) at 4k 32", is that everything is huge, and you lose a lot of screen real estate.
Honestly I think 8k 36" is the sweet spot.
DPIs don't mean anything unless you factor in viewing distance.
In fact, it is common to recommend a vertical viewing angle of 30 degrees. Not more as it tends to increase eye fatigue and neck pain. If you follow that recommendation, what matters is the definition (the number of pixels), not the resolution in DPI.
So, let's run a few calculations. The "retina" resolution is based on a pixel size of 1 arc-minute, that's 20/20 vision, at 30 degrees, that's 1800 pixels. 4k is 2160 vertical, so that's about the limit of human vision. So, basically, 4k is what you want at any size.
8k is not useless but you are pushing the boundaries here. In order to notice it, you need perfect, over 20/20 vision, high luminosity and high contrast. Beyond 8k, you enter superhuman territory, with an exception: you can notice discontinuities at a much higher resolution (vernier resolution), but it only matters if you don't have anti-aliasing. And of course, high contrast, luminosity and perfect vision.
There are exception. For example there is a limit on how close a screen can be, so having 4k on a tiny smartphone screen is mostly useless. The other end of the spectrum would be VR, with fields of view over 100 degrees, 8k per eye is considered a minimum for an immersive experience.
>So, let's run a few calculations. The "retina" resolution is based on a pixel size of 1 arc-minute, that's 20/20 vision, at 30 degrees, that's 1800 pixels. 4k is 2160 vertical, so that's about the limit of human vision. So, basically, 4k is what you want at any size.
No, because I don't want to move my 32" monitor further away to get that 30 degree viewing angle. The reason I have a 32" monitor for work is to have more screen real estate. A 30 degree viewing angle works for watching movies and stuff, but when I use it for coding, I essentially have multiple 30 degree viewing (on-screen) windows.
You might say "ok well just get two or three monitors", but that isn't the same either. Besides the space between the monitors, with one large monitor I can subdivide my screen space in any way depending on what I'm doing, where each window has a 10-30 degree viewing angle or whatever.
>you can notice discontinuities at a much higher resolution (vernier resolution), but it only matters if you don't have anti-aliasing.
That's just not true though. It does matter even with antialiasing, the difference is clear. In particular, the dell xps 15 2019 has a ~290 dpi OLED, which has high contrast.
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>DPIs don't mean anything unless you factor in viewing distance.
Between phone, table, and laptop, monitor, yes.
But when speaking of monitors alone, it's not that relevant an observation in practice, since most monitors, whether 27", or 32", or 24" are seen from more or less the same distance.
> 4k is 2160 vertical, so that's about the limit of human vision.
This is false. Misalignment of borders can be detected with a precision up to 10 times better than visual acuity [0], therefore your numbers should be multiplied by 10, meaning 40K is the optimal screen resolution, or 80K for people with particularly good vision.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperacuity_(scientific_term)
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Why scale it if you think that makes me everything huge? I don't do the scaling and enjoy the extra real estate.
Because then you lose the sharpness, and the extra real estate is too much, so everything is both less sharp AND tiny.
I don't scale it, but then I lose the text sharpness. I would like both.
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There's settings other than 100% and 200%. Set it to 125%. Or 150%.
That is not the same. Non-integer scaling results in worse sharpness because of the way it needs to be implemented.
See eg: https://tonsky.me/blog/monitors/
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I have the same displays as you- Dell 4k @ 15" and currently using a 32" 4k (I sit 2ft away from it). I also have a Macbook Pro 16 (3072×1920). I honestly don't see a substantial difference between any of them, and I'm generally pretty picky about resolution.
Right but if you scale the 32" so you get the hidpi sharpness (and put it far away), you lose the real-estate that you could have on a 32" screen.
I use 4K 32" with scaling at 100% and it seems totally fine. Lots of real 15-17" laptop screen at 4K makes no sense to me as I can't use 100% as the text size becomes too small.
Right, the whole idea is that you use 200% and get that really crisp text.
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You shouldn't be as close to the laptop screen as to the big monitor. And at larger distances the pixel densities can be lower.
This is the argument that HiDPI displays are pointless if you're not very close to the monitor, and if you've used a retina display, you know that there is absolutely a difference.
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Did you say that backwards? On my lap, the screen of my laptop is 17"-20" from my face. At a desk, the monitor is usually about 28" from my face.
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It's that you have to go to such a larger screen size. I just upgraded my monitor from a 1080p. I really wanted a 24" @ 4k for higher dpi and crispness. Practically impossible to find, despite being common on laptops with much smaller screens. I had to go up to 27" instead, which is still crisp, though not as much, and larger than I wanted for the space it's in.
I need both 4K and 120/144Hz on 32inch but it's not available now. Maybe soon.