LCD resolutions: Calling experts

[alexachucarro]

My mate goes on how Dell's laptops display 1920 x whatever res. for their screens. Yet the Ti has just reached 1520 x whatever. I recently read an article explaining LCD stuff. I know about the TrueRes for an LCD screen. I'm also aware that LCD as a technology has limit to its smallness. So how is it a 14.1" Dell has a greater res than Apples 22" Cinema Display.

Cnay anyone clarify for me. I'm assuming that the Dell's aren;t at theit TrueRes.

???

[ulrik]

That's the reason why the original Cinema Display was so cheap!!! (seriously!)

How Dell reaches the 1920, I don't know, but I guess it's some kind of "virtual" resolution, like only displaying every second pixel or something...but I really don't know...

[serpicolugnut]

If a 15" laptop LCD could display 1920 resolution, you wouldn't be able to read it. Just the other day I saw a guy with a Toshiba Satellite 5105 (very very nice laptop) that had a 15" display running at 1600x1200, and while nice, it was very hard to read.

However, Apple is lagging behind the other players in this area with the TiBook. First off, the ATI Radeon Mobility, while bumped up recently to 32MB, is still a lame video chipset. The nVidia GeForce4Go is readily available, and better suited for a mobile workstation. Plus, with the TiBook topping out at 1280 width resolution, Apple is two steps behind the competition. I really want to replace my rev. A PBG4/500, but Apple has yet to give me any incentive to do so.

[serpicolugnut]

I just checked - the Dell's resolution is 1600x1200, which is about the best you can get for a 15" display - anything more and the text will be unreadable...

Apple's PBG4 is at 1280x854.

[fryke]

Actually, I'm glad the resolution isn't any higher on the new TiBooks. If you have to do graphical work for press, the resolution should be as close to 'real' as possible. 72 dpi, anyone?

[serpicolugnut]

Acutally, you can down sample to other resolutions which come close to the 72dpi that's optimal for print projects.

However, I don't even think that Apple's LCD displays are 72dpi anymore. 15.2" x 72dpi = 1094.4, so Apple's PBG4 displays are significantly higher than 72dpi, as are most LCDs these days...

Down sampling on LCDs can somtimes look really bad & smudgey, but on those Toshibas, when you downsample to 1280x960, it looks very very good.

[Bluefusion]

Yeah, downsampling on Apple's LCDs seems to look worse than downsampling on almost any other LCD I've used (try scaling the Cinema Display down one notch--oooh, yuck!)

[.dev.lqd]

Macs have (typically) been 96dpi for screens... haven't they?

It's all academic in the long run anyhow... the only really good way to proof is through a hardcopy.