On Wed, May 29, 2013 at 09:16:00PM +1000, muzza wrote:
Screen Res has been a bug bear of mine too:. In the past yoiu could get decent res:- 1280x1024 or above and quite commonly 1600x1200 and at 2ms response times. However it seems that some idiot somewhere decided that we only watch videos on our computers so we only need 1920x1080 at 5ms response times,
it's not so much that 1920x1200 and other resolutions are over-priced, it's that 1920x1080 is dirt-cheap. the reason for that resolution is because that's what all the TV manufacturers made in mass quantities for 1080p "Full HD" televisions. different resolutions just aren't built in the same numbers, with the same economies of scale. they flooded the market and, as a result, screens of that resolution got a massive reduction in price that other resolutions didn't. 1080p is good enough for TV so we probably won't see significantly better resolutions cheaply until the TV watchers are convinced that 4K TVs are worthwhile. personally, i can't see the need for it for TV, but i'll be ready and waiting to buy when they get cheap enough - a nice small 24-32" 4K TV will make a very nice computer monitor. that won't be for several years, though. 2560x1440 (aka "1440p") will beat 2560x1600 for a similar reason - 16:9 is a wide-screen TV resolution, 16:10...but it won't be as cheap as 1080p because there's no reason at all for TV owners to upgrade to that - nothing is broadcast in that resolution....even most "HD" content is just upscaled SD, but it's hard to notice because most people watch TV from 10+ feet away. it's Apple iMacs and Dell workstations and the like driving the production of 1440p, a much smaller market than TVs - but users can watch full-screen videos on 16:9 without letterboxing and without weird scaling distortions...still, i'll probably replace my current 1920x1200 monitor with one when 24 or 27 inch 1440p monitors get down to $3-$400 - they're around $600-ish now. I'd prefer 2560x1600 because that extra vertical resolution is invaluable but i doubt i'll ever see that at an affordable price, apart from Apple's brief flirtation with that on 30" imacs, they're specialty-market items for medical devices (and anything medical is always ridiculously overpriced)
and for crappy lappies only 1366x768.
we're already starting to see laptops with better resolutions, 1080p and 1440p in 4-ish, 7, and 10 inch sizes- tablets (and even phones) are pushing that....but again, there's a bigger market for 7 and 10 inch tablets than there is for 11, 12, 14, etc inch laptops. small notebooks will benefit hugely from the mass-produced tablet screens. other sizes, not so much.
the point is why are they bringing out screens that even MS Windows doesnt support?.
windows, and linux, support such resolutions. but like web-developers, application developers test their software on their full-size desktop screens and if looks good there, it's good enough. so they make dialog boxes that don't fit in 1366x768 screens. most don't even think about the fact that it will look different, let alone crappy, on a different screen with a different resolution or size.
Its possible that the gamers that used to drive computer improvements have been undermined by the general dweeb population who dont know any better.
TVs are a much bigger market than enthusiast gamers
Its also possible that it is the thin end of the wedge encouraging us to move to tablets and phones with higher resolutions (if impossible to see the older you get)
no, it's just that mass-market things are cheaper than other things. craig -- craig sanders <cas@taz.net.au> BOFH excuse #24: network packets travelling uphill (use a carrier pigeon)