iPad mini Specific examples of Mini Display at its Worst?

Night Spring said:

To clarify, I wasn't advocating that we compare the mini display to the iPad 3/4. OP asked for examples of "worst" aspects of the mini display, so I told him if he wanted to see that, then he would have to compare it to iPad 3/4. In other words, I tend to agree with you -- the mini display only looks bad if you compare it to retina displays.

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Apologies, I was trying more to speak in generalities than specifically to you (meaning when I said 'you' I meant 'one'), I just used your post because it was convenient as a way to discuss the whole comparison thing going on that gives the mini a bad rep.

I don't remember (and correct me if I'm wrong) any people talking about how crap the gen 1 and gen 2 iPads were when they were released, and now people on here talk about the "crappy" mini screen (but in absolute terms which I think is silly and dishonest), even though it's only when you compare the screen that it falls short, and I think the device is so much more than merely a screen, just as a car (in my poor analogy I used earlier) is so much more than merely its engine.

High quality PDFs on mini are not good enough. If pdf viewing is your priority like myself, that will be one of the deal breakers.

The iPad mini is great for everything else except high quality PDFs due to low resolution and small screen.

Another effect is the web browsing. Try this: take iPad 3/4 load up CNN.com on both devices (including mini) both in portrait mode. If you say it's acceptable on the mini then you have some great built in anti-aliasing eyeballs!

maverick22 said:

Okay, I checked Best Buy on the way home again (only 1 minute from my house--they must be getting tired of me haha), and I played around on the mini for a few more minutes.

Both blu-ray.com and macrumors looked great on the mini as far as my eyes are concerned! Unless BB happen to sneak in some mini with retina (joking), I am convinced that I will be completely satisfied with the mini. I have looked at cnn.com before, and it looked good to me. I don't know what BB is doing to their display units, but it sure looks great in store!

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Well it will look like crap if you have it side by side to an iPad retina. If not, then you aren't accustomed to the retina display. It's not tragic to not have a retina display in fact the mini is totally fine without it. But apple has to make a retina because once you have seen retina it's very hard to go back to non retina. Personal preferences of course!!

maclook said:

(...) Like most other people have said though, it's not really a big deal once you start to use it day to day or if you haven't been spoiled by retina displays.

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Reading that on my rMBP with an iPhone 4s next to me I wonder if I really should have ordered the Mini. On the other hand, I chose the 13" rMBP only due to its size. Even though the 15" rMBP was the much better deal with much stronger components. Two inches less sometimes makes all the difference.

maverick22 said:

I'm asking you all who said the display is bad: when are you finding the text fuzzy or bad(specific apps/websites)?

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I had problems with small, fuzzy text in the AIM iPad app. Specifically, the conversation bubble area.

I use my iPad the most at work (with an Apple Bluetooth Keyboard). It sits about as far away from me as the monitor for my computer does, maybe 18" or so away.

Didn't have problems reading many other apps from that distance other than the AIM one, but I'm in AIM a lot during the day, so that sucked.

Also, I had problems with the "tab close" button in Safari being so close to the "Show the previous page" button (in landscape mode). There were too many times I meant to go back a page but ended up closing the tab accidentally. On forums, trying to hit the little icon that takes you to the first unread message was pretty difficult for me too, without having to swipe and make everything bigger.

The mini's not bad, but for me, it didn't work out.

WilliamLondon said:

Apologies, I was trying more to speak in generalities than specifically to you (meaning when I said 'you' I meant 'one'), I just used your post because it was convenient as a way to discuss the whole comparison thing going on that gives the mini a bad rep.

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Ah, gotcha. No problem!

I don't remember (and correct me if I'm wrong) any people talking about how crap the gen 1 and gen 2 iPads were when they were released, and now people on here talk about the "crappy" mini screen

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I forget when the iPhone got the retina screen -- was that before or after iPad 1? -- but once the iPhone had retina, I recall comments started popping up that they couldn't stand the iPad screen because it was non-retina. And yes, I believe the word "crappy" was bandied about. Perhaps the sentiment wasn't as widespread back then, but there has always been a number of people saying they couldn't stand to use a non-retina screen once they got used to retina.

If anyone is unhappy with text in safari I urge you to try mercury browser. Makes a huge difference.

For those that can't see the individual pixels in a non-retina display, care to say how old you are?

My minimum focusing distance is 7 inches. I don't know if that's good or normal or what? I'm 36.

Anti-Lucifer said:

High quality PDFs on mini are not good enough. If pdf viewing is your priority like myself, that will be one of the deal breakers.

The iPad mini is great for everything else except high quality PDFs due to low resolution and small screen.

Another effect is the web browsing. Try this: take iPad 3/4 load up CNN.com on both devices (including mini) both in portrait mode. If you say it's acceptable on the mini then you have some great built in anti-aliasing eyeballs!

Click to expand...

Honest question, when you are browsing on your computer is your browser window adjusted tall and narrow?

I can't for the life of me figure out why people browse the web in portrait mode on any iPad. Obviously everyone is different, but to me it just feels more natural to use it in landscape for web surfing.

maverick22 said:

Okay, I checked Best Buy on the way home again (only 1 minute from my house--they must be getting tired of me haha), and I played around on the mini for a few more minutes.

Both blu-ray.com and macrumors looked great on the mini as far as my eyes are concerned! Unless BB happen to sneak in some mini with retina (joking), I am convinced that I will be completely satisfied with the mini. I have looked at cnn.com before, and it looked good to me. I don't know what BB is doing to their display units, but it sure looks great in store!

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Most any desktop version of a website with lots of text is barely readable as it is crunched to kingdom come. Unless I look at bluray.com or yahoo.com for example in landscape mode, forget it.

Knowimagination said:

Honest question, when you are browsing on your computer is your browser window adjusted tall and narrow?

I can't for the life of me figure out why people browse the web in portrait mode on any iPad. Obviously everyone is different, but to me it just feels more natural to use it in landscape for web surfing.

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Tall and narrow does work better for some things -- for instance, I'm attaching screenshots of the New York Times in portrait and landscape. In portrait, you can see almost all of today's headlines in one screen. My eyesight isn't good enough to make out the words at this size, but for someone with good eyesight, I can see how they might prefer to read this in portrait. And while I don't adjust my web browser to tall and narrow on my desktop, again, the reason is my eyesight -- can't make out the words if I make it narrow. If my eyesight were better, then I'm sure I'd adjust web browsers to be narrower and therefore taller, because then I could see more of a page at a glance.

Knowimagination said:

Honest question, when you are browsing on your computer is your browser window adjusted tall and narrow?

I can't for the life of me figure out why people browse the web in portrait mode on any iPad. Obviously everyone is different, but to me it just feels more natural to use it in landscape for web surfing.

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Maybe it depends what type of surfing? If reading a lot then portrait feels natural on a tablet because it matches the experience of a book, magazine or newspaper.

I'm really liking my mini - I am using the 'reader' function in safari much more than what I used to on my old ipad 1. It makes text look great since it enlarges it slightly...

Small text is the weak point in my opinion. I've switched to Mercury Browser since you can set a default text size that applies to every page. That has made browsing a much better experience for me.

Kayakphotos said:

Small text is the weak point in my opinion. I've switched to Mercury Browser since you can set a default text size that applies to every page. That has made browsing a much better experience for me.

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You know about the macros that were made to increase or decrease the font in Safari?

Just do a search for it on this forum and I'm sure you will come across it. Makes a word of difference if one likes to use Safari.

maverick22 said:

Maybe that's what the deal is. I'm on a computer all day, and work directly under fluorescent lighting 10 hours/day. I get eye fatigue fairly quickly.

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Well I'm in a similar situation as you then. I had the iPad 2 for over a year and a half and even though it was an awesome device, I could feel the fuzziness affect my eyes when I would read. I also have very very bad eye power.

I recently got the iPad 4 and I can easily read a full 20 page article on it without any problems. In fact, I love the screen so much, I use it a lot more now than even my regular computer (MBP, no retina).

WilliamLondon said:

...It's sort of like looking at and deciding a 1-series BMW is the car for you, you like the size, the appearance, the comfort and feel of it, how it drives, the gas mileage, etc., then someone comes along and says, "it's crap, the engine is so small, you'll never be happy with that engine" (always focusing on the engine, as if that's the *only* part of the car, or the only part of the car that matters)...

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I would never buy a car without test-drving other cars to see which I prefer.

AppleRobert said:

You know about the macros that were made to increase or decrease the font in Safari?

Just do a search for it on this forum and I'm sure you will come across it. Makes a word of difference if one likes to use Safari.

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Yeah, I have a bookmark for enlarging font but I got tired of having to click it on every single new page I opened up.