Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

MBP 15" 2009 Model... Blurry Screen?

A

ArcAngel66

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 26, 2009
156
8
Not sure if this has been discussed yet, but after searching on these forums I couldn't find a topic already talking about it...

I just received my 15" Macbook Pro ( Mid 2009, the most recent update ), and noticed right away at just how blurry the screen is.

Comparing it to other laptops around me, and my desktops monitors... the text on the Macbook's screen looks blurry compared to them all.

Now Im making it sound like it's horrible, and it's really not... I just expected it to be a lot crisper and sharper.
 
ArcAngel66 said:
Not sure if this has been discussed yet, but after searching on these forums I couldn't find a topic already talking about it...

I just received my 15" Macbook Pro ( Mid 2009, the most recent update ), and noticed right away at just how blurry the screen is.

Comparing it to other laptops around me, and my desktops monitors... the text on the Macbook's screen looks blurry compared to them all.

Now Im making it sound like it's horrible, and it's really not... I just expected it to be a lot crisper and sharper.
Click to expand...

what's the resolution of your screen? make sure it's at 1400 x 900
 
Picture2.png


Picture1.png




EDIT: You can see the text that's blurred pretty well here sorta, I tried to get it in "big" text so it showed up well.



Not sure how well those turned out... But basically it's the text that makes it noticable...

The text within iTunes is absolutely horrible, and everywhere else it seems not nearly as sharp as my desktop Dell monitors. I think it could also be the contrast, as that seems overly high, and could possibly be making the monitor look less crisp.
 
It seems sharp enough to me, but that's because you took a screen capture of it. Try taking a picture of the monitor with a camera, as then we can see what you are seeing on the actual monitor.
 
I think you're just not used to the font smoothing in OS X. You can try lowering the setting in the Appearance preference panel and see if you prefer that.
 
incandenza said:
I think you're just not used to the font smoothing in OS X. You can try lowering the setting in the Appearance preference panel and see if you prefer that.
Click to expand...

I think this could be it. I'm going to have to take a look at them in the Apple store tomorrow.

I don't know, just looking at high resolution screen shots of OSX on my Dell monitor, the 3 bubbles ( red yellow and green ) in each window seem 100% round... But when I look at them on my macbook pro, they just seem very pixelated and blury/not crisp.

I see it as either one of three problems:

1) I'm not used to Mac OSX and how the font compares to windows.

2) Im not used to laptops, Im normally on my Dell 24" 1920x1200 monitor.

3) I have a bad display.
 
ArcAngel66 said:
Picture2.png


Picture1.png
Click to expand...

Wait... Those look like screen grabs to me, rather than actual photos taken with a camera, therefore it doesn't show the true likeness of what the eye can see. So until you provide us with actual photographic images, the feedback you'll get from us will be inaccurate.

Here's an example of my MBP's screen taken with a Canon ƒ2.8 100mm Macro Lens. (excuse the dustiness of the display.. i ain't cleaned it in a while)

20090627-cptty3fsydff6w452fiytjwmfp.jpg
 
UltraNEO* said:
Wait... Those look like screen grabs to me, rather than actual photos taken with a camera, therefore it doesn't show the true likeness of what the eye can see. So until you provide us with actual photographic images, the feedback you'll get from us will be inaccurate.

Here's an example of my MBP's screen taken with a Canon ƒ2.8 100mm Macro Lens. (excuse the dustiness of the display.. i ain't cleaned it in a while)

20090627-cptty3fsydff6w452fiytjwmfp.jpg
Click to expand...

Ok. Ill do my best in the morning to do this. I was trying it earlier, and my D40 wasn't able to focus well enough that close to the screen. But ill try a few other things.
 
ArcAngel66 said:
Ok. Ill do my best in the morning to do this. I was trying it earlier, and my D40 wasn't able to focus well enough that close to the screen. But ill try a few other things.
Click to expand...

I know exactly what you're talking about, it was hard for me initially to go from Windows to OS X because of the font smoothing. As someone mentioned earlier, you should go to System Preferences -> Appearance and lower font smoothing from the default best for display setting to low and see if that makes things better for you.

Mac laptops tend to be a lot brighter too than PC laptops so adjusting the brightness setting should also help. Adjusting the gamma/color should help a lot too - you can accomplish this by going to System Preferences -> Display -> Color and editing the "Color LCD" default profile. You can click through everything (disabling advanced options), change just the gamma to 2.2 from 1.8 and then save the new profile as Color LCD Calibrated or whatever you want. This will make the "internal brightness" of the display less and make colors look richer and darker. Good luck!
 
This is the #1 issue holding me back from buying a MBP. Seriously.

To my eyes, text on Windows using ClearType is much sharper than the same text on a Mac. The Mac fonts, to me, look blurry or fuzzy in comparison.

I went to see the new MBPs the other day, hoping that this may have changed... but no go. :(

Here are just a few other threads about it:

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/716370/

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=245012

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/367918/


EDIT: I forgot to mention that I did try adjusting the font smoothing on the MBP System Preferences -> Appearance. While it did seem to change it a bit, the text still did not look as sharp as it does Windows w/ ClearType on.
 
I don't know... On Mac, the text is very clean looking and the visuals are very balanced. However, in Windows, the font smoothing is rather crude, like the font smoothing on my Blackberry. It didn't bother me when I switched from Windows, but then I see what you mean. There is a very large difference between how text on the Mac looks and how it looks on a Windows computer. It's all a matter of preference.
 
w00t951 said:
It's all a matter of preference.
Click to expand...
In all honesty, I don't see how anyone could prefer the Mac fonts, since (again, to me) they appear to be less sharp than Windows w/ ClearType. So, in my mind, I don't see how anyone would prefer text that is less sharp.

Believe me, I'm not trying to knock Apple -- I own an iPhone (which has beautifully sharp text, by the way) and very much want a MBP. I just can't get over the blurry text, and don't see how I'd ever get used to it. Maybe if I never saw text from Windows again... but since we have 3 other Windows machines in the house, that's not gonna happen.
 
It took me a long time to get used to OS X's font rendering, though I doubt I'll ever 100% adjust to it. I don't get headaches like I used to, but it's still hard for me to read sometimes. It still seems like a blurred mess a lot of the time, like I'm looking at a picture with some pieces gone here and there.

I agree in that I don't see how anybody could prefer OS X's font, but there are just as many who say the same thing about Cleartype. I guess we should be glad there is a choice.
 
mcpryon2 said:
I don't get headaches like I used to, but it's still hard for me to read sometimes.
Click to expand...
I'm glad you said that. Fearing a flame war, I didn't want to mention that I seem to get a headache every time I use a Mac... ;) ...but it's true. It's good to know -- sort of -- that I'm not the only one!
 
I thought this was expressed well:
ubercool said:
Welcome to the world of Apple's poor anti-aliasing technology! :(

The problem began with OS X. Until then, Apple had the sharpest text rendering of any computer on the market. But OS X brought a new font display technology that used a really bad dithering method.

That's why Windows fonts look so much better. I think it's a friggin embarrasment that Apple, with such a rich graphic arts background, would saddle its 50 million-plus design-infatuated users such a poor display technology.

The funny thing is, I have done a lot of research in this area, and you and I are among the few complaining about this, explaining why Apple has continued this poor practice. Another bizarre aspect of this design approach is the fact that whenever you get a document from a Mac person, it's invariably in the 125% view, because no one can read a Mac document at 100%.

That's a really poor decision on your part, Steve Jobs! I can't believe you can't see that on your Sony TZ, I do! :D Parenthetically, I must blame Steve because I think that Apple's 5,000-plus engineers obviously know about this.

BTW, time to get out of the closet. I'm the founder of MacWEEK, and I've been around a long time, so I know of which I speak. So don't flame me. :cool:

Michael Tchong
Trend Analyst
http://www.ubercool.com
Click to expand...
Source
 
UPDATE:

Went to the Apple store to compare the MBPs there to mine. ( the brand new one in Scottsdale, AZ, just a week old! )

While it's a bit tough to fully 100% compare amongst the huge spotlight's completely blaring down at you... I did get a good feel and what about 4-5 of them there were like compared to mine:

They all look the same, and that same is just like mine!

Mine looks the same as basically every one I looked at. I used iTunes as a comparison, and the fonts all looked rather... well, crappy on of them compared to PC/Vista counterparts.The text inside iTunes just is blurry, and not smooth, and etc. But it's most likely something you get used to either way however.

I'm happy that mine isn't defective though!... Now I can just get used to what it is, and that's something Im totally fine with. I don't mind the text being a bit "blurry" as long as it's meant to be that way!

The real test will be when I install Windows on this Mac though, then I can get a true comparison on sharpness.
 
ArcAngel66 said:
UPDATE:

Went to the Apple store to compare the MBPs there to mine. ( the brand new one in Scottsdale, AZ, just a week old! )

While it's a bit tough to fully 100% compare amongst the huge spotlight's completely blaring down at you... I did get a good feel and what about 4-5 of them there were like compared to mine:

They all look the same, and that same is just like mine!

Mine looks the same as basically every one I looked at. I used iTunes as a comparison, and the fonts all looked rather... well, crappy on of them compared to PC/Vista counterparts.The text inside iTunes just is blurry, and not smooth, and etc. But it's most likely something you get used to either way however.

I'm happy that mine isn't defective though!... Now I can just get used to what it is, and that's something Im totally fine with. I don't mind the text being a bit "blurry" as long as it's meant to be that way!

The real test will be when I install Windows on this Mac though, then I can get a true comparison on sharpness.
Click to expand...

There is another thread on this here. I noticed that same thing. Text looks fuzzy on these screens, but it's really just the font smoothing that osx uses. Unfortunately, there's no real fix. You could attach an external monitor. Either way, these new screens seem to bring out the red and blue subpixels around text more than others, so the text appears fuzzier since you're seeing more of the pixels. It's a tradeoff I guess :)
 
kanpachi said:
You can click through everything (disabling advanced options), change just the gamma to 2.2 from 1.8 and then save the new profile as Color LCD Calibrated or whatever you want. This will make the "internal brightness" of the display less and make colors look richer and darker. Good luck!
Click to expand...

Ditto on this. I think these screens are slightly blurry as well. Changing to 2.2 gamma makes the edges of the text darker and easier to focus on .It's not "crisper," it's just easier on the eyes.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back