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macbook_21

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Nov 28, 2015
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OK, this is a newb question, I have my first retina display mac. Yay!

I have done a quick search, but can't find the answer. What are the resolutions for the display options?

There is a 'default,' a larger text and two 'more space' options.

What are the resolutions associated with each option? Thanks.
 
The default + more space options look like 1280x800, 1440x900 and 1680x1050.

The real resolution doesn't really change, but those are the scaling options.

Not sure what larger text does/
 
OK, the cursor shows: "looks like" 1680X1050 at the 'most space' setting, 1024X600 at the 'larger text' setting, and 1280X800 at the default setting.

So, default is 2560X1600 but 'looks like' 1280x800?
 
OK, the cursor shows: "looks like" 1680X1050 at the 'most space' setting, 1024X600 at the 'larger text' setting, and 1280X800 at the default setting.

So, default is 2560X1600 but 'looks like' 1280x800?

Correct.

Native panel res is 2560x1600, everything else is scaled.

Being a 2x scale, 1280x800 is the fastest (and default) scaling option.
 
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OK, the cursor shows: "looks like" 1680X1050 at the 'most space' setting, 1024X600 at the 'larger text' setting, and 1280X800 at the default setting.

So, default is 2560X1600 but 'looks like' 1280x800?
- Correct. The actual resolution is always 2560x1600. But by default, OS X makes it look like 1280x800 in terms of available real estate by using four actual screen pixels for each UI pixel. That creates the effect of a 1280x800 resolution but with much sharper details since each UI element can be four times as detailed - which is the whole idea of the "Retina" screen.
The other scaling options then just map the pixels differently and use some software wizardry to still make it look good. Essentially, if you select "most space", OS X will render the UI at 3360x2100 and then downscale that four times so it looks like 1680x1050.
 
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Without going to check, I believe that if you hold down the alt key you can also bring up a list of available resolutions to choose from.
 
Ah, so 'looks like 1440x900' is a little slower.

Supposedly, i haven't noticed any real problems. But the machine is definitely doing more work.

The way it works as i understand it is that the machine renders the "looks like" res at 2x resolution and then scales it via OpenGL or whatever to fit the native 2560x1600.

Because "looks like" 1280x800 is already 2560x1600 the second step of scaling it back down to fit the panel doesn't need to be done.

If you go for something like 1440x900 it renders at 2880x1800 and then needs to scale back to fit 2560x1600 native res.


It does this to stop jaggies becoming apparent which would happen if you were attempting to scale straight from say 1440x900 to 2560x1600 due to the pixels not being an exact integer scaling factor. Blowing things up huge then scaling back prevents jaggies from being bad enough to see.
 
Supposedly, i haven't noticed any real problems. But the machine is definitely doing more work.

The way it works as i understand it is that the machine renders the "looks like" res at 2x resolution and then scales it via OpenGL or whatever to fit the native 2560x1600.

Because "looks like" 1280x800 is already 2560x1600 the second step of scaling it back down to fit the panel doesn't need to be done.

If you go for something like 1440x900 it renders at 2880x1800 and then needs to scale back to fit 2560x1600 native res.


It does this to stop jaggies becoming apparent which would happen if you were attempting to scale straight from say 1440x900 to 2560x1600 due to the pixels not being an exact integer scaling factor. Blowing things up huge then scaling back prevents jaggies from being bad enough to see.

I think they switched to Metal under El Capitan but not sure. Would explain why it's smoother.
 
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