Cinema VS Thunderbolt Display

[commac]

I'm a web developer whos been waiting for Apple to release a refreshed 27" display for over a year. A thousand dollars for a monitor without USB3 support seems off. I have a late 2013 retina macbook pro which has 2 thunderbolt ports.

People are talking about the possibility of the next Apple display being retina or 5K only. If thats the case I would like to buy now and have a standard DPI monitor for seeing what the majority of the world sees. It is still very frustrating to work in Photoshop on retina screen (need to work at 200%).

My question is: Is it better to buy the thunderbolt or Cinema display?

The thunderbolt has more ports (that are out dated) but the cinema display seems compatible with PC's which would be nice since I have a Windows machine as well.

Does anyone have experience with the Cinema display on a PC?

I also have the logic that more parts in the Thunderbolt display mean more points of potential failure.

I cant think of any major reasons why the Thunderbolt display is better. I have an ethernet adapter and don't have any firewire devices. Does Thunderbolt allow for anything really cool over the Cinema that I'm missing?

 

[JoelBC]

I have been pondering the same thing especially when Apple is selling both as refurbs for the same price, $799.00,

 

[Macsonic]

Hi Commac. There was a time I hooked up an Apple Cinema Display to a PC Windows XP machine and works fine for Photoshop work and video rendering. Note that I am using the older aluminum LCD cinema display that was launched back in 2005. I was also able to use the newer non-Thunderbolt LED cinema display released sometime in 2009 if I recall the year correctly. I prefer the color characteristics of the older aluminum cinema display because the skin tones of people was Warmer than the LED ACD. Also I prefer the matte screen than the glossy glass screen. The reflections on the glass sometimes distracts when I am viewing large images to edit. Though I know to many design and video firms the glossy works fine with them.

 

[commac]

Hi and thanks for the response. I loved the 30inch cinemas but right now the only screens available from apple with a warranty are the 27" cinema or thunderbolt which are identical panels with the difference being access to Ethernet and FireWire on the Thunderbolt model. The cinema has the advantage of being not confined to newer apple machines.