External displays with similar pixel density to 17" MBP display?

[mwallens]

've got a 17" MacBook Pro, native resolution 1920x1200, which is quite high in terms of pixel density (132 PPI). I have a 24" external Samsung display, also 1920x1200, which means the pixel density is a lot lower (94 PPI). It works fine, but (as you might expect), screen items increase in size rather noticeably when I drag from the laptop display to the external display. (The 24" LCD Apple Cinema Display is also 1920x1200, so also 94 PPI and the same thing would happen). I've been looking all over the place, and I can't seem to find an external display in the 20-24" range that has a resolution higher than 1920x1200. Ideally I'd like to find a display with the same amazing pixel density, so everything is the same size on both my laptop display and on the external display. I don't know what that would be--probably something like 2048x1152 on a 20" or 22", and 2560x1600 for a 24". Even Apple's 30" Cinema Display at 2560x1600 (or what I imagine will be the new 27" LCD coming out later this summer, probably at 2560x1600) would suffer from this problem, because while the resolution is great, the screen size is so large that the pixel density would still be lower than 132 PPI and once again screen items would increase in size when moved from the laptop monitor to the external monitor. I don't really care about screen size or cost. I'd buy a 20" display, or a 30" display, if the pixel density were identical to (or at least close to) the pixel density of my MacBook Pro. Anybody know where I can find something like this?

 

[kasakka]

No such thing as far as I know. I don't know why it matters that the size of things changes when moving between displays if the resolution is the same it has the same amount of space for things on the display anyway.

 

[five5s]

Actually, I think it's a great question. I was wondering the same myself and then found the question here.

I'm near sighted and need glasses when working on the 17" MBP (not complaining, I love the monitor real estate), but when hooked up to an external where everything is larger, have to remove the glasses.

Having an external monitor with the same ppi as my MBP would make things much simpler.

 

[kasakka]

To have that kind of pixel density, the display would have to have a resolution of 2560x1600 at about 23". Never going to happen.