Picking monitor size/resolution (scaling, resolution)

[raduvlr]

Hello

I've been trying to decide on an external monitor for the office that will be used both on a 2017 Macbook Pro as well as on a HP Spectre notebook. (no gaming, mainly coding and light photo/vide editing).

Currently I'm testing a LG 27UL850-W, 27" 4K display.

On the good side: has USB-C connectivity for the Mac, HDMI and Display port for the windows machine, on Windows the 4K resolution at 150% scaling looks pretty good

Not so good: when connected to the Mac, the "Default for display" setting gives me a 1920x1080 resolution which makes everything way too big. Native 4k resolution, everything is sharp but tiny. Scaling to 2560x1440 makes everything about the right size, but sharpness is not as good anymore and unfortunately makes some interface elements rather sluggish. (having to render everything at 5k then down scaling)


I'm thinking that any other 27" 4k display will have the same issue on the Mac.

Another option would be to get a 27" non 4k with native 1440 resolution but would definitely miss the sharpness on Windows as well as viewing 4K content on both Mac and Windows.

Currently available 5K monitors are little bit outside the price range.

Should I start looking at maybe bigger monitors and try using them in the native resolution without scaling? Any recommendations? From a space/size perspective the 27" was a good fit for me.


What would you guys recommend? What do you use as external displays and with what resolution ?

Thank you.

 

[frou]

Whatever the physical size of the monitor, for macOS you basically want it to be a model with ~220 PPI (for Retina) or ~110 PPI (for non-Retina).

Have a read of this: https://bjango.com/articles/macexternaldisplays/

 

[raduvlr]

Thanks for your reply.

So basically ,if I'm reading it right, the viable options on Mac to get best image quality (sharpness, interface size) on sizes higher than 24" are either 5K displays in the 27" range (running in Retina mode) either displays in the 27-49" range that have a variation of QHD resolution (2560x1440, 3440x1440) and are running in native resolution.

On Windows however, the sweet spot seems to be at 4K or higher resolution with scaling (which offer better results than QHD native resolution) - at least for displays below 34"

 

[frou]

For people blessed with not being a stickler about pin-sharp Retina, then the various big ultrawides (incl. curved models) are very good value for money these days.

 

[raduvlr]

As my use case is in an office environment, an ultra wide monitor comes with some additional challenges from a physical size point of view.

I started researching now for some alternatives to see if an UW QHD fits better with my needs (still have about a week to decide on weather to keep the 27 LG or replace it).

Any recommendations for a model (34" is probably the biggest i could fit)?

Thanks

 

[Fishrrman]

A 27" 4k display "normal setting" on the Mac IS "looks like 1080p".
Except, it's running in "HiDPI" mode (4 actual pixels are used for each "perceived" pixel).

You can "scale it" to a different "looks like" resolution, but that can impact performance. Sometimes it doesn't look quite as good, either.

A 27" 5k display will give you "4k quality on a larger display", and it will "look like" 1440p (2550x1440). This is the image you see as the default on a 27" iMac.
But these displays are few and the prices are high.
You said that would be above your budget.

A compromise?
You might consider a 32" 1440p (NON retina) display.
These are not expensive and the image quality can be quite good.
A possibility might be the HP "Omen" 32" display (or others).

 

[theluggage]

the "Default for display" setting gives me a 1920x1080 resolution

Pedant point: no, it doesn't give you "1920x1080 resolution" - unless you're using ancient Apps from pre-2012 it gives you 3840x2160 resolution with the UI elements doubled in size to compensate.

Likewise "looks like 2560x1440" doesn't give you 2560x1440 - it gives you 5120x2880 with 2x UI elements downsampled to 3840x2160 - the only connection with 1440p is the apparent size of the UI elements. Its not too different from the "full-screen anti-aliassing" option in some games.

I'm thinking that any other 27" 4k display will have the same issue on the Mac.

Yup.

Another option would be to get a 27" non 4k with native 1440 resolution but would definitely miss the sharpness on Windows as well as viewing 4K content on both Mac and Windows

Well a few years ago 1440p was luxury so a native 1440p display would be a perfectly good budget choice. Just not as good as 4k.

From my experience I'd say that you'd also miss the quality of "looks-like-1440p on 4k" (i.e. 5k scaled down to 4k) which has significantly more detail than native 1440p. Yes, there's slight softness to the edges of text and hard lines in "looks like" c.f. optimum 4k, but if you look that closely at native 1440p the only sharp edges you'll see will be on the honking great pixels*.

So before you 'downgrade' to 1440p make sure you've really tried "looks like" mode as part of your regular usage and stopped worrying about it not being "optimal" - if you're "testing" a display its natural to go hunting for minor imperfections and lag that would be imperceptible in daily use.

That said, I'm on a 2017 iMac with 580/8G graphics - so I can't really comment on what the lag might be like on a Mac with an iGPU.

(Public Service Announcement: if you plan to use external 4k+ displays, get a Mac with a discrete GPU).

Should I start looking at maybe bigger monitors and try using them in the native resolution without scaling?

Might be a plan - if your eyesight is good enough that the 'softness' of 'looks like' is an issue then you might be OK with "native 4k" on a 32"+ display. I find native almost usable, for short periods, on a 28".

What do you use as external displays and with what resolution ?

I'm using a cheap 'n' cheerful Dell S2817Q (28", 4k) - bought when I wanted a cheap 4k display in a hurry for a Hackintosh experiment - as a second display on my iMac.

Horrible case, controls, stand etc.
Pretty good connectivity (DP, mDP, 2xHDMI, better-than-nothing internal speakers.
Somewhat washed-out colour - no good for serious photo or movie work.
But... pin-sharp, with decent viewing angles, slightly better than 27" if you want to use native, or one of the higher "looks like" modes.

Wouldn't recommend as primary display - but if you find it cheap and want a second display for non-colour-critical "real estate", yeah.

Mostly its in "looks like 1440p" mode and I have no beef with the quality.

 

[Basic75]

Whatever the physical size of the monitor, for macOS you basically want it to be a model with ~220 PPI (for Retina) or ~110 PPI (for non-Retina).

Unfortunately many monitors are now around 150 PPI which makes them not very well suited for a Mac, just as OP found out. What's worse is that many websites are recommending 150 PPI monitors for use with a Mac!

 

[satcomer]

I saw this one and read up it’s good on the new Mac Mini with Thunderbolt video review:

 

[frou]

Unfortunately many monitors are now around 150 PPI which makes them not very well suited for a Mac, just as OP found out. What's worse is that many websites are recommending 150 PPI monitors for use with a Mac!

Apple themselves have let the Mac's general fidelity standards slip, because for a while they have been shipping various laptops that, at out-of-the-box settings, show a downsampled image! Steve Jobs' ghost needs to crack the whip.

 

[Basic75]

Apple themselves have let the Mac's general fidelity standards slip, because for a while they have been shipping various laptops that, at out-of-the-box settings, show a downsampled image! Steve Jobs' ghost needs to crack the whip.

Yes I know, and I also know that I'm not the only one waiting for a 15" with a true 1680x1050 equivalent retina display, that would be 3360x2100. Or a 16" with UHD?

 

[theluggage]

Apple themselves have let the Mac's general fidelity standards slip, because for a while they have been shipping various laptops that, at out-of-the-box settings, show a downsampled image!

The display quality in "scaled mode" is excellent, and a couple of clicks takes you back to the original "looks-like-1440x900" mode. Nothing has been lost. Better than switching to horrible 16:9 format so they can use cheaper "4k" UHD panels made for PCs.

Of course, what would be even better would be to switch to 3:2, 260 PPI panels like the MS Surface range (better for everything except watching video).

Or, solve the whole problem by fixing MacOS to have a proper scalable UI...

 

[frou]

The display quality in "scaled mode" is excellent, and a couple of clicks takes you back to the original "looks-like-1440x900" mode.

The whole mythos of Apple is that they're perfectionists. Whichever way we slice it, having most of their customers for a product blithely being presented with downsampled visuals ain't that.

I would assume that Apple can get panels made to their specification if they actually want them enough. They don't have to take what they're given.

 

[Basic75]

Or, solve the whole problem by fixing MacOS to have a proper scalable UI...

Amen to that

 

[satcomer]

Or, solve the whole problem by fixing MacOS to have a proper scalable UI...

Maybe holding down the Option key when going into the System Preferences Displays settings to select a desired setting

 

[theluggage]

Maybe holding down the Option key when going into the System Preferences Displays settings to select a desired setting

That's not it - in Windows and some flavours of Linux, you can actually set the size at which the UI elements are rendered - independently of the screen resolution - between 100% and 400% in steps of 25%. Properly-written applications call OS-provided scaling/coordinate-conversion routines to calculate the size of their UI elements in actual pixels. That feature has been in Windows since the days when 640x480 was considered "high resolution".

Apple have - effectively - just provided two scale options: 100% ("Low res/1:1") and 200% ("HiDPI/Pixel-doubled") and instead offer the GPU-intensive alternative of rendering to a "virtual" screen of your preferred resolution and downsampling that to the display's native setting. Harks back to olden times when Mac displays were actually fixed in hardware at 1 pixel = 1 point - you couldn't easily set the screen 'mode' and larger screens had more pixels...

The Windows method is theoretically better - the problem is with badly/lazily written software that doesn't follow the rules (esp. when it comes to changing resolution or using multiple screens) - Apple's system was a much easier transition for developers and copes better with compliant software (which comes out fuzzy rather than unusably small). But then Apple is much better at getting developers to change than MS - if they'd introduced a fully-scalable UI in 2012 when the retina Macs came out and pushed resolution-independent SVG for icons etc. they could probably be obsoleting the old fixed-resolution system by now.

(* Apple/Adobe effectively re-defined the "point" as exactly 1/72" around the same time)

 

[Basic75]

That's not it ...

As long as most people don't understand and/or don't care for the difference Apple doesn't seem to have enough incentive to fix this properly. And the next time somebody doesn't understand the difference, ask them where you can change the font size of the menu bar like you could 25 years ago on your Amiga

 

[theluggage]

As long as most people don't understand and/or don't care for the difference Apple doesn't seem to have enough incentive to fix this properly.

Sad but true.
For my money, the 'downsampling' works quite well and 4k @ "looks like 1440p" doesn't bother me, even sitting next to a true 5k screen - on an iMac with 8GB VRAM. The potential problem is with the 13" MacBook Pro and the Mac Mini which rely on integrated GPUs. In particular, the Mini which only has the most basic iGPU designed for Windows office use, and is otherwise begging to be paired with a bog-standard 4k 27" or two.

 

[rumormillion]

Ok so tell it to me like I'm 12. What would be the optimal 'closest' scaled-down setting to design at scale with an external monitor? Let's say my web designs aren't always matching what ends up developed in the real world, or on most screens. Looking too big in some cases. Same with my fellow designers on similar products.

Currently using MacBook pro retina with touch bar, connected to external AOC monitor and home, and a Samsung equivalent at work (27" in bargain monitors, just under 4k but lovely). I have had both externals scaled down (using option key menu) to 2304 x 1296 based on area and readability preference. Although a trusty measuring tape shows 3008px downscaling is closest to retina on the laptop. Obviously too small.

I'm a decent designer, but terrible at maths! What is a real-world solution for working day-to-day you think?

Specs: For the AOC... https://displayspecifications.com/en/model/8c801a73

Dpi calculator gave me this:

Display size: 23.53" × 13.24" = 311.5in² (59.77cm × 33.62cm = 2009.68cm²) at 163.18 PPI, 0.1557mm dot pitch, 26627 PPI²

Thanks in advance for any advice!!!

 

[mystery hill]

(Public Service Announcement: if you plan to use external 4k+ displays, get a Mac with a discrete GPU).

Or a Mac with Apple silicon.

 

[theluggage]

Or a Mac with Apple silicon.

...an excusable omission from something I posted last September...

Plus, even though the M1 GPU thrashes Intel integrated graphics which is fantastic for something like an Air, last I looked, it was only "OK" by discrete GPU standards (depending on how well optimised the software was) and it only supports two displays (= only 1 external on a laptop/iMac or 1 TB3/DP + 1 HDMI on a Mini) so I'd still be inclined to be patient and wait for M1X/M2/whatever if you want to go to town on multiple external displays, especially with GPU scaling.