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Question: Why does Apple bother to offer the glass/glossy screen?

entatlrg

entatlrg

macrumors 68040
Original poster
Mar 2, 2009
3,385
6
Waterloo & Georgian Bay, Canada
- Glass is used to cover the screen > added cost.

- Glass = added weight (.5lbs on 15"?)

- A glossy screen is reflective in an office environment and poor outdoors.

- Apple is praised for their previous non glass covered displays, including the Macbook Air's screen.

So why did they add the glass?

Yet you pay $50.00 for Anti Glare and they're subtracting the glass and adding antiglare film ... anti glare should be offered at a LOWER price you'd think.

It's hard to make sense of ... added cost, added weight, reflections, creates indecision and debates :) and you pay more!
 
Because some people like the way it looks and it is always good to give customers more options. Some people aren't bothered by reflections (either because they are used to it or because they don't use it in ultra bright environments), and some people don't throw their back out from the whopping .5 lb additional weight.
 
Some people think it looks better... such as me. The silver border around the matte screen just doesn't make it look like a MacBook Pro anymore.
 
Clearly they want to keep the glossy aesthetic uniform across their line and have tooled their production line accordingly. You pay more for the anti-glare because it's non-standard.

It's hard to make sense of ... added cost, added weight, reflections, creates indecision and debates and you pay more!
Click to expand...

Sounds like the iPod touch vs. iPad debate.
 
I prefer it. I like the way it looks, and I think the colours look more crisp. :) You only pay more for the anti-glare because not a huge amount of them are sold, so it's a lesser produced special option.
 
Ash9414 said:
Some people think it looks better... such as me. The silver border around the matte screen just doesn't make it look like a MacBook Pro anymore.
Click to expand...

The silver border has been there since PowerBooks and lasted until 2008. IMHO the ugly black border doesn't make it look like a Pro machine anymore - it degrades it to a fancy bling-bling consumer laptop to stare at.

I like the aluminum bezel, it matches the unibody enclosure way better than the glossy black border. Makes me shiver when I see that ugly thing in Apple Stores.
 
Dragonforce said:
The silver border has been there since PowerBooks and lasted until 2008. IMHO the ugly black border doesn't make it look like a Pro machine anymore - it degrades it to a fancy bling-bling consumer laptop to stare at.

I like the aluminum bezel, it matches the unibody enclosure way better than the glossy black border. Makes me shiver when I see that ugly thing in Apple Stores.
Click to expand...

Totally agree. The mac newbies think it looks great but us old PowerBook users felt the black bezel was cheap and gimmicky looking.
 
Dragonforce said:
The silver border has been there since PowerBooks and lasted until 2008. IMHO the ugly black border doesn't make it look like a Pro machine anymore - it degrades it to a fancy bling-bling consumer laptop to stare at.

I like the aluminum bezel, it matches the unibody enclosure way better than the glossy black border. Makes me shiver when I see that ugly thing in Apple Stores.
Click to expand...

Then there is no point in black keys? The keys match the bezel, it looks like a well designed computer that way. With the matte screen, it just looks like Apple has quickly stuck something onto the screen and haven't bothered with what it looks like.
 
TBH, I like the old MBP keyboard more than the new one, but I have no choice here. The keyboard on my Santa Rosa MBP is the best I ever had.
 
I'm a fan of the glossy, on my second MBP with a glossy display and happy with it. I've used mine in several different types of environment and never felt that it was having a negative impact on my use.

Plus personally prefer the black border, gives a nice stark contrast against the unibody casing, the aluminium border on the matte makes it look too bland for my liking.
 
entatlrg said:
- Glass is used to cover the screen > added cost.

- Glass = added weight (.5lbs on 15"?)

- A glossy screen is reflective in an office environment and poor outdoors.

- Apple is praised for their previous non glass covered displays, including the Macbook Air's screen.

So why did they add the glass?

Yet you pay $50.00 for Anti Glare and they're subtracting the glass and adding antiglare film ... anti glare should be offered at a LOWER price you'd think.

It's hard to make sense of ... added cost, added weight, reflections, creates indecision and debates :) and you pay more!
Click to expand...

I completely agree, although I think that the extra fee is for the non-standard nature of things. But I would happily pay that fee, IF Apple could offer that option in its 13" range. My 15" unibody also annoys me, but then I would lose the Express Port, so I cannot upgrade. The MacBook Air was my favorite portable ever to type on. Shame about the hinges and the noise!


Dragonforce said:
I like the aluminum bezel, it matches the unibody enclosure way better than the glossy black border. Makes me shiver when I see that ugly thing in Apple Stores.
Click to expand...

It makes me shiver to see two of these extra-mega-hyper-super glossy screens at home. I hate them!



I think the glossy screen makes computers look better in stores, in ads and on stock pictures, when you don't use them and to me at least, they make no sense, when using them. Figure out, what Apple Inc is more concerned about...
 
Presumably they did a little marketing research before deciding to make glossy screens the default option. And I'm guessing it told them that most customers preferred glossy over matte, or didn't really care.

I'd be willing to bet the weight difference is pretty negligible. Plus they may have been able to compensate by shaving weight in other places when making the change to unibody construction. I don't know how thick the glass is on the glossy screens, but it seems pretty thin.

As for charging extra for the matte, it's a non-standard option that an overall minority of customers probably choose. It probably costs Apple a little more to stock and maintain two different parts in inventory for a relatively less-purchased matte option.
 
I like the silver bezel but have no problems with the glossy screen...
You're right...antiglare should be cheaper/no extra cost
btw now antiglare is only high res option and is $150...this is the worst part of the update that happened on april 13th...$50 was okay if not bad but $150 is too much.
 
Ash9414 said:
Then there is no point in black keys? The keys match the bezel, it looks like a well designed computer that way. With the matte screen, it just looks like Apple has quickly stuck something onto the screen and haven't bothered with what it looks like.
Click to expand...

I guess you've never seen a Titanium PowerBook.
 
I personally have no problem with the glass. It doesn't reflect that much at all in the places where I use it. :eek: I like the look better, too.
 
I called Apple because i had to use my parents LED 24" Apple Display for a week. My usual is a 30" Apple LCD ACD.

My eyes were beet RED after doing this for a few days. It got so I could not even look at the screen.

I don't know if this is because of glare into the screen from the glass or if it is because of the way the newer LED's might internally flicker ala flourescent lights -- imperceptible to the human eye but flickering on and off nonetheless, causing eye strain -- but I remain upset.

I tilted the 24" screen towards as much shadowy reflection as I could, but am still wondering if the eyestrain is from the display flicker itself.

If so, this is a huge deal. Apple should know by now that florescent lights are the bane (and pain) of every artist, designer, writer, and anyone working indoors. I mean, it has been public knowledge for what -- 60 years that you cannot do detail work with florescents.

Florescent lights work (and save energy) by turning on and off internally.

Our eyes do not "see" this because our eyes have something called "persistence of vision".

For example, if we did not have persistence of vision, we would be able to see the film frames going by every time we saw a movie that was projected normally in a projector. Instead, we don't "see" the frames themselves go by, we "see" the 'persistent image".

But with crappy florescent lights and I also believe with the new twisty idiotic lights that are replacing incandescents everywhere, you get eye strain.

I hope to God that Apple has not incorporated this type of "flickering" technology in their LED screens. We'll see because I have a few more days on the LED. It helped to push the screen at an angle that did not have light reflections, but this thing is obnoxious and painful to my eyes.
 
California said:
I don't know if this is because of glare into the screen from the glass or if it is because of the way the newer LED's might internally flicker ala flourescent lights -- imperceptible to the human eye but flickering on and off nonetheless, causing eye strain -- but I remain upset.
Click to expand...

Find something else to be upset about.


The LEDs on the backlit MacBook Pro keyboards do flicker, but the LED displays do not.
 
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