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Apple's redesigned 2012 iMacs rumored to feature anti-reflective glass displays - Page 3

post #81 of 103
4/2/12 at 4:28pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by myapplelove View Post

It's not merely an issue between glossy and matte, there are trade offs between both (sharpness vs. reflectivity). Apple could have opted for a semi gloss screen (i.e. dropping the glass) as in the air which would have been just fine for most people, but instead they opted for the worst option of an untreated glass on top of the display (and not fused to the screen as in the iphone) creating a second refraction surface and tons of mirror like glare.

Educate yourself about screen coating tech before spewing uninformed sarcasm about a vast number of people who have real usability problems with the glare on the imac and they are not out to get neither apple nor you, but have instead been asking for a feature that will enable them to work without prematurely having to wear prescription glasses from their eyes having to constantly readjust against the glare:

http://www.pcmonitors.org/articles/m...lossy-monitors


My intended joke was aimed at the industry I spent twenty years in, the digital print and publishing one where we were using special gear and we all were horrified at glossy screens. I've gotten over it but seriously I was pulling the legs of my compatriots . We used very high cost matte screens running at special temperatures and in low lighting so as to visually match colors. All old school now. I had no intention of insulting visually impaired folks and I am sorry you took it that way.
Been using Apples since 1978 and Macs since 1984
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Been using Apples since 1978 and Macs since 1984
Long on AAPL so biased. Strong advocate for separation of technology and politics on AI.
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post #82 of 103
4/2/12 at 4:49pm
I would like to see a unibody iMac where the entire back cover comes off like it does on the Macbook Pro. Apple will call it a startling innovation, but it would be the same concept as the original iMac G5.
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post #83 of 103
4/2/12 at 4:52pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Haggar View Post

I would like to see a unibody iMac where the entire back cover comes off like it does on the Macbook Pro. Apple will call it a startling innovation, but it would be the same concept as the original iMac G5.

That seems to require the stand not to be placed on the back of the device, and the back and sides are a solid aluminum casing. That might be more trouble than it's worth to Apple for the few users that want to tinker with their iMac innards. What are your plan for getting around these issues?

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post #84 of 103
4/2/12 at 4:57pm
Semi-gloss screens without a glass front panel, like in the Air, are a pretty good compromise. I have compared the 13" Air and MBP screens side by side in a number of stores, and the Air screen is much more useable than the glass panelled MBP in med-high ambient light conditions.

Only real advantage of the glass panel, far as I can tell, is that it provides good mechanical protection to the LCD panel behind it.

If they offer a good quality anti-glare coating on the glass, I'd be happy with that.

(The only reasons I don't own a current MBP 13" are screen related high reflectivity, and lower res than the Air.)
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post #85 of 103
4/2/12 at 4:59pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by SolipsismX View Post

That seems to require the stand not to be placed on the back of the device, and the back and sides are a solid aluminum casing. That might be more trouble than it's worth to Apple for the few users that want to tinker with their iMac innards. What are your plan for getting around these issues?

Hardware designs also need to be serviceable for technicians who have to work on these things every day. The more quickly technicians can take apart and repair the computer, the sooner the customer can get it back. Even Apple's own technicians have been frustrated with iMac designs since the iMac G5 with built in iSight. Blaming technicians for not working faster is not a solution.

Having easy access to service a computer is hardly "tinkering". It is the Home Improvement, "Tim the Toolman Taylor" mentality, where people spend entire weekends boasting their prowess at taking apart difficult designs, which is "tinkering". Other people just want to get into the machine, replace the part, and get out as quickly as possible. This is not at all different from Steve Jobs' adoptive father telling him about making the back of the fence look just as good as the front.
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post #86 of 103
4/2/12 at 5:22pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by digitalclips View Post

My intended joke was aimed at the industry I spent twenty years in, the digital print and publishing one where we were using special gear and we all were horrified at glossy screens. I've gotten over it but seriously I was pulling the legs of my compatriots . We used very high cost matte screens running at special temperatures and in low lighting so as to visually match colors. All old school now. I had no intention of insulting visually impaired folks and I am sorry you took it that way.

cool, no worries.
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post #87 of 103
4/2/12 at 10:35pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by NeilM View Post

Really? We have a couple of iMacs at the office, an older aluminum 24" and a brand new 21.5", and I've never heard the slightest noise from either of them.

There was one model year of iMac where the fan ran constantly due to some weird design issue. It was ridiculous. My voice teacher had one and the thing was constantly whirring away even when just sitting there basically idle. It was really loud and irritating.
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post #88 of 103
4/2/12 at 11:06pm
"...with keys that could have a total travel range of as little as 0.2 millimeters."

Dammit, some of us actually like key travel! Moving from my MBP to my wife's MBA is noticeable as is. Not sure I'd care to type on it for any duration, but that's me.
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post #89 of 103
4/3/12 at 5:07am
Quote:
Originally Posted by myapplelove View Post

That's an informed opinion. The world doesn't need any more matte screens (despite my sig which has run its course) because apparently the technology now exists to the point of being mass produced where the trade offs between glossy or matte won't be something we will have to suffer through. For me the best type of coating at the moment is semi gloss, like a (good quality one) from the airs, or some recent coatings from samsung, and in pva monitor panels, but none of them are there yet. Having said all that apple's choice of sticking an untreated layer of glass on top of semi gloss screens as in the imacs and macbooks has very rightly been heavily critised as a purely aesthetic choice creating serious usability problems what with the added glare from the glass. There was never a usability benefit from the extra glass (semi gloss would have had less glare) and there was always a very serious reflection problem created because of it. How apple managed to spin that the extra glass was indeed offering something in terms of screen quality is beyond me and is in the realm of the reality distortion filed; untreated reflective mirror like glass never offered anything really and it detracted so much in terms of glare from using the macs.

The kind of treatment that I want isn't really a semi-gloss in the traditional sense. For example, a semi-gloss clear coat over paint adds a scattering effect, a haze if you will. With the anti-reflective treatments I've been talking about, light isn't scattered and you don't get a haze, just the intensity of the reflection is greatly reduced.

I get that the glass looks pretty nice and the glass protects the LCD, and on laptops, I think it makes the lid more rigid, but the shine can be a problem. I tried bringing a laptop with glossy screen into my machine shop, and that was just a mistake because it is brightly lit and there were many distracting reflections. My older matte computer screens were a lot more comfortable to use in that environment. Hopefully Apple will be offering this non-matte anti-reflection material on their Macs. I consider it to be better than the gloss/matte false duality.
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post #90 of 103
4/3/12 at 9:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by BandiTT View Post

The white iMacs already had anti glare displays. Apple switched to "glossy only" on the aluminium iMacs...

Do not confuse antiglare with matte. Antiglare are the actual displays without glare, matte are the old displays. Color saturation, vibrancy and deep blacks of new displays blow up the old matte ones.
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post #91 of 103
4/3/12 at 9:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Haggar View Post

Hardware designs also need to be serviceable for technicians who have to work on these things every day. The more quickly technicians can take apart and repair the computer, the sooner the customer can get it back. Even Apple's own technicians have been frustrated with iMac designs since the iMac G5 with built in iSight. Blaming technicians for not working faster is not a solution.

Having easy access to service a computer is hardly "tinkering". It is the Home Improvement, "Tim the Toolman Taylor" mentality, where people spend entire weekends boasting their prowess at taking apart difficult designs, which is "tinkering". Other people just want to get into the machine, replace the part, and get out as quickly as possible.

I'm all for it being easier but my desires don't a valid reason make... and neither do yours.

Do you think a MBP needs to have a user-replaceable GPU and CPU? I sure hope not or you're in for a lot of disappointment.

Bottom line is Apple is moving the Mac toward becoming just another device. We've moved past having every component in your electronics to be user replaceable. The desktop tower market is dying. The desktop market is shrinking. Even the PC market is shrinking with devices like the iPad coming on the scene. Why are people buying iPads when they can build their own tower?ยก

It's not their focus. It's not their goal. I see no reason to expect Apple to limit the design of their AIOs to make it so users can get inside it easier.

Quote:
This is not at all different from Steve Jobs' adoptive father telling him about making the back of the fence look just as good as the front.

Did he also tell him to make the fence easy to take apart?

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post #92 of 103
4/3/12 at 1:33pm
Haven't they called their glossy screens anti reflective since they were introduced?
Ever watched a MacBook pro matte vs glossy side by side? It's a horrifying experience. The matte is colour correct with no crazy colour gamut blowout, and true 8 bit i think. I'm wondering what the real decision behind moving over to glossy was. Probably money.
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post #93 of 103
4/3/12 at 2:27pm
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Quote:
Originally Posted by palegolas View Post

Haven't they called their glossy screens anti reflective since they were introduced?
Ever watched a MacBook pro matte vs glossy side by side? It's a horrifying experience. The matte is colour correct with no crazy colour gamut blowout, and true 8 bit i think. I'm wondering what the real decision behind moving over to glossy was. Probably money.

Color correct would be a strong word there. Relative to other devices there are a lot of colors that neither screen type can reproduce. I think Apple uses all 8 bit panels as even though they're TN type. This doesn't mean they're not dithered at all (most are to some degree). They could be, but they aren't necessarily dithered to reach an 8 bit approximation. Supposedly glossy doesn't require as much of a screen treatment.
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post #94 of 103
4/4/12 at 12:18am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton View Post

Quote:
Originally Posted by nkhm

Matte != anti-glare

My eyes say otherwise

Matte surfaces do not produce glare. But you can have a special coating on a shiny surface to minimize glare without making it matte. I know that my eyeglasses have such a coating and they are not matte of course.
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post #95 of 103
4/4/12 at 4:31pm
Matte is not the same as anti-reflective is not the same as anti-glare.
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post #96 of 103
4/9/12 at 1:29pm
A couple of issues that make this article mostly pointless:

1: Digitimes (business model is making up link bait).
2: Anti-Reflective coating is largely meaningless. Almost all glossy displays claim to have AR coatings, and that doesn't stop any of them from essentially working like a mirror. In practice AR coatings offer a small improvement.

Matte screens are AG coated, not AR coated.

FWIW IMO the terminology is somewhat senseless.

AR coatings don't actually stop mirror like reflections, but AG matte coatings actually do.

Nothing really stops glare as in an intense bright spot when the sun shines on it.
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post #97 of 103
4/9/12 at 2:32pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snowdog65 View Post

A couple of issues that make this article mostly pointless:

1: Digitimes (business model is making up link bait).
2: Anti-Reflective coating is largely meaningless. Almost all glossy displays claim to have AR coatings, and that doesn't stop any of them from essentially working like a mirror. In practice AR coatings offer a small improvement.

Matte screens are AG coated, not AR coated.

FWIW IMO the terminology is somewhat senseless.

AR coatings don't actually stop mirror like reflections, but AG matte coatings actually do.

Nothing really stops glare as in an intense bright spot when the sun shines on it.

You're right that Digitimes isn't worth anything as a news source.

Depending on the coating, AR can easily cut out three quarters of the amount of reflected light, it's quite noticeable. Matte surface usually isn't a coating, it's more of a textured surface treatment. The main problems with matte are that it reduces sharpness and that it diffuses light, washing out the blacks.
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post #98 of 103
4/9/12 at 4:37pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by JeffDM View Post

You're right that Digitimes isn't worth anything as a news source.

Depending on the coating, AR can easily cut out three quarters of the amount of reflected light, it's quite noticeable. Matte surface usually isn't a coating, it's more of a textured surface treatment. The main problems with matte are that it reduces sharpness and that it diffuses light, washing out the blacks.

Just about every glossy mirror display already claims to have an AR coating. Possibly Apple doesn't but looking at them in store, it doesn't seem noticeably more reflective than other glossy displays that do.

I have been seeing these claims for ages. Xerox XShield glass was make big claims about less than 2% reflectivity from its AR coating, yet in reviews they were still said to act as mirrors.

IMO the best choice is a light AG matte coating that does real diffusion to kill reflections effectively while having negligible impact on the source image. My Samsung TV has this kind of coating and it is great. No reflections and no impairment.

It is mainly LG that has the very strong AG matte coating that some find objectionable.
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post #99 of 103
4/9/12 at 9:14pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snowdog65 View Post

Just about every glossy mirror display already claims to have an AR coating. Possibly Apple doesn't but looking at them in store, it doesn't seem noticeably more reflective than other glossy displays that do.

I have been seeing these claims for ages. Xerox XShield glass was make big claims about less than 2% reflectivity from its AR coating, yet in reviews they were still said to act as mirrors.

IMO the best choice is a light AG matte coating that does real diffusion to kill reflections effectively while having negligible impact on the source image. My Samsung TV has this kind of coating and it is great. No reflections and no impairment.

There is no perfect surface, but I see matte as a second tier as they even a light matte does not diminish the amount of light returned to the observer, so you're going to still see the same light, even if you can't make out what the light came from due to the diffusion.

My Samsung plasma has a good anti-reflective surface. The CRTs I had in the past did as well. The current MacBook Air has a nice anti-reflective surface. The screen of my pre-glass "glossy" MacBook Pro looks nicer to me than the new glass models and the preceding matte models, because it has an anti-reflective surface.

The Xerox sounds nice, but the spec isn't nearly as good as it can be. Normal glass reflects 4% of light, Xerox claims their glass only reflects 2% of incident light, making it a reduction in half. Some coatings can get down to 0.1%, though getting that good in production is probably not practical.
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post #100 of 103
4/10/12 at 9:07am
The actual number I see for regular glass is 8%, so 2% is a 75% reduction. Which still ends up causing a lot of reflective problems in monitors.

.1% is a number I have only seen from 30 layer AR "Invisible Glass" PR from Nippon Electric glass. I don't think this is a production item. This is likely economically unfeasible, and will likely have durability issues as well.

Real museum glass is more like 1%(only half XShield). Tru Vue seems to be the major supplier:
http://www.tru-vue.com/Tru-Vue/Produ...ti-reflective/

Even this, in production product may be unfeasible for economic/durability reasons.

Monitors are a special challenge. With dark backgrounds, they turn in to the perfect mirror candidates.

If we get a real, practical .1% reflective product (which I doubt) that may solve the problem, but production AR products in the 1% to 2% range don't.

Also Apple would need to get away from the air gap to really fix this. A perfect invisible glass would then make reflections obvious from the inner gloss surface unless it was bonded to it.
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post #101 of 103
4/10/12 at 9:12am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snowdog65 View Post

The actual number I see for regular glass is 8%, so 2% is a 75% reduction. Which still ends up causing a lot of reflective problems in monitors.

.1% is a number I have only seen from 30 layer AR "Invisible Glass" PR from Nippon Electric glass. I don't think this is a production item. This is likely economically unfeasible, and will likely have durability issues as well.

Real museum glass is more like 1%(only half XShield). Tru Vue seems to be the major supplier:
http://www.tru-vue.com/Tru-Vue/Produ...ti-reflective/

Even this, in production product may be unfeasible for economic/durability reasons.

Monitors are a special challenge. With dark backgrounds, they turn in to the perfect mirror candidates.

If we get a real, practical .1% reflective product (which I doubt) that may solve the problem, but production AR products in the 1% to 2% range don't.

Also Apple would need to get away from the air gap to really fix this. A perfect invisible glass would then make reflections obvious from the inner gloss surface unless it was bonded to it.

very interesting post, thanks. So what would a 1%-2% range mean, reflections the type of the air's semi gloss or higher, if the comparison is apt that is.
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post #102 of 103
4/10/12 at 11:05am
Quote:
Originally Posted by myapplelove View Post

very interesting post, thanks. So what would a 1%-2% range mean, reflections the type of the air's semi gloss or higher, if the comparison is apt that is.

There was a guy, posting here, who actually had a piece of museum glass cut for his iMac, and he also put another AR/AG film on the panel itself. Overall he said it gave him about 50% reduction in reflections. I have no idea how it would compare with an Air.

To really improve Apple needs to get rid of the gap between cover and screen. So they have one surface to deal with and not two.
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post #103 of 103
4/10/12 at 11:26am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snowdog65 View Post

There was a guy, posting here, who actually had a piece of museum glass cut for his iMac, and he also put another AR/AG film on the panel itself. Overall he said it gave him about 50% reduction in reflections. I have no idea how it would compare with an Air.

To really improve Apple needs to get rid of the gap between cover and screen. So they have one surface to deal with and not two.

well said, fused display and glass as with the iphone, I 've been saying that too for while and I wonder why the have not managed with the ipad yet. Maybe an issue with assembling the device, or managing to have gorilla glass sufficiently thin and tough at larger sizes is getting in the way of fusion...

Btw, I was contemplating going with the museum glass custom cut way too for the imac, never got around to it...
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