New Apple Cinema Display? - Page 4

All I know is that Dell monitors suffer from accelerated decrepitude.

Does anyone have any updates on the topic?
NEC has just announced MultiSync LCD3090WQXi which will be available from March 10th (information is relevant for Japan), 29.8 inches 2,560×1,600 resolution 107% of Adobe RGB!!! and yes - it is ugly...

No, but you can hope that the rumored end-of-February event brings some ACD love.

And who knows, we may even get the eagerly-awaited 10.5.2 as well...!

I'm posting this from 10.5.2... and a crappy 20" Dell monitor.

w00t! Will download at home tonight!

Doesn't new aperture 2 mean a new ACD on the horizon?

Why would it?

aperture is about photos, and a display is about viewing them... figuratively saying...

Yeah it does. Especially when I carry around my 30 inch display. How can I put that fragile piece of crap in the overhead on a plane without breaking it?!

If that dell display didn't have those corny looking speakers in the bezel I'd probably buy one, it has a little of the neat look the old cinema displays did.

That said, I'd like to see new ACDs, since I need some. :|

Anyone know much about this monitor?

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2033/...408a736f_o.jpg

Are you on a spamming spree, ncee?
Two threads and one post in another thread with non-working links?
At least this link is working.

And it's a telly box, not a monitor for a computer. As you can see, there's also an AppleTV.

it's just a lame illustrator/photoshop rendering of someone's gadget setup.
if apple ever shipped something that boring/ugly, there'd be a lot of people fired in cupertino.

It's a logo-less pioneer TV, the Apple TV is a clue.

Ok.

Well it came from an Apple PDF file for Aperture 2.0. So I thought - in-correctly so, that it was a computer monitor.

I would have thought that Apple would have used their own monitor for an ad like this so much for thinking.

As for the multiple posts I never got a window showing or saying the post(s) got through or were up.

I have since emailed these folks to ask how I'd go about taking down multiple posts.

Skip

Samsung to release three new LED displays in Japan
SyncMaster XL20 = 20.1" Adobe RGB 119% NTSC 114%
avail: end of 03.2008
1250 usd approx

SyncMaster XL24 = 24'1" Adobe RGB 123% NTSC 123%
avail: end of 03.2008
2200 usd approx

SyncMaster XL30 = 30" Adobe RGB 123% NTSC 123%
avail: end of 04.2008
4150 usd approx

prices and information are for Japan.
http://plusd.itmedia.co.jp/pcuser/ar...9/news014.html

What it means... LED displays are ready for mass production with a quite reasonable prices. Wake up Neo, i meant Apple...

What's taking Apple so long with display updates?

Heck, even the iMac is slimmer than Apple's displays. Must we await Nehalem?

Yeesh. Prices, design and specs have moved on. Come on Apple, get with it.

Lemon Bon Bon.

Your colorimeter specs for NTSC and sRGB are incorrect.

Samsung itself says that the color space is up to 123% for NTSC only.

The price for the XL20 starts at nearly $1600 US. Who the hell would pay that price?

MacMall Samsung XL30
http://www.macmall.com/macmall/shop/...nitor-Monitors

$4,569.99

Blow me.

I'm hoping for a new cinema display soon.

This is what i'm hoping for:

built in isight
redesigned imac like body
LED display
10 - 15% brighter (if you don't like it being so bright... just turn down the brightness)

20" 24" 30" 36" models

I think it would be cool to be watching a football game or something and chatting with your friend on a nice 36" LED cinema display
"YEAH! touch down! oh yeah!
"nooo!!! what are you cheering about"

ha I know Apple isn't going to do any of that because they never do what I want or expect, but I still love apple

I wanna' see two lines of display;

20" Apple Home Display

• Glossy 1680x1050,
• 3x USB, IR Receiver, iSight Webcam

24" Apple Home Display

• Glossy 1920x1200,
• 3x USB, IR Receiver, iSight Webcam

24" Apple Studio Display

• Matte 1920x1200 LED,
• 2x USB, 1x FW400, 1x FW800, DisplayPort, IR Receiver

30" Apple Studio Display

• Matte 2560x1600 LED,
• 2x USB, 1x FW400, 1x FW800, DisplayPort, IR Receiver

I will vomit if they make the Cinema Displays glossy.

I agree, making the cinema displays glossy is the worst thing you could possible do. In fact everything in the apple line-up should have a matte display, yes, that is including stuff like the iMac and Macbook. The glossy displays make me want to puke.

I don't see what's so wrong with the glossy displays. If you are actually forced into using one you'll realise how much sharper the detail is. I have a feeling you'll be doing a lot of puking in the future!

Hopefully they'll just give glossy/matt options on all the new displays.

Okay, firstly, the Cinema Display product family is aimed at professionals – people who are concerned about colour reproduction rather than image sharpness. After all, in professional apps like Photoshop CS3, you can zoom in to 3200%. Very few pro users would attempt to retouch an image at 100% anyway – so the fractionally increased sharpness of a glossy panel over a matte panel really isn't an issue.

Secondly, Apple hasn't produced a single glossy LCD display to date that is suitable for professional use – because all of Apple's glossy panels are 6-bit, and 6-bit equals proper-fucked straight out of the box.

Thirdly, glossy displays suffer from reflections SO badly, that they are unusable.

Fourthly, the glossy 6-bit displays that Apple have shipped so far seem to suffer from a minimum dot – which results in any colour value <5% being bumped back up to 5%. As a result you won't be to get an accurate on-screen representation of a 0-5% gradient in any colour channel. Instead you'll get a flexography-like minimum dot size halo.

This is why I know that anybody who tries to persuade me that glossy screens are suitable for professional use, simply doesn't know what they are talking about.

I've had the misfortune of using a number of glossy displays – from MacBooks to MacBook Pros and the new iMacs – and they've caused no end of problems. Even if you can stomach working on a display that suffers from reflections so badly, you'll only get so far before you realise that the inaccuracies are affecting your outputs...

...glossy displays look great on the shelves, and consumers love them, but when it comes to pro work it has to be matte.

if you're regarding my post, I was saying that I want a line of consumer displays (glossy), and a line of pro displays (matte!).

Okay, fair enough - but let's keep to the glossy vs matte debate, and not bring in all the stuff about the current range of glossy screens Apple has produced. Of course I wouldn't be interested in a 6-bit screen, minimum dot etc. That would be totally unacceptable.

I'm just saying that each screen should be available (at the SAME spec) in either glossy or matte. I'd have to see them side by side, but when I've compared like for like before, the glossy screen has had a superior contrast. Which, incidentally, is good for video.

A lot of people prefer the glossy screens, some of which are consumers but I know of a great deal of graphic designer friends who plumped for the glossy screen. Are you saying that if you buy a MB Pro with a matte screen you get an 8-bit screen? I can't imagine that's true. Are you saying the latest iMac screens are 6-bit? I have not heard of such complaints but please correct me if I am wrong.

Yeah I know a lot of graphic designers who have bought glossy screens as well (I'm a graphic designer and I bought two of the new iMacs). It's very tempting to purchase an iMac instead of a Mac Pro and Cinema Display combo, because iMacs appear to offer such great value for money.

Unfortunately it's a false economy I had to offload my iMacs at a hefty loss on Ebay, and without exception my friends are moaning about their screens. I had a real scare when a job I was passing on press looked nothing like we were expecting it to look like. Luckily we were able to pull the job there and then. If I had trusted the 6-bit screens I would have been up shit creek without a paddle (but I would have had several million rejected whisky labels to keep me company). If you're a pro, and if you're signing off on artwork, 8-bit Cinema Displays are undoubtedly the way to go.


The only panels that Apple currently produces that use 8-bit screens are the Cinema Displays..


Everything else, including the new iMacs, MacBooks and MacBooks Pros, use a 6-bit panel of some form or other regardless of whether it has a gloss or matte treatment. The 6-bit panels can theoretically achieve millions of colours, but only via dithering. And even with dithering, they can't achieve as many colours as a proper 8-bit screen. There has been a great deal of debate about this, and a few eyebrows raised over the fact that Apple shows Aperture running on MacBook Pro and iMac hardware when they are, strictly speaking, unsuitable. It's very simple - you can't edit an 8-bit image safely when all you can see are 6-bits.

That's why I'm saying that you can't currently purchase an Apple glossy screen that's suitable for colour reproduction work because they're all 6-bit. The images may look great on screen, but sooner or later it's going to come back and haunt you.

I suspect your question is whether or not a future 8-bit Apple Cinema Display with a glossy treatment would be suitable for Pro work. Based on my experience, the answer is categorically NO!

That's interesting to know. And a little disappointing!


I still find that quite a hard argument to swallow. Practically all CRT monitors in the past, pro or consumer, had glossy screens. I used to own the AppleVision 1710 which was considered a high-end monitor. It had a glossy screen and was one of the best colour reproducing monitors on the market. I never had any problems with reflection then, and I still don't have any problems with reflection on glossy LCD screens now.

Why have so many designers become so anti-gloss?

Yes, but I want a consumer display that is not glossy. the glossy has such bad glare.... maybe they could have an option for glossy or matte on all of their displays.

Yes.


Hehehe, the AppleVision 1710, now that's going back a bit! They were beautiful monitors. I had a Apple Colour Display 20, and a ColorSync 20 display around the same time.

CRTs generally have some sort of anti-reflective coating on them. The majority have a matte etching either on the inside or outside face of the glass. You can sometimes see this etching if the monitor is switched off and an external light source is reflected on the screen.

Reflections were a problem at the time, but the main reason that people didn't consider it an issue was because we simply didn't know any better. Back in the day printers would often have a darkroom set up for colour accurate work, or you would get monitors (like Eizos and LaCies) that had hoods. I still remember one occasion where a designer left, and my fellow designers were arguing over who should get their desk because it offered minimal reflections.

Whilst CRT monitors were glossy by their very nature (even although the manufacturers tried everything to tone down the glossiness), Apple go out of their way to make the screens as glossy as possible.


Well like I say, a lot of it has to do with every gloss panel to date being 6-bit. Also, the gloss panels are configured to artificially accentuate the colours and contrast, so you're getting a false impression of what's there. You're then (in the case of the new iMac) viewing that image through a piece of highly polished, polarized glass. It's kind of like a professional sound engineer using Super Twin Turbo Bass Boosting headphones in a recording studio...

...like the speaker system in a recording studio, a professional computer monitor should produce as neutral an image as possible – you don't want to see colours that aren't actually there or likewise tone-down colours that are present. You need to know that what you are working with is as accurate a representation as possible.

This presents a problem for Apple, because the majority of the panel manufacturers are now catering for the PC gaming market and that means a shift away from accurate panels to panels that offer faster refresh rates (6-bit) and accentuated colours and contrast. This may go some way to explaining the relatively high price of the current Cinema Displays and the delays in bringing an updated Cinema Display family to market – Apple will have their work cut out sourcing suitable panels when the whole of the industry is forging full steam ahead in the opposite direction.

A lot of it has to do with ergonomics and usability as well – a glossy display on a laptop isn't just as bad because the laptop tends to be quite low in comparison to your head, and as a result you mostly tend to see the uppermost part of the wall behind you or the ceiling. With an iMac, and with the 24" in particular, it's bang right in front of you at eye level, so you see yourself and everything that's behind you - usually a window.

Reflections have a massive impact on eye-strain, and if you're like me you probably regularly pull 12 hour + days. The most common solution to reflections is to turn the brightness of the display right up, but then you only compound matters because now you're squinting into a very bright object for long periods of time. The current glass iMac will give me a migraine aura within a couple of hours – since switching back to a proper Cinema Display I haven't had a single migraine.

Take it from me, the new MacBooks and iMacs are great if you're playing around with iPhoto or surfing the net in your spare time, but if you're parked in front of one at your work for hours on end (and you're stressed up to your tits as it is), it's a horrible, horrible, place to be.

I was very unlucky with my AppleVision. The colour was great while it lasted, but then I started to get problems with the magnets and about 14 months after buying it, the thing went *foom*. Most expensive cost-to-lifetime ratio I've ever had!


Really - now it all begins to make sense... These 6-bit screens are good for refresh rate then? Do all PC monitors out there suffer the same? I find it very difficult to get the bit channel information on monitors. Apple are just as bad. It really should be well advertised in the specs, don't you think?

So are Apple having problems sourcing manufacturers of LCD screens which provide 8-bit channel colour and have a decent refresh rate? Do the current models then suffer from poor refresh rate?


A lot of good points there, well made. I understand where you are coming from now! I would say therefore the best path for Apple would be to have two ranges of monitors - Apple Cinema Display and Apple Cinema Pro Display (?) - with perhaps gloss 6-bit for the general consumer and matte 8-bit for the pro customer (or at least a choice)... Surely that would be the best way to break into the cheaper monitor market for them? There must be a market for people who buy Mac Minis, after all...?

I've just been a little concerned of late that Apple have been guilty of putting form before function. There have been two or three instances of this in their consumer products, and one in their pro line-up. The new iMac was bad enough, but the MacBook Air was just an absolute disaster.

It's safe to say that I'm now totally paranoid about this philosophy pervading in to their pro hardware. I hope Apple realise that pros are looking for no nonsense hardware that simply does it's job. In my experience, a glossy Cinema Display is a complete non-starter.

I am pleased to say that am I absolutely delighted with my new Mac Pro and Cinema Display combo - and I hope that Apple will continue to develop fantastic pro hardware for years to come.

The primary benefit of 6-bit over 8-bit is the faster refresh rate. A fast refresh rate is ideal if you're playing games but it doesn't affect colour accurate pro applications. Indeed, many pros will tell you that a slower refresh is preferable (within reason).

Panel manufacturers are EXTREMELY slippery when it comes to describing their panels. The refresh rates are a give away, but also if a manufacturer list as panel as support 16 million colours, it's a 6-bit, because 6-bit panels can only reproduce 16 million colours via dithering. Only true 8-bit panels can reproduce the full 16.7 million colours (and without any need for dithering). 6-bit panels are sometimes referred to as 18-bit (6-bits times three channels), and likewise 8-bit are sometimes referred to as 24-bit.

You'll also sometimes see a panel referred to as 8-bit FRC - this is actually a 6-bit panel as well. The FRC means Frame Rate Control and it's simply just another way of getting a 6-bit panel to simulate the colour gamut of an 8-bit display. It's a real minefield.

If you look at the tech specs for the iMac, MacBook, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro you'll see that they are listed as supporting either 'million of colours' or '16 million colours'. This is a very sneaky way of trying to pass of a 6-bit panel as having a similar colour gamut to a true 8-bit panel. Only the Cinema Displays are listing as offering '16.7 million colours' and that extra .7 million makes all the difference because it means that it's an 8-bit panel and that it'll reporduce the entire gamut without having to resort to dithering.


I would imagine that they are. There are probably manufacturers that are happy to continue developing the panels for Apple, but there will be a premium involved as the sort of panels that Apple requires are no longer in such high demand.


In the current Cinema Display family the 'poor' refresh rate could be considered a bonus for the pro user.


Yes, that's something I've been saying for a while now. As it stands, Apple simply can't compete in the consumer market because they're effectively trying to sell-in an expensive pro product that's completely unsuitable for the consumer.

A Mac Display family & a Mac Pro Display family would appear to make sense...

Apologies for going slightly off-topic here, but am I correct in thinking therefore that most LCD TVs, even the expensive Sony ones, are only 6-bit?

That's a good question I've no idea. Certainly you'd expect the refresh rate to be pretty important?

Forgive my definite ignorance here, but why is a slower refresh rate preferable for pro work? I've been studying LCDs for about a month now, trying to get a handle on which features are good for (which) population... why is a slower refresh rate preferable?

I too believe Apple should eliminate all glossy displays. I know they look cool in the store, but they are just wrong. And the cinema displays MUST stay matte.

The iMac glossy is plain ugly.

Does any one know the stats on the MacBook Pro for glossy vs. matte?

I've been doing a bit of net research and it seems as though the 6-bit screens are known as TN (Twisted Nematic) LCDs and the ones TVs usually use are MVA/PVA (multi-domain or patterned vertical alignment) screens. These are 8-bit colour and have better viewing angles.

Considering most LCD TVs require a fast response time too, why do TN LCDs get used instead of MVA/PVA?