Resolution independence in Leopard confirmed by Apple

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  • Reply 101 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shetline


    Why would you want to turn off anti-aliasing on a very hi-res display?



    At current common display resolutions, anti-aliasing is a bit of a mixed bag. It gives you a better sense of real font shapes and visual character, but at the expense of a terribly obvious and often annoying soft-focus effect. Get up to 200 ppi, or even 150 ppi, and I think you'll find that soft-focus effect goes away, and that anti-aliasing actually helps text look sharper and cleaner. To get the same results without any anti-aliasing, you'd need insane resolutions like 600 ppi or higher.



    This is one of the reasons why crt's are still preferred in high end work, other than for the better color.



    Crt's automatically anti-alias very small detail, as the electron spot isn't perfectly sharp, and doesn't cover the pixels on the screen perfectly. The phosphors will glow strongly where the beam hits them directly, and then there is a diffracted glow that extends away from the spot, diffusing the pixel. So, at very small sizes, text, and other screen features get anti-aliased.



    This doesn't happen with any of the digital technology displays, other than plasma, where it happens to a lesser extent, and for a different reason.



    LCD's, therefore require sub-pixel anti-aliasing for these small features.



    But, despite what you are saying, with that anti-aliasing, you can't see the stairstepping on a 150 line display without putting your nose almost to the screen, a most uncomfortable way to work.
  • Reply 102 of 184
    hirohiro Posts: 2,663member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shetline


    Can I take it that this is, more precisely, a 15.4" display? If so, the resolution is 147 ppi.



    How acceptable do you find the results if you abandon trying to use the full 1920x1200 resolution directly, and set the display to function at a lower virtual resolution like 1600x1000 or 1280x800?





    Hated it. Too fuzzy.
  • Reply 103 of 184
    hirohiro Posts: 2,663member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Chucker


    Er, no, Mac OS Classic had no ability in any way comparable to what Windows 95 has.



    I used them both and they felt roughly equivalent to me then. I'm not going to dig up the old hardware to verify though. And Windows still doesn't do resolution independence, just manual size selections which is wholly different. So I have a hard time imagining they axed a complete technology out of the kernel and never put it back if it's as big a deal as this.
  • Reply 104 of 184
    akacakac Posts: 512member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shetline


    Can I take it that this is, more precisely, a 15.4" display? If so, the resolution is 147 ppi.



    How acceptable do you find the results if you abandon trying to use the full 1920x1200 resolution directly, and set the display to function at a lower virtual resolution like 1600x1000 or 1280x800?



    I had a Dell 15.4'' LCD running at 1920x1200. I LOVED it. I ran Windows at 120 DPI and MOST things worked fine - toolbar icons in MS apps were screwy, but OK. What I loved about it is that the fonts were so crystal clear. The UI was at the same size as say 1440x1000, but the CONTENT could hold so much more OR crisper.



    I will love when OS X is res independant. It will not affect Photoshop at all - a pixel will still be a pixel, but the UI of photoshop will scale.
  • Reply 105 of 184
    shetlineshetline Posts: 4,695member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Hiro


    Hated it. Too fuzzy.



    Then you can imagine that screen being used as a resolution-independent display as something like a combination of how crisp and nice text looked at native res (conveniently and automatically scaled up to a proper readable size without a hack like telling the system to use extra-large fonts), along with a lot of graphics and some GUI components in various apps looking the way this stuff does...



    8) \



    ...when displayed at a non-native resolution.
  • Reply 106 of 184
    hirohiro Posts: 2,663member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shetline


    Then you can imagine that screen being used as a resolution-independent display as something like a combination of how crisp and nice text looked at native res (conveniently and automatically scaled up to a proper readable size without a hack like telling the system to use extra-large fonts), along with a lot of graphics and some GUI components in various apps looking the way this stuff does...



    8) \



    ...when displayed at a non-native resolution.



    Yep. 150ppi isn't enough, I would guess you have to go north of 200ppi to make it workable at more than a few resolutions. I'm pretty sure 300ppi would be good for arbitrary scaling as that was the early breakthrough level (300dpi) for laser printers being heralded as resolution independent and useable for vector scaled fonts.
  • Reply 107 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Hiro


    Yep. 150ppi isn't enough, I would guess you have to go north of 200ppi to make it workable at more than a few resolutions. I'm pretty sure 300ppi would be good for arbitrary scaling as that was the early breakthrough level (300dpi) for laser printers being heralded as resolution independent and useable for vector scaled fonts.



    That makes no sense at all.



    The scaling in your machine could very well have been badly done, but 150ppi can't be responsible, by itself, for fuzzy display quality.



    Something else is responsible for that.



    I find it interesting that Akac found it to be sharp.
  • Reply 108 of 184
    What's taking so long with 200-300 dpi monitors?



    I thought we'd be here by now. It seems monitors just keep getting rehashed with slightly bigger screens with the same old resolutions?



    I guess I'd have to see R.Indep in action for me to truly judge it. Hopefully we won't have that long to wait...



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 109 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Lemon Bon Bon.


    What's taking so long with 200-300 dpi monitors?



    I thought we'd be here by now. It seems monitors just keep getting rehashed with slightly bigger screens with the same old resolutions?



    I guess I'd have to see R.Indep in action for me to truly judge it. Hopefully we won't have that long to wait...



    Lemon Bon Bon



    Do you have the $10 to $15 thousand to spare when one does come out?
  • Reply 110 of 184
    hirohiro Posts: 2,663member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by melgross


    That makes no sense at all.



    The scaling in your machine could very well have been badly done, but 150ppi can't be responsible, by itself, for fuzzy display quality.



    Something else is responsible for that.



    I find it interesting that Akac found it to be sharp.



    It is responsible for fuzzy non-native display resolutions, the pixels are still much larger than the minimum visually resolvable size. The interpolations and approximations made for normal system fonts were bad enough for me to discard those options quickly. Scaling is pretty well understood math so it isn't that that is poorly done, just that the pixels (at ~147ppi) are still too large for true unconstrained resolution independence.
  • Reply 111 of 184
    hirohiro Posts: 2,663member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Lemon Bon Bon.


    What's taking so long with 200-300 dpi monitors?



    I thought we'd be here by now. It seems monitors just keep getting rehashed with slightly bigger screens with the same old resolutions?



    I guess I'd have to see R.Indep in action for me to truly judge it. Hopefully we won't have that long to wait...



    Lemon Bon Bon



    One of the problems is current high resolution monitors are too fine a resolution for most folks to be comfortable with natively, but not fine enough to do true unconstrained resolution independence. A similar issue to the "Uncanny gulf" problem in human animation. There, more realistic models/animation look good until suddenly it looks creepy because it is so close to what you expect that you expect 100% realism but don't get it.



    Thats where current high-res monitors are OK for res independence at some resolutions, but not all of them. Eventually when ppi is even finer the pixels will be well below the physical threshold to identify individual pixels without great effort or special circumstances. Then RI can be unconstrained and truly effective.
  • Reply 112 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Hiro


    It is responsible for fuzzy non-native display resolutions, the pixels are still much larger than the minimum visually resolvable size. The interpolations and approximations made for normal system fonts were bad enough for me to discard those options quickly. Scaling is pretty well understood math so it isn't that that is poorly done, just that the pixels (at ~147ppi) are still too large for true unconstrained resolution independence.



    I simply don't agree with what you are saying.



    People sitting a normal 24 inches from the screen are not going to resolve a 200ppi display. If you have to get to 12 inches or less to do so, it isn't useful.



    Displays are not prints. You can resolve greater detail in prints than you can in a display.
  • Reply 113 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Hiro


    Thats where current high-res monitors are OK for res independence at some resolutions, but not all of them. Eventually when ppi is even finer the pixels will be well below the physical threshold to identify individual pixels without great effort or special circumstances. Then RI can be unconstrained and truly effective.



    I don't agree with that either. It's not a secret in the industries that deal with resolution, such as print and video, that detail below the threshold of your visual acuity is wasted.



    You're telling us to do just that.



    The ideal is to have the smallest detail at the pixel level to be just resolvable.
  • Reply 114 of 184
    jeffdmjeffdm Posts: 12,951member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by melgross


    Do you have the $10 to $15 thousand to spare when one does come out?





    Like really. To back up your examples, the IBM T221 started out at over $20k, slid down to something like $8k. Viewsonic's VP2290b costed a thousand or two bit less. Both are discontinued and were not replaced with new models. The brave and the crazy can pick them up used on eBay for much less, and they'd also have to be sure to grab a quad-link DVI card while they are at it.
  • Reply 115 of 184
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by JeffDM


    Like really. To back up your examples, the IBM T221 started out at over $20k, slid down to something like $8k. Viewsonic's VP2290b costed a thousand or two bit less. Both are discontinued and were not replaced with new models. The brave and the crazy can pick them up used on eBay for much less, and they'd also have to be sure to grab a quad-link DVI card while they are at it.



    Both were 22" models. Too small for serious work. Models that would be big enough these days would cost considerably more than either of those, because slightly larger screens always cost a premium. Check the price differences between 19" and 21" monitors. It will be even more of a difference for very high rez screens because of the difficulty of getting them to be fairly defect free. It's simply the number of pixels.
  • Reply 116 of 184
    "Do you have the $10 to $15 thousand to spare when one does come out?"



    Have you ever been doused in petrol?



    I can't see how monitors are any different to cameras, mobile phones, hard drives of a certain size, cpus...blue ray drives...they all command a premium at the outset. And in a few years cost peanuts. Monitors seem to have progressed by a glacial pace by comparison.



    I guess when the hi-def 'revolution' pans out over the next 5-10 years...we might be pushing 200-300 dpi mainstream in computer monitors by then. I wish I could see an example to compare in all honesty.



    I'd like to be able to see a 300 dpi picture at actual A4 size on a computer screen. I can only guess it means more pixels for a given area...does it mean more or less eye strain and does R.I help with that? A bit?



    As is? Standard monitors. For art...pencil...drawing type stuff...it's hard going. Hurts my eyes for detail stuff. You have to 'zoom' in for details. With paper you just stick your face closer for detail stuff.



    Shrugs. Can't beat a pencil and paper at the moment.



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 117 of 184
    "the IBM T221 started out at over $20k, slid down to something like $8k. Viewsonic's VP2290b costed a thousand or two bit less. Both are discontinued and were not replaced with new models."



    Well, that's an example of it. I remember being quite excited at the time. And thought maybe in a few years we'll have 200 ish dpi in the mainstream.



    What we currently stuck at? 100?



    Lemon Bon Bon
  • Reply 118 of 184
    flounderflounder Posts: 2,674member
    Holy crap, LBB, where have you been??
  • Reply 119 of 184
    shetlineshetline Posts: 4,695member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Lemon Bon Bon.


    What's taking so long with 200-300 dpi monitors?



    Let's take 100 ppi to be typical of what's out today. Many laptops go tighter than that, but they're still just giving overall pixel dimensions that are the same as many desktop monitors, just squintily squeezed into a smaller area.



    200 ppi takes 4 times the video memory of 100 ppi and four times pretty much everything else like bandwidth and rendering overhead. Productions costs go way up, not just because the technology for making tiny pixels is more expensive, but because the odds producing of reject displays goes up. Suppose, for example, you're being fussy and consider 1 bad pixel is enough to throw a display into the reject pile. Suppose your pixel failure rate is 1 out of 10,000,000. For roughly every four 100 ppi 1920x1200 display you produce, you'll have to reject one of them.



    The same physical display size, but at 200 ppi, is nearly 10 megapixels. With exactly the same quality control, you'll end up rejecting something like 80-90% (I'm too lazy to work out the exact math right now) of everything you produce.



    300 ppi is going to be all the worse for production failure rates, and require 9 times the video memory and bandwidth and processing power.



    Combine these difficulties with the absence of wide-spread support for resolution independence, and the currently small demand for that kind of resolution, it's not at all surprising the available technology hasn't advanced very far towards creating affordable 200+ ppi displays.
  • Reply 120 of 184
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shetline


    200 ppi takes 4 times the video memory of 100 ppi and four times pretty much everything else like bandwidth and rendering overhead.



    Let's not exagerate here...200ppi takes 2 times the video memory and two times the bandwidth compared to 100ppi.



    edit: same with 300ppi...3 times...not 9. Basic math here. Also, the fact that the pixels are smaller may mean that a higher number of dead pixel may be tolerable. At 300ppi, it's starting to get difficult to really notice dead pixels.
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