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Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

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Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#161

Really, a $3300 Mini-LED display in 2026?

Show me an HDR display that is 2000 nits peak HDR calibrated 27" for under $3,300. Not a gaming monitor. Closest you can find is a lilliput UQ31 that has half the nits.

And which supports DICOM calibration, which normally costs you >$5k for a smaller (e.g. 21") display.

It's now vastly cheaper to buy a Mac and a 27" Studio Display XDR than it is to buy a single 21" DICOM display for your clinic. Heck, it's not much more expensive to buy two SD XDRs than to buy one standard DICOM display.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#162
post #82

anyone else still using their 30" cinema display from 2003?

I was keeping mine alive on life support until about two years ago when I updated to the Samsung 5K display.

Loved the extra screen real estate of the 30" ACD and it's a beautifully designed product that I enjoyed having on my desk.

In its last year or two the backlight wear started to result in colors to become uneven. Blues were less vibrant and reds had tint issues.

Was also difficult to justify the power draw, it had a 150w power supply.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#163

I was hoping for OLED or dual-OLED based monitors, especially for this price point but I’d want this slightly lower than the XDR price. Sequoia+Tahoe seems like they’ve been laying the groundwork for OLED macs — removing the menu bar background and making text dynamically change colour, moving/cycling backgrounds, liquid glass reducing the effect of static UI elements, etc. I personally wouldn’t buy a new LCD based d…

Along similar lines, there's no way I would buy an OLED at this price point. If I'm dropping $3k on a monitor, it needs to be a technology that lasts, not a technology that wears out over time.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does gloss mean reflective? Like where I can see the room lights reflecting off my screen. I never considered the possibility that someone might consider that a good thing.

In an environment with little to no reflections, gloss looks so much better. It becomes truly transparent with no distraction. Matte displays always have a little frost to them.

What kind of environment is that? Maybe if you're a black person wearing black clothes, no glasses (maybe contacts are ok?) in a room with closed curtains, no lights and nothing reflective, sure.

I used to daily drive an apple thunderbolt display (the last non-retina one, 2560x1440). That thing was atrocious. I could often see the reflections of my glasses, or a white glare if I was wearing a white shirt. At nigh, in a dark office (lights off, just whatever came in from the street).

I'm typing this on a matte "ips black" dell ultrasharp something-or-other at 10% brightness, wearing glasses, a white t-shirt, with an overhead light, and see no reflection or glare on my screen. There's no way in hell I'd go back to a shiny screen.

I understand "anti-glare" technology has improved. The most recent apple screen I've tested is an m1 mbp. It seems somewhat better than my 2013 mbp, but still a worse experience than my 2015 (or thereabouts) 24"@4k dell, which is pretty old technology. My 2025 lenovo has a screen that's much more confortable to use inside.

Paradoxically, I'd say the one environment where I prefer my macs to my matte screens is in bright sunlight. Sure, there are more reflections than you can shake a stick at, but there's always an angle where you can see the part of the screen you want. You have to move around, which is obviously annoying, but you can see. The matte screens just turn to mush. Luckily for me, I hate being out in the sun, so I never encounter this situation in practice.

I think the "frost" you're talking about depends a lot on the screen implementation. I tested once an HP model, 27"@4k, and it did have such an effect. Anecdotally, it didn't handle reflections all that well, either. So maybe it's just a question of lower quality product?

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#165

As long as we're here: What are people's current favorites for a 5K 27" screen that doesn't cost as much as a whole damned computer?

I've tried the LG UltraFine and LG UltraGear (w/144hz) ... still went with the Studio Display. Expensive, but my previous Thunderbolt display gave me 12 solid years – hoping the SD does the same. Edit: Also consider the price of speakers, camera, hub, power, and the "it just works" factor.

Ultimately, I'm beholden to whatever I can get work to pay for, unless I want to pay out of pocket to subsidize the capex of a multi-trillion dollar conglomerate.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#166

So the $1600 Studio Display does not have 120hz. Here’s some monitors you can buy at that price point: - 6k 32” monitor (similar PPI) (Acer PE320QX) - most high-end 4k displays (even OLEDs) with 144hz+ refresh rate 32” 4k isn’t great PPI, but it’s still fine PPI, at a reasonable distance. Double the refresh rate is a much more noticeable improvement to me than 40% better pixel density, at a distance where retina matt…

Do you notice 120Hz and above when doing office tasks? I'd much rather have improved resolution and PPI rather than 120Hz for that use case.

120 Hz vs 60 Hz? Night and day. Immediately noticeable just by moving the mouse pointer. Would expect improvements in scrolling to be apparent to even the most casual passers-by.

120 Hz can also noticeably improve frame pacing for 24p video*.

120 Hz vs 144 Hz? Barely noticeable when flipping between the two. Not sure if I'd pass an ABX test with 100% accuracy.

Can't speak for 240 Hz or higher, as I haven't used them.

* Though 119.88 Hz is probably a better default for this since most non-DCI "24p" video is still 23.976 FPS; this is changing, but until browsers and streaming apps support VRR for video, I'm not convinced this is a good thing due to the mountain of legacy 23.976 FPS content.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ll give you an anecdote: my work laptop is an M3 Pro MBP, and my Dell U4025QW works just fine with it over Thunderbolt at 120Hz VRR

It’s quite possible this is running with a reduced color space (chroma subsampling). Degradation happens automatically based on available throughput and most people don’t notice.

For desktop use? Chroma subsampling is obvious. DSC compression, on the other hand, is not. DisplayPort and HDMI support both.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Text sucks in oled displays. 200 ppi is not enough to make it look decent. OLED smartphones have much higher ppi to deal with this.

> Text sucks in oled displays. Not anymore, as long as you make sure that any RGB antialiasing is turned off . Linux defaluts to disabling this and doing only grayscale antialiasing, so it looks great on an OLED out of the box. Windows can be configured to do this.

Low-res is low-res. Curves on SVGs and vector graphics look terrible.

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#169
post #13

I might be the only one, but it's still to this date (and dating all the way back to 2014 with the first iMac 5k display) Apple is the only company that truly gets HIDPI desktop displays with high quality gloss and 200+ ppi at screen this large. In the meantime popular and widely sold gaming screens with matte blur filters and mediocre ppi give me headache and eye fatigue after a few hours of use. Prior generation St…

> In the meantime popular and widely sold gaming screens with matte blur filters and mediocre ppi give me headache and eye fatigue after a few hours of use.

I presume you also mean "when used for text heavy work" here, yes? Or do you mean that these displays tire out your eyes even when used "for what they're for", i.e. gaming? (Because that's a very interesting assertion if so, and I'd like to go into depth about it.)

Re: Apple Studio Display and Studio Display XDR

#170

Really, a $3300 Mini-LED display in 2026?

I feel like if they can profitably sell a Mini-LED in a $1400 14" Macbook Pro, they can find a way to sell a larger one in a 27" display for under $3300…

I have the last-gen Studio Display, pretty great during the day (the nano-texture is astonishing), but just looks like trash at night when the backlight overwhelms the blacks.

My guess was that the “Studio Display 2” would introduce Mini-LED, and then a “Pro Display 2” would have the high-refresh and maybe 32". Wake me up in five years, I guess.

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