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The state of external retina displays

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Re: The state of external retina displays

#151

Post by ProZsolt »

ivalm wrote: post #111
xyzzy123 wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some work tools get treated like capital or heirloom and some get treated like consumables . Scissors or a hand plane are decent "heirloom" items. Potentially you can retire with the same one you started with, or pass them down. Electric drills start to lean toward consumable. Battery tech changes over the years and they do wear out in non-fixable ways. Screen and computer tech advances so fast that 5 years is a "goo…

I am guessing scissors, esp if they get sharpened 2x/day will not last multiple decades (because sharpening an edge removes material).

Not necessarily. You can sharpen a knife(and I assume a scissor) with a sharpening steel. Which won't remove any material just straighten the edge.

Re: The state of external retina displays

#152

Post by minimaul »

floatboth wrote: post #126
minimaul wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a 27" 4K, so it's already low PPI compared to the monitors in the article.

That's double the PPI compared to 27" 1080p ;) Granted, the usual "non-retina" 27-inch resolution was 1440p, but it's still a monitor you could use 2x scaling on. Yeah 1.75x or even 1.5x would be kinda preferable if you want more screen space but I like the huge UI elements.

Exactly - 27" 1080p is too large, 27" 1440p is nice for UI size for me, and then it's about extra pixels for sharpness & clarity.

Unfortunately the OSes I want to use don't do fractional scaling well - macOS or Linux, but Linux can work here, it's getting better. Windows does fractional scaling well in theory, but I find it works poorly in practice as app support for it is really patchy.

Re: The state of external retina displays

#153

Post by hank_z »

rdl wrote: post #6

Every time I buy the LG 5K I feel a little sad (it's overpriced for what it is, outdated, and limited with non-Macs), but every time I use it, I'm happy with the purchase. Biggest downside (aside from the price) is extending the Apple lock-in.

I can actually connect it to Ubuntu and use some code to simulate physical buttons. So you are not totally locked in apple ecosystem.

Re: The state of external retina displays

#154

Post by kruxigt »

never_a-pickle wrote: post #91
henvic wrote: post #60

I really wanted the 27-inch LG UltraFine 5K ( https://www.lg.com/us/monitors/lg-27md5kl-b-5k-uhd-led-monit... ), but I heard many complains about it not being as reliable as you'd expect, then I decided to get the LG UltraFine 4K ( https://amzn.to/3qs2pFW ) a little over a year ago, and I don't regret at all spending so much more for a display, than I'd normally expect to. Now, I want to update to Apple's Pro Display…

Slight differences in white balance, even after calibration, preclude the use of multiple monitors for myself as well. Even if they are the same monitor, same model our nervous system is very good at detecting these differences. I have no settled on a new monitor either, I'm using a 24" that is slightly too small for split screen use, but doable. 27" would be nice but 32" would likely be the best here. There are a fe…

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Re: The state of external retina displays

#155

Post by shog_hn »

tcas wrote: post #72
mgarfias wrote: post #9

I’ve got a pair of the ultrafine 5ks. I’d happily trade them in on something that I can plug into and know that it will power up the display reliably. Right now if I take my laptop off somewhere and come back, who knows if they’ll both power up. I’m frequently stuck on one display and no amount of unplugging and reconnecting or swearing helps.

I have 2x LG Ultrafine 5Ks as well. I found the USB-C connector wears down over time and causes display and power issues. I've reflowed the connector itself, and am looking at doing a complete connector swap soon. The mechanicals of an active USB-C cable puts stress on the joints and causes them to crack and create unreliable connections. I wish there was a way to lock the connector in and use something else as strai…

I have an LG Ultrafine 5K and suffer from random display disconnections. I was wondering if I was just unlucky, but this kind of explains everything now. Is there any guide that you know of for doing the reflowing? It's at the point now where I need to spend up to an hour carefully tweaking the connector into the right position to provide a signal so I don't mind hacking away at it with the risk of it breaking.

Re: The state of external retina displays

#156

Post by wmf »

kbenson wrote: post #128
querulous wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the problem with the apple xdr display isn't just the price though. it's not a good monitor for a lot of users. it's limited to 60hz, it's response time is really poor, it suffers from really obvious blooming and bleed at high brightness and it has bad off axis color accuracy and brightness. sure, if you care deeply about color accuracy and 6k resolution it's pretty good. these aren't the only metrics on which monito…

Yes, the issue is not that it's expensive, it's that it doesn't justify that cost (serious question, what's that stand made out of to cost $1000?) If you can get an equivalent (or better) monitor for the same price (or less), then it's not really about spending an extremely generous salary to have better tools, it's about spending it to have a substandard tool that happens to have an Apple name attached to it. If it'…

If you can get an equivalent (or better) monitor for the same price (or less)

You can't; that's the point. There are no 6K monitors besides the ridiculous Apple one and the Dell 8K probably needs to be run at 2.5x which I don't know if macOS even supports.

Re: The state of external retina displays

#157

Post by Latty »

floatboth wrote: post #119
russelg wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

DisplayPort over Thunderbolt is not a proprietary connector (this is what the Pro Display XDR uses).

It's really stupid to force Thunderbolt usage though when USB-C has an alt mode for DP directly.

I believe the reason, IIRC, is it's actually doing two DP streams because one isn't enough bandwidth for the full resolution, which you can't do in alt mode where the PC is literally using the pins of the connection as though it were a single DP cable (although this may be more viable with newer DP specs these days, not sure).

Re: The state of external retina displays

#158

Post by ProZsolt »

Eric_WVGG wrote: post #134

My utterly unrealistic dream is: now that the first batch of 5k iMacs is approaching “old age,” some business would start selling kits than had the tools and instructions necessary to gut old iMacs, and a new controller board that would convert the remaining screens to basic DisplayPort displays. At $300 and around $500 for an old iMac on eBay, this could be somehow both more economical and likely more reliable than…

I assume they use eDP[1] internally so it wont be that har to convert them to a monitor[2]

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DisplayPort#eDP [2]: https://hackaday.com/2019/07/18/put-those-ipad-displays-to-w...

Re: The state of external retina displays

#160

Post by washadjeffmad »

urthor wrote: post #73

> Ridiculous Option: Apple Pro Display XDR I'll admit, a monitor that costs more than my first car is beyond affordable for 99% of the population. But saying that, many of the people reading this are pulling truly exotic salaries right now. After devoting untold hours to reaching the top of their profession. Let's say you're a professional earning $300k plus in software. You're often working 100% remote, using your m…

The startup dude with the Embody and topped out M1 Max with four roommates mates is such a meme today, though.

That's because it's incomplete.

A $5k screen is not so much a tool of the trade as an accessory for someone signalling themself to be valuable or valued. More commonly, coming to own these things is the result of little professional envy.

Our software engineers spend all day developing. They sit in $2-300 chairs and work on their preferred displays (last gen dual Apple TB displays for the Mac guys, dual anythings for the Windows, 1440p ultrawides for the java team).

You know who the only person in our org with an XDR is? The CIO with a MacBook Air, for writing emails and teleconferencing. They got theirs because another C-level made a big deal about how they couldn't work without their dual 5K UltraFines, also for sending emails and teleconferencing.

None of our enployees who could make use of an XDR display owns one because they either own a more industry-capable professional display (Flanders Scientific, Dolby, Sony pro series) or got an iMac Pro when they existed for under $5k.

I don't fault anyone who admires the XDR any more than I fault myself for liking any of the niche luxury items I do, but I wouldn't delude myself for even a moment into believing that an $8k watch is an essential investment because time management is an important skill to have.

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