New laptop - high res or no?

Colorblinded wrote in post #18150050
Those XPS 13s are nice machines. I had the 3200x1800 version briefly before I decided to trade up for the 4K XPS 15.

I don't THINK I'll ever have a 15" laptop...

kaitlyn2004 wrote in post #18150066
I don't THINK I'll ever have a 15" laptop...

Oh, it's like calling a doberman a lapdog. Technically, it almost fits on your lap

My previous laptop was a 14", the 13" was definitely smaller but I ultimately decided that if I could have a 15" 4k screen in a laptop that was smaller in basically every direction except width, I'd go for it.

The extra power is nice too.

If quality editing is important, my personal recommendation would be to use a decent size external hi-res monitor that has calibration capability. Most laptops can operate in dual mode, and it is possible to set up one screen (low-res) for one task while another task needing hi-res is done on the better/bigger monitor.

I took notice of several people complaining about laptop screens. In case you aren't aware Microsoft has put a utility in most Windows versions (since maybe Vista) called Clear Type Tuner (see https://www.microsoft.​com …cleartype/tuner​/tune.aspx). Clear Type is enabled by default but not necessarily optimized for an individual. The utility can make quite a difference in the display of text and takes about a minute to optimize. Simply go to Start, type in cctune.exe, run and then follow the prompts.

John from PA wrote in post #18150173
I took notice of several people complaining about laptop screens. In case you aren't aware Microsoft has put a utility in most Windows versions (since maybe Vista) called Clear Type Tuner (see https://www.microsoft.​com …cleartype/tuner​/tune.aspx). Clear Type is enabled by default but not necessarily optimized for an individual. The utility can make quite a difference in the display of text and takes about a minute to optimize. Simply go to Start, type in cctune.exe, run and then follow the prompts.

What does it do?

Archibald wrote in post #18150195
What does it do?

You go through about four screens, picking what appears to be the best text out of several choices. When done the video driver is optimized to your specific screen, viewing distance, etc. It supposedly is for Internet Explorer but I think it improved all my "visuals" and I use Chrome.

Kind of like the eye doctor spinning the dials and asking you which is more clear, A, B, or C.

In my case, I got a significant improvement but I wear contact lenses that over correct (my vision is about 20/15).

John from PA wrote in post #18150304
You go through about four screens, picking what appears to be the best text out of several choices. When done the video driver is optimized to your specific screen, viewing distance, etc. It supposedly is for Internet Explorer but I think it improved all my "visuals" and I use Chrome.

Kind of like the eye doctor spinning the dials and asking you which is more clear, A, B, or C.

In my case, I got a significant improvement but I wear contact lenses that over correct (my vision is about 20/15).

OK, thanks for the description.

I have the Dell XPS 13 normal res laptop. The text reads fine. The only thing is that when scrolling with two fingers on the touchpad, it too easily mistakenly changes the zoom percentage, which is annoying. I guess Clear Type Tuner won't help with that.

Maybe Clear Type Tuner could improve the text on my machine, but I think I will leave it unless a problem appears.

Other than that, this small laptop is easily the best I've ever owned. The regular screen resolution seems to be plenty fine already for me, and I don't see any real incentive to try to go higher.

I have a high res surface pro. awesome machine but it bugs me no end with scaling. I have been talking to various software makers and they say by the first of next year most stuff will be updated to be used on high res monitors. On1 software should be updated in a month they say.

Tom Reichner wrote in post #18149831
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I very highly recommend the highest resolution screen you can get. If anything appears too small, you just hit COMMAND and 4 at the same time to zoom in. When you do zoom in, there are so many pixels that text appears very rich and smooth and clean - just reading a document ends up being an aesthetic pleasure!

For about a year now, I have been using a retina 5k display, and have experienced no disadvantages whatsoever. No scaling problems at all, ever, with anything.

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Hi Tom, what size is your monitor? 24" - 27"? What OS?

I ask because I do not believe that your experience is applicable to the discussion of a 13" laptop screen in a windows environment.