To hit the correct pixel density on a Mac you need either a 27 inch Display @ 1440p (110 PPI / non-retina) or 27 inch Display @ 5k (220 PPI / retina). You can, in theory, use a 40inch monitor @ 4k (110 PPI, non-retina), but one would need a 20-inch 4k display for the right retina pixel density (same screen real state as 20-inch @ 1080). Anything else will either look too big, too small or require suboptimal scaling techniques. So, IMO, 27inch @ 1440p is still the practical budget option for a Mac.
If you mean a 5K screen at 1440, then that does look good. That's what I use with the 5K Studio Display. But definitely not a "budget" option as 5K screens are pricey.
5k 27 inch displays are ideal. That's what I'm running as well. My main point though is that macOS is somewhat bad at non-fractional scaling and there aren't many 4k displays sitting near the 110 DPI or 220 DPI sweetspots. As a budget option I would take a 1440p / 27 inches display over a 4k / 27 inches or 4k / 32 inches display.
@@macmost Apple's 27" Thunderbolt display is 2560x1440. The next step in Apple's lineup is a 5K 5120x2880 Studio Display, which is double a 1440 display. Macs support 4K but it is not optimized for 4K.
@@brucestarr4438 Apple discontinued the Thunderbolt Display 6+ years ago. Macs work best at a variety of configurations and 4K @ 1080p is definitely one of them too.
hi sorry the off topic but i red some coments and you guys are better than me . i want to daisy chain 2x27 monitors on mac. but there are not many thunderbolt screens. is there somo options to do that with display ports but without dock or hub? e found this asus PA27AC (have thunderbolt) and it is QHD. can you guys help-? because 4k with thunderbolt are expencive so i drop to QHD but less options.
What!! Sorry but some of your comments miss the mark. 1440P is not 1/2 the resolution of 4K but rather 1/2 the resolution of 5K, 5120x2880 vs 2560x1440. Apple chooses non-standard 5k and 4.5k resolutions for a reason. That reason is to reach a Retina resolution of ~220dpi and the native DPI of the 27in, 5k iMac is 218. I haven't specifically looked but I'm sure the 24in iMac will be close to the same. They get the sharp display by doubling/combining pixels as you mention to get that sharpness and it works very well. 110dpi is an appropriate non-Retina resolution and corresponds well to 1440p and keeps Apple hardware from breathing too hard. Hover over the default resolution under the "Scaled" display settings and what does it show? Exactly, 2560x1440 and Apple will work their display magic on this to get the sharp display. 220dpi and 110dpi are the only resolutions that Apple builds their software to natively work with. If you choose any of the other resolutions, you are warned that they could impact performance and they will for anyone who does a lot of video and possibly photo editing because the display software has to work harder to calculate and then display these non-Retina standard DPI resolutions. This is definitely true on the 5K iMacs and I've personally experienced it. Also, if you "Option - Click" on the "Scaled" button you will see a list of all possible resolutions if someone is looking for more granularity and choices. This is very useful since you can't just change the scaling like you can in Windows. Your point showing the problem with downscaling from a native 1440p to 1080p is valid but a nonsensical thing to do. If you plan on using 1080p then a native 1080p display will be sharper. The problem with choosing a display for a Mac product is complicated due to the way Apple's display subsystem works. 4K and other resolutions will certainly work but anything that uses a resolution very far away from 110 or 220dpi is going to strain the display performance. 6K, 5K, 4.5K and 1440p are the best current choices for maximum graphics performance and sharp display. Search for "Hunter King"'s video from 4 months ago regarding MAC resolutions for a good explanation of the issue and a link includes an article with a calculator so you can compare various sizes and resolutions for an appropriate DPI. Users performing simple tasks such as browsing the internet or streaming will probably not notice a problem but for the more demanding users it's important to know.
I never say that 1440 is half the resolution of 4K. It is half the number of pixels. 2560x1440=3,686,400 and 3840x1920=7,372,800. You get exactly twice the number of pixels with 4K as you do with 1440.
One big thing is also that if you choose a 1440p size on a 4k display the Apple display subsystem first upscales the 4k to 5k and then uses that to get a 220 dpi. That is what is causing the decrease in performance. Shout out to Hunter King’s video about returning his 4k display who explained this very well.
I do not completely agree. MacOS works internally with 110ppi (non-Retina) or 220ppi (Retina). For Monitors with other resolutions scaling of the ui is necessary, which can lead to artifacts. So I personally prefer for 27" the 2k resolution (which matches the non-Retina resolution without scaling), it's more comfortable for my eyes while e.g. scrolling. The optimum would be 5k, which matches with 218ppi Retina-UI.
I am sorry, but this is a very bad advise! Anyone who wants to combine an Apple computer with non-apple screen has in fact a very limited number of choices. And as a first step, one should always look at what resolutions and physical dimensions Apple selects for their own screens. You will discover that for desktop computers, Apple has a very consistent policy with regard to DPI - that is the number of physicals pixel per inch - it is either 109 for non-retina and double of it - 218 dpi - for retina displays. Why is this important? Because unlike windows or linux, OSX doesn't employ UI scaling depending on resolution - all UI elements are designed to look and work best on either 109 DPI or 218 DPI in retina displays. One should notice, that windows is usually designed for 96 DPI - for instance, Apple has put full HD screen in 21' monitors for iMacs, while in Windows full HD is most suitable for 24 inch screens. There is actually only one combination, at present, that is common to Windows computers and was used by Apple - that is the 27 inch display with 1440p resolution. This combination was used in non-retina 27 inch iMacs - and, in my view, is the most suitable screen choice for anyone that cannot afford Apple screen at present. So why not 27 inch 4k monitors? Because you simply waste screen real-estate. If you use Apple software (Logic or FinalCut) you will discover that the bigger screen doesn't offer you any advantage - all UI elements are huge. You will have less real estate than 24 inch new iMac which has more pixels. You will, in fact, have the same experience as working on 21 inch retina iMac... I would only recommend this combination if you have eyesight difficulties and normally bring magnifying glass to your computer.
This is a good video, but it misses some key points. About 1-2 months ago, I went through this exercise to get an external display for my MBA M2. I opted for high quality 1440P 27" Dell U2722DE screen. I had multiple 27" iMac's - 1440p and 5K and also had 1080P 27" displays, and I think, unless you go with a 5K display, 1440P seems like the best compromise. 4K display only gets you effective 1080P resolution which is way too low for 27" screen. I believe 1080P is acceptable for 22-24", but not for 27". Ever wonder why Apple's 27" screens are 5K? They are 5K to give people the 1440P effective HiDPI screen estate, not 1080P. I would rather have a slightly less sharp 1440P than 1080P HiDPI with significantly less screen to work. Also, saying that 1440P is small on 27" is a bit of a stretch since that is what Studio Display is and all 5K iMac's - 4K native on 27" is small, but not 1440P.
Note that 1080p on a 4K is still 4K. You still see images, text and other things in 4K. It is just the interface is drawn at the SIZE of 1080p. You are still using every pixel.
@@macmost i don't know much about this stuff, but watching my mac mini m1 on my Asus 27" VG27AQ(1440p) is great. and it still looks great also on my 4K 28" AOC U28P2G6B. what ive observed differently was on system preferences>display, where AOC display i have to choose the option of a scaled display, while Asus display is at default display.
Can you please reference some source? I really want to understand this in more depths. Also, are we talking about the masOS UI? Or application contents? Eg, vector graphics should render to any res, right?) thanks
1440p looks fine. Apple's Studio Display is 5k (5120x2880) AKA 1440p*2, with double the pixel density for the "retina" effect. Otherwise, a regular 27" 1440p at 1x pixel density would look the same. The sizes of all the windows and text and apps would be the exact same, just non-retina.
The bottom line here is this is only really an issue if you need to scale to hd ui because native 1440 is too small for you. 4k will obviously still offer superior clarity compared to 1440p, but the fuzziness is specifically related to the hd scaling and not an inherent problem of the 1440p resolution.
My test shows that text is certainly more clear when operating at 1920x1080 rather than at 2560x1440 (2K, QHD) on a 4K monitor for the same font size. However, on a 27 inch monitor, operating at 1920 x 1080 results in the text still being too large - say for menus, sidebars, etc. It is more appropriate to run in this mode on a smaller monitor - say 24 inches. For example, the LG 24 inch monitor that is made for Mac operates in this mode.
problem is nobody (professional at least) gets a 4k display to have it in retina @HD, but to have a more space for UI. So 2k becomes the best solution since you have more room but the UI is still usable, while in 4k becomes really tiny especially on a 27.
My experience: 1440p on 32” (@ default) for over 5 years, “upgraded” to 4k for like a month. Then went back to 1440p. With a 32” monitor it really is the sweet spot for macs for me (adobe cc).
Because that's the scaling that MacOS prefers below 5K at 110 dpi. For appropriate scaling on a Mac 110dpi or 220 dpi (5K) is what Mac's prefer and scale the best with.
Most of the people who cant afford the extremely expensive 220ppi -s monitors, usually with 5k displays, the best option is a 110ppi solution, like 27 inch 2560x1440 or an ultrawide 34 inch 3440x1440 monitor. Another very beneficial feature is real 10 bit displays which has brilliant colours.
Problem is not with 1440p. It's with Apple as always. 1440p is a universal ratio, but Apple want you to invest in their own overpriced monitors. This could easily be achieved with a software tweak(pixel align with expense of gpu, which I don't mind). My 5 year old windows perfectly connect and scales with my 2 external 4k monitor. But for my brand new mac m1, I had to buy an adapter to support both monitors, and I use 4k in 1080p resolution with mac, because in 4k resolution text is too small and 2k scaling text is blurry. Look reddit everyone have same problem. Apple knows and ingore users. BetterDummy couldn't help. I might buy their paid version to solve this. Apple has good products but too greedy to allow 3rd party devices.
Buy an LG 5K monitor and it works perfect. Yes. Apple close pixel doubling when introducing retina displays. It has not changed, but as far as I know the have been some improvements in the scaling from 5K virtual to 4K real displays.
@Евгений Мокрушин i don't care what you see. I'm sharing what I see. My 6 years old windows is super crisp when connected to my two 4k monitors, my new mac m1 doesn't even support dual desktop. I have to buy an adapter for it. And its in 1080p. Lol. Windows, no adapter, native support.
I used a 2560x1440 display with my late 2012 Mac mini. It worked great. At the time I bought it Apple was still selling their Thunderbolt 27-inch displays, which used the same resolution. Because my display was 25 inches instead of 27, the pixel density was better on my 25-inch display. My cheaper display was actually better for viewing content. I had to use DisplayPort. Using the normal HDMI at the time would only give me 1920x1080. 4K displays were still new at the time and they wouldn't have worked on my Mac mini anyway.
For a "2K" display, use BetterDisplay (or some such, as you suggest) to render a HiDPI 1920x1080 mode, which will not look blocky and jagged, but rather nice, as macOS will internally render 1920x1080 at 3840x2160 internally, then scale it down to the native 2560x1440 resolution of the display 60 times per second. And no, on modern Mac hardware, this is not a heavy lift. Do not directly display 1920x1080 to the 2560x1440 display without macOS scaling. Though not a 100% perfectly analogous situation, I am doing this with my 2880x2560 28-inch LG DualUp display to find the right resolution and it looks _superb_, and I came to this config directly from a 27-inch iMac with 5K Retina display, to give perspective as to where I'm coming from. (I've detailed my process and experience in this in a blog post out there on the web.)
5:52 the main reason why I choose 1440p instead of 4k is that it is way better than 1k with just enough details (not too les) while having half the pixel count as the 4k screen. this allows game to run at native resolution while achieving more frames when compared with an 4k screen.
I've been using 27 inch 1440P display next to a 27 inch 4K display for years and to my eye, there is very little difference in the user experience. The 1440p screen doesn't look significantly worse. If I look closely, I can see that 4k is sharper, but the difference is never a distraction while working.
@@macmost I swap between my work Windows laptop and my personal Mac. On my Mac I typically work with Photos - Pixelmator - Affinity & iMovie. The UI elements are scaled, but the photo & video content are shown at native resolutions on either screen.
For me, the best part of the video was the tip at the end, that a DisplayPort cable works better than HDMI. Thank you very much for explaining this, Gary! Based on what you said, I replaced my HDMI cable with a DisplayPort one and it's so much better! I use a 1440 monitor for Windows and love it. Occasionally I want to use it as a secondary display for my MacBook Air, and just have to make do with what I have. The smaller font size doesn't bother me too much, the upside is that the display has a lot of screen real estate in this native mode.
I just said the same thing. Nobody else mentioned using a DisplayPort cable. I just want to buy a 27" 4K monitor for my MacBook Pro, and all the other videos were so confusing. I'm so glad that I saw this video before I bought a 1440 monitor.
Great informative video, if a bit biased :-) I do not agree with your statement, as I dont see a problem with 1440p on 27” monitors running non scaled native resolution, and not all who would use a 27” monitor with 1440p are gamers. As an architect there is a lot of software which makes use of 3d accelerated graphics, and this is still easier to run on lower resolutions like 1440p as opposed to 4K. It was Apple who introduced me to 2560x1440p resolution on their big 27” iMac back in 2009, and it was a great machine with a fantastic display, and Im not aware of anybody needing to scale the user interface in OSX back then, because text was hard to read or things looked fuzzy. Im actually not sure if this was a even possibly. And as others have also pointed out, Apples new Studio Display uses a 5k retina display where they in their adds run it at a 2x scaling effectively making it 1440p size with the exact same ratio as a native 1440p 27” display. If you do scale the image, I think you have a valid point, but it is a matter of taste, and I would encourage all to try a 27" monitor with 2560x1440p running it non scaled, before they use their hard earned cash for a 4k 27" monitor, if they only want to run a scaled image anyway. I work on a 27" 1440p monitor 8 hours a day, and I sit at a distance of about 75 cm (29 inches) from my eyes to my screen, and for me, everything looks nice and crisp and I have no problems with reading anything on screen or viewing anything in my CAD modelling software.
Great explanation and exactly my experience too. 27" at 1440p is a native scaling for Macs and looks perfect. Not at all too small as suggested in this video.
This is misleading and sensational. Mac OS has been made to be perfect on 1440p screens since 2009. You can still comfortably use a 1440p display without scaling if you don’t need retina. Complaining about small UI at 1440p does not mean there “is a problem with 1440p”
Personally I love the native 1440p resolution on my 49 inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 (equivalent to two 27 inch 1440p displays side by side) in my Mac. The windows and menu bar are very comfortably sized for my needs.
Thanks, Gary. I have a Macbook Pro 16 (2019) that I view on a 27" 4K monitor. Not sure if what I do works with all Macs - but - I prefer to run at a resolution of 2304x1296 which I get to thru SYSTEM SETTINGS > DISPLAYS > hold down the OPTION key while clicking on SCALED. This brings up a Resolutions Menu to choose from which I turn on the All Resolutions button and then choose. Some resolutions are offered at "low resolution" - which I avoid. Also to prevent flickering I ensure my display is set to 60 Hz and not the other offering of 45-60 Hz variable.
I was a bit bummed learning about this AFTER purchasing my Dell 4K monitor. As far as screen real estate, I like 1440p scaling, but after switching to the default 1080p I can definitely see the difference in clarity. Now, I wish I had just spent the extra $$ on the Studio Display. 🥺
Did you try using 1440p scaling on your 4K monitor? And if so, how did it go? I remember seeing another video about this exact topic, and the guy that tried this really liked it-said it wasn't really quite "Retina" (since it's like 160-ish DPI vs. 200+ DPI for the Studio Display)-but still very sharp, noticeably more than on a true 1440p display). For me, the Studio Display is a dream that's still a ways off, so I "settled" on an HP 27mq for now-I get the same exact UI scaling & space to work with as a Studio Display, great colors (I picked HP because I loved how the colors looked on my 1080p, HP 23cw--which is my second monitor now!), and slightly higher DPI than my old HP as well; so while text doesn't look "Retina" by any means, it's still nice and crisp, getting fonts just a bit closer to "Windows sharp." I've had this new dual-HP setup going for almost a month now, and just that small net gain of +13 extra pixels per inch in going from the old to the new as my "main" has really made for a nice improvement! Now, I don't know what size 4K monitor you bought, but if it's a 27", that's a *+54 DPI* (!) improvement over my 1440p screen right there! (163 vs. 108.8 dots/pixels per inch) That's a night-and-day difference in clarity. From what I understand too, if you have one of the newer M1/M2 machines, you will only take a 1-3% performance hit, using one of these non-integer-scaled resolutions w/your 4K monitor.
@@rblossey I am currently using the 1440p resolution on my 27" 4K monitor. Although I like the look of the default resolution (1080p), there isn't enough screen real estate for my work productivity, so I settled on 1440p. It's not bad and with the M1 chip I doubt there is much of a performance hit (if any).
@@rblossey I have two monitors connected to my Mac Studio: an Apple Studio Display as a primary screen, and an LG 4K 27" Ultrafine as a secondary screen. First of all, because the Apple 5K uses 77% more pixels than a 4K display, it will ALWAYS look smoother, it just a physical fact. My Mac Studio is a fully maxed out (no pun intended ) M1 Max, so I have enough computing power to run the LG 4K at a scale that matches the 5K's native MacOS resolution as close as possible. To give you an idea, the other day I was watching a 4K Bluray rip (i.e. full 4K quality, no compression unlike streaming), on the LG 4K while working on Adobe Illustrator with multiple tabs open, plus three browsers open with a multiplicity of tabs on the Apple Studio Display, and there was ZERO lag. For reference, I am using a DisplayPort 1.4 to USB-C cable... as HDMI is not a good idea when connecting a second monitor to a computer for several reasons, including HDCP issues.
@@rsr789 that’s amazing! This is one reason why I’m excited about the new M2 Pro Mac Mini, cause now the multi-monitor limits-both in # of monitors you can (officially) run and in resolution-are effectively gone 😁 So I might for this in-between option instead of a Studio now when it comes time to upgrade.
@@rblossey Just as aside: I used to have that same LG 4K connected to my 2015 27" iMac, connected via miniDP to DisplayPort and I never had any major issues either, while using Illustrator, InDesign, and /or AutoCAD. So an Apple Silicon chip should be a cakewalk for several 4K and/or 5K monitors.
For those who are still wondering which monitor to buy for Mac then go for 5k monitors if you have budget or go for 4k monitors, your last option should be 2k monitors. On 4k monitor you can just scale down to 1080p for Retina like display quality or scale down to 1440p which looks a bit better than the native 1440p display. I’ve tested both 4k and 2k monitors on mac. I preferred 4k monitor over 2k. Currently I own Asus Proart Pa279CV 4K Monitor. I bought it for editing purpose, colors look very accurate out of the box as it has Delta E < 2. It’s mentioned as 10bit monitor but it’s actually 8bit + FRC. Anyway I am very happy with my decision.
May I ask you if working with text is fine with the Asus Proart Pa279CV 4K Monitor? I'm going to buy a Mac Mini M2 and I wanted to connect it to an Asus Proart Pa278CV 1440p Monitor, avoiding the 4K for the reason explained in this video. I do photo editing as well, but I will use it also for office and some graphics as well. And I really don't know which of the 2 monitors to buy. Thank you for your suggestions!
@@monica3484 I haven’t noticed any issues so far. Texts seem crisp. But ai recommend you to try both 1440p and 4k monitors before buying. Windows and Mac are different so you should try it on mac system.
I dont understand why is it better to buy 4k and scale down to 1440p instead of saving money and buying native 1440p, im considering the dell U2724DE that is 2560x1440 and 120hz, the 4k version is only 60hz, since mac works better 1440p I assumed its better to buy the 1440p version, right?
I am absolutely oppose that a high refresh rate isn't as important as resolution. Dragging a window around and scrolling webpages on a 32inch screen in 60 fps is something i am still not getting used to. I think gaming isn't the driver in the success of high fps smartphones, its the fluid navigation and i am pretty shure that high fps in office will common in some years, because people will recognise the discrepancy of their laptops and smartphones to their office screens.
I agree with your conclusion here-that 4K displays will usually offer a better experience for users than 1440 displays-but I don’t think that I quite agree with all of your reasoning. Yes, a 4K will offer greater pixel density than a 1440p display, and that’s definitely a good thing. But I think that your illustration showing the 1440p’s “mismatched” pixel grid when it’s scaled might be ever so slightly misleading? For instance, you mention that text and photos will look sharper on a 4K display (and I agree with that), but I think that the reason that text and photos will look sharper is because you a 4K screen offers greater pixel density-not because of a “mismatched” pixel grid. Take photos, for example. If you were to be looking at a 25 megapixel photo on your monitor, you wouldn’t be able to view that photo at 100% zoom (showing every pixel) whether you’re on a 1440p display or on a 4K display-so you’re going to have scaling either way. Or take text as another example. Modern fonts are vector based, so they don’t have trouble scaling either. And if you might worry that the “mismatched” pixel grid might inherently make things look terrible, you might try this experiment: 1. On your 5K studio display, take a full-screen screenshot. 2. Then, using Photoshop or another image editor, scale that screenshot to 4K and then save that as a PNG (or another lossless image format). 3. Then open that PNG and view it at 100% scale. (At this point, the scaled screenshot should only fill a portion of your screen.) At this point, the image will be smaller, and I’ll grant you that it won’t be as sharp as the original screenshot. But I’ll venture that the image won’t look inherently terrible-because when Photoshop or other image editors scale down high-res images, they’re are enough pixels to go around to calculate average pixel values when needed. I bring up this experiment because-as far as I’m aware-macOS does its scaling in the same way (by rendering the screen at an internal virtual resolution that’s higher than the physical display, and then scaling that down before it’s sent to the monitor). And while that sort of scaling might ostensibly have to make compromises if the original image were to have, say, a line within the UI that were to be 1 physical pixel wide, I’m not aware of macOS having any UI elements that are only 1 physical pixel wide. I love your videos, Gary, my slight disagreement with some of your reasoning here doesn’t change that. And I definitely agree with you that Mac folks will be waaay better off with a 4K display than a 1440p display; I just happen to feel that way because of the difference in pixel densities rather than because of concerns about a “mismatched” pixel grid. PS If by any chance you had wanted to, Gary, if you were to potentially update the video’s title from referring to “1440” to “1440p”, my Spidey-sense is that the latter, being more specific, might offer slightly better SEO?
I guess my point is when someone tries to use a 1440p screen at a size other than 1440p or 720p. Most find the first too small and the second too large. So they end up going in-between. If neither 1440p or 720p work for you with a 27-inch screen, then getting a 1440 27-inch was a bad idea and a 4K would have been better because 1080p on a 4K is right in-between 1440p and 720p on a similar-sized 1440 screen.
I've been using a Dell 1440p 27" screen for 3 years with the "default" setting and it looks perfect. I would love 5K of course but the damned things cost too much and there's not much to choose from. So I don't know why you say 1440 makes everything too small. It absolutely doesn't, at least not on my screen (Dell U2719DC).
The video explains the resolutions very well and the part about using odd resolutions on displays. However the biggest omission is the relationship between the physical size of the display and the resolution (i.e pixel density). It's true that text and UI elements on a 1440p display can be too small too view, but only if you use a smaller display (And that would apply to any resolution). 1440p works very well on a 27inch and above (I have a 25inch 1440p monitor and it's borderline, but I solved it buy moving the monitor a bit closer to me, but should have gone for a 27inch instead.). That also brings in the another factor, which is the distance at which the monitor is placed from the user. Finally to add, 1440P works fine on Mac, Windows and Linux, I use the same 25inch 1440P display on all of them and never had any issue (unless you start scaling the display)
I have an MBP Retina Late 2012 and just got a used DELL U2518D 25" 1440p display and with mDP to DP cable I get 1440p in 59,98hz which works great but I'm considering getting SwitchResX to scale the UI a bit larger. But it doesn't seem to work fully on Catalina. I got a "application unsupported" message. Which screen modifier apps do you use and how did you set it up? I tried a 27" 1440p display before but thought the DPI was too bad so I wanted an 24" 1440p display but got this 25" used for cheap. I don't think Intel MBP 2012 is strong enough for 4K 60fps so there's no way I would get 4K for this one. But whenever I get a Apple Silicon Mac I would get a 4K display.
I was actually working on this just the other day. I learned that actually your Mac doesn't expose high DPI mode on 1440p by default. The way to force it is actually to rotate the screen and then rotate it back. Then you get an option to scale in high DPI mode at 720. One thing I was thinking about during the video was ... can't the mac be smart enough to turn off a few columns on the side or rows at the top in order to make it scale perfectly at any resolution?
That's one of the things you can accomplish with SwitchResX. If I need to record a tutorial with my MacBook which is 16:10, I use SwitchResX to force it into 16:9 and pixels on the top and bottom are not used.
1080p does not offer enough real estate for me so I scale my 4K 27" to 1440p. Something I have noticed is that Windows scaling at 150% seems superior to that of MacOS. (but it took Windows many years to get it right). Scaling at 200% of course works just as well in both.
How do the Mac OS fonts look when you scale @ 1440p on your 4K screen? Really wondering just how big of a difference 163 DPI (4K) vs. 208 DPI (5K) really makes for that! ("half-Retina" vs. actual Retina, I guess you could say?) And while I have watched some videos on the topic, even screenshots of the monitors don't really capture the difference (empirically, yes; pixel-peeping, yes; overall user experience...definitely not!). By the way, I think Windows having superior scaling @ 150% might have something to do with the way Microsoft designs their fonts! Historically they've always aimed for "sharpness" and clarity vs. "character" and "faithfulness" to print fonts (as Apple has done before, at least before the age of Retina). I could be wrong about this, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if, in these sub-Retina ranges, Windows would have a slight leg up here (at 5K though, it's a different story! the gloves come off at that point 😉).
@@rblossey Interesting enough, I booted my Mac (I use Windows 95% of the time) and updated to whatever the latest OS is and the scaling of text looks on par with Windows now. There is definitely a difference in scaling between the OS release last year and the release this year.
@@alexmm01 that’s great ! Good news for me too, since I might be making the jump to 4K/27” soon ;) Apple seems to be making some improvements to the font rendering again over the last few years. I don’t know exactly how they’re doing it, but they definitely got a lot of negative feedback over how badly the fonts were rendering on non-Retina displays over the last 5 years or so (I seem to remember Mojave, or the one that came right before it being the worst offender, and people using workarounds to get the fonts back to an “acceptable” appearance). I was a little worried about this a few months ago when I got the Mac Mini, but it wound up looking pretty good (not perfect, but good) with my 1080p, 24” display, and it looks even better now with my 1440p, 27” display (net gain of +13 PPI, but even that is noticeable!). It’s definitely good enough to get me through the long wait/saving period for the studio display ;)
Gary, you really do go the extra mile with your content. Translating the technical details in to simple language and visuals helps to cover a wide demographic of viewers. It’s great to see. Thanks for another great video!
Great video...but why do Apple not solve this issue in their operating system? Windows handles the same problem in a much better way by allowing you to scale the display up whilst still maintaining native resolution, no third party solution required.
I use my 4K display at native resolution so 4x 1080p canvases, and I find it’s perfect. I can’t imagine anyone finding 1440p at 27” too small, that’s exactly what iMac had before going 5k. It’s the perfect scaling.
@@macmost LOL! I get the feeling Boomers aren't living in the heads of marketers, anymore. Oh how I'd have loved all the tiny screens and tiny fonts as a 60 yr old! Any idea why menus and so many windows have fixed font sizes that can't be changed without altering resolutions? There are many resolutions that would suit different tasks if only I could adjust font sizes of the system information.
After a decade of being really happy with my 27-inch iMac, I finally upgraded to the M1 mini. I connected it via hdmi to the 54-inch 4k TV I already owned, The results are perfect.
Most of these TV's these days are better than many computer monitors, and I for one have to say, it's about dang time. Especially if you have the real estate to display the real estate. 🙂
To expand on font fuzziness, here’s what Apple officially does with retina resolutions: Macbook Air 13.3’ default resolution is HIDPI 1440x900 which is probably 2880x1800 resolution of fonts and media. Native resolution of Air 13.3’ is 2560x1600, which is less. So Apple officially uses HIDPI resolutions with downscaling. It should have been set to HIDPI 1280x800 to perfectly align the pixels, maybe it’s not that important.
I will save this tutorial so that when I upgrade my external display I'll meet all of the qualifications for the better screen output. Thank you so very much
Interesting! So if anything to do with image editing and text then 4K is good. BUT... what to buy when one is using a MBPro M1 Max for Blender / Cinema 4d? 1440 is better option right? Thank you.
Why would you want fewer pixels when doing graphics work? Seems like you would want more. You already have a MacBook Pro with a great screen. But if you want something additional and you are doing that kind of work, then I would imagine you'd want a 5K screen even, not to go all the way down to a 2K one.
Thanks for this video. As a mac and pc user I am torn between a 1440p and 4k display. I’m more confident on now getting the 4k display for future proofing as 4k will become the new standard soon with so many powerful GPUs coming out in the next year or two and now due to your explanation for mac users. Thanks!
@@eplugplay8409 I recently tried a dell 27 inch 4k monitor with MacBook pro. It looks great at 1440p as recommended here. I need a 34 inch so will try a 34 inch at 1440p and see if i am comfortable with the display
I have had the 27" Apple Thunderbolt display with my Mac mini for like 3 years and the resolution is great, I love how much space I have for my windows and text is just the right size.
This is great. I have been a Mac user for a long time using a HD Dell screen. It has worked well for what I use it for. Now I want to upgrade to a 27” screen.
My m1 mini is the main 'box' for my 65" 4K tv, and I absolutely love it. It is great for computer tasks, and 4k video. (And I set my display for the larger 'virtual' pixels as well, and it looks great w/ texts).
I had my doubts about how the scaling would work, but the day I brought my M1 Mac Mini home (my first Mac in 29 years! 😲), the very first thing I did was hook it up to my 55" 4K TV...what an experience that was! 😁 It's not something I do much now-I have a more "specialized" dual-HP monitor setup and a big desk that works with both my Mac mini & "mini" HP ProDesk-but I'm considering getting a 30-ft HDMI cable + a cheap switcher just so I can bring that back whenever I feel like it :) It really looks great.
Excellent as always, Gary. For almost a year I had my M1 Mac Mini running on a 4K Samsung monitor. It looked good but not great. Finally splurged and bought the 5K Mac Studio Display and it looks stunning using the Default settings. You explained why.
What matters most is _Aspect Ratio._ The two screens you named are both 16x9 (called HD). However, most iMacs and MacBooks have screens with a 16x10 (actually 8x5) aspect ratio. You *_cannot_* mix these. If you do, moving something from one screen to another will cause it to balloon up or squish down as you drag it between the screens. Pixel depth is important but dragging windows between the two monitors you mentioned will be fine because they are both 16x9. But, do not "mix and match" different aspect ratios. I have "fixed" this problem for friends who bought a second monitor with the wrong aspect ratio. I had to admonish them with, _"You didn't call me first before you just made a blind computer purchase, did you?"_
Not sure what you mean. If you are using two screens, there is nothing wrong with having different ratios. I use one screen horizontal and another vertical, in fact. That's an extreme difference. Moving icons or windows works perfectly fine.
Thank you so much, i faced the same issue with my new 1440 display, as I didn't have the budget to go up to 4k, but then I installed the Betterdisplay, and notched down my res to 1152 with HiDPi and now the screen looks exactly how I wanted it.
You explained very well, thumbs up! I have a 2k 32inch 165hz LG display. I used HDMI cable and it sucked, I now using USB-C to DP. Running at 2k with 144hz! 🎉😊😊
Great video. Although it didn't talk about the issue that for a lot of people a 27inch 4k display scaled to 1080p or 4k is too big or small respectively.
I think that has to deal more with DPI being too high or not high enough. Its confusing because it not only has to deal with screen size and resolution but also DPI which can be different from different manufactures even when both are 4k at 27in for example... But I also think Apple designed everything to be confusing and have limited real life options outside of their own ecosystem...on purpose. For the "real" advice (if you have the money) - just research whatever manufacture Apple is using to produce their panels...and buy that identical item from the manufacture's brand instead. To be honest...it'll still be expensive...but you'll get the nearly the same experience as you would with the Apple display you researched...since same manufacture and all...and especially if its for a 2nd monitor...money saved is money saved in this economy... And as for gaming...the best advice is just build a dedicated PC with NVIDIA latest and greatest, and have one of those 0ms latency large OLED 4K screens. I have 5700XT i9 iMac with full on Bootcamp...the last Apple computer to support Bootcamp...which should have the best compatibility with Windows gaming. And its great...for the most part...but there are still certain things I wish I had...such as being able to update the 5700XT with a non-bootcamp driver...and also a Nvidia graphics card because a lottttt of games have options where only Nvidia has boost options to further increase frame rate and lower latency...and not available on any AMD graphics card...and most importantly...not having to shut down and save my work each time I want to take a game break...(but thats probably for the better because I'm gaming less now)
For example...in Valorant...I can only get ~300fps (no complaints for real life usage)...but I know 5700XT is capable of nearly 500~600 fps if I was just allowed to update the driver to a non-bootcamp driver...which I don't think is possible because there were some small changes made to the iMac version of the 5700XT that is not in the Windows/Windows version of the 5700XT. (But with NVIDIA's latest/greatest with the boost on...I'm seeing people get nearly 1000fps)... But if you're buying a Mac...you're probably not worried about making it into Esports...but yeah...for absolutely top tier competitive gaming...building a dedicated Windows PC is a must...
I went and bought a displayport to USB C for my 2020 MBP and replaced that HDMI....and it is like night and day!!!....Thanks for the info Gary!!.......
Well Apple external displays are 5120x2880 which is exactly 2x 1440p, with that wouldn't 1440p display be the next best thing after 5K with just halved resolution instead of scaling everything to 4K? I don't understand the arguments in this video.
I have 2 1440 25" from dell. And they are not bad at all. Under Windows you are able to scale the font and interface to allmost any in fine increments. Now I bought an m1 Mac mini and I'm still shocked there is now way under macOS to at least scale the fonts systemwide. Guess there are two ways of locking at it: MacOs sucks in that regard or as apple would say "you have the wrong displays". Don't know what I will doe. I'm not going back to windows! For now I use some reading glasses in the native apps. They are the worst. Adobe lets you tweet to somehow usable.
Thank you for very detailed and informative video. Unfortunately I have to disagree with you. 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x settings is perfectly acceptable working space for many apps and industries. If you want higher fidelity than something Apple or LG 27inch 5120-by-2880px at 2x is much nicer but also a lot more expensive. The important bit missing form your video is the screen physical dimensions. 27 inch screen with 3840-by-2160px (4k) at 2x is nice sharp but not enough real space for many applications and industries. I would not recommend this to everyone. It depends what you need for the job. 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x settings could be better suited than 3840-by-2160px (4k) at 2x for many. Also 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x are really great value and you save a lot if you need two or even four screens for your work.
For some people, yes, 1440 on a 4K is fine. For others it the interface items are too small and some things look "fuzzy." Depends on the person and the screen a bit too. I think 1080 on a 4K at 27 inches is better.
27” 4K is too tiny, you need to scale up otherwise you can’t see. By scaling your GPU has to work hard and effect your battery
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The biggest problem with Macs is that there is no system font scaling. I have a nice 32 inch 4K display with the Looks like resolution set to 2560x1440 (because I need as much real estate as possible on the screen for apps like Intellij/Pycharm IDEs, terminals, text editors, etc.), yet fonts are too small overall. Fortunately, I can increase both the UI and editor font sizes in the IDE, Visual Studio Code, and Sublime text (apps I use most often), but Finder (especially the path at the bottom), all system dialogs and menus, the native apps like Numbers, Pages, Podcasts, etc. have so small fonts that, even though my eyesight is okay, I find it very hard to work in these apps, so I just avoid them. Same with Safari - I would love to use Safari, but the text in the tabs is too small, so I use Firefox with the layout.css.devPixelsPerPx option set to 2.8. Tried Chrome, but didn't find a way to adjust the UI font size. To me, it looks like Macs are made to look good on laptop screens with resolution set to smth like 1400x900, with the font sizes hard-coded. But many people connect their macs to external monitors (Mac mini and 32" 4K Dell in my case) and expect to get the same real estate with nicely readable fonts they had on Linux (my case) or Windows.
You can simply use CMD +/- (Mac) or CTRL +/- (Windows) to zoom in/out in your browser window to enlarge or decrease text size, but it will size the rest of the page with it at the same time, though it might help for your situation.
Have you considered scaling @ 1152p (Hi-DPI) or 1200p (Hi-DPI), and then maybe just adding one more monitor for the extra real estate? (maybe a vertical one?) With 4K to work with, all these scaled resolutions should look pretty good. One of those two settings should get close (if not match) the new 24-inch iMac scaling, which is 4.5K (not 5K like the Studio Display, or the previous 27" Intel iMac). The system text gets a little more readable, and the screen real estate lost, I think, could easily be made up for with one extra monitor (and probably expanded!). I'm convinced there'd be a good compromise there somewhere....
I'm in the same situation as you, I'm using a 27" 1440p monitor connected to my mac and the text is too small at native resolution and blurry at scaled 1080p resolution. The eye exam went well, so I don't understand how people don't notice this defect. For my sanity I really think I'll sell the Macbook air M1 for a Thinkpad with Linux
Actually, the original Apple Cinema Display was 1600×1024 (1999). There were many models over the years with different native resolutions, but none at 1440p until the 2008 "LED Cinema Display 27-Inch." Then the Apple Thunderbolt Display (2011) was also 1440p. So the last time Apple came out with a new 1440p screen was 13 years ago. The smaller MacBook Air is 2560x1664, but that's at 13 inches diagonal.
@@macmost true (I did not know about the Cinema Display you mentioned, my mistake). The 30" Cinema Display (2004) was 16:10, hence 2560x1600 and that was perfect scaling for a 16:9 2560x1440 for the LED CD (2008). Nonetheless modern 27" macs are based on 1440p resolution, as 5K is a 1440p at 200%. Taking that into consideration 4K screens are not native in MacOS for the usual display size at 27 and 32 inches. Plenty of reviews already discussed this topic. I wouldn't care about any of this... modern M based macs are capable of running anything.
My understanding here is that a 4k monitor with 1440p scaling gives bad picture - rather, scaling it to 1080p scaling gives it a "native" resolution look whilst reaping the benefits of high pixel density of 4k. Now, 4k's pixel density aside, a 1440p monitor should give good picture if scaling were 720p or 1440p,right?
Sorry but this video is so misleading. 1440 is hardly a bad resolution for macs, in fact it's the perfect native 1:1 resolution for a 27" screen and a great balance between screen real estate, readability and affordability. There is no need to run at retina level dpi, it's nice sure, but not required on a mac or even critical to do so. Have been using a 1440 display on various macs for over a decade in professional 3D work. If you think 1440 at 27" is too small for text & interface elements, then you need glasses or have other eyesight problems. A 4k 27" monitor running retina at an effective 1920x1080 resolution is absurdly large for text and interface elements.
I specifically got a Macbook because of the retina display. I also got a 4k external monitor and run it at 1920x1080. And it is absolute brilliant! True, you can get by with a 1440 display. But with 4k it is so much better and it does not cost much more. P.S. I have very bad eyesight...
The most amazing explanation on various display resolutions particularly for Macs.. i was searching for a lots of display option but this video clarified everything. THanks a lot Gary !! 😇
I don't agree with you. 4K display with mac is horrible to work with. Because using HiDPI you're stock with 1080p real-state (less canvas to work with). Instad, using 1440p display, you use te same canvas (real-state on screen, more windows, and apps at the same time) as the brand new Studio Display, or equal to previous 27 inch iMac non-Retina. So, i prefer a 1440p 144 Hz display over the 4K 60 Hz. Using 1440p I have more canvas to work (not with Retina quality), much better smooth moving windows, no issues with scaled. 4k is good to entertainment, but not to work with. 1440p Is a much better choice. BELIVE ME! I come with a 1080p 60Hz to a 1440p 144 Hz, and the difference IS MASIVE!
You mention "less canvas to work with." Canvas in which app? Most (all?) apps have an adjustable canvas. So you can set the zoom level to whatever you want. Since a 4K screen has twice as many pixels as a 2K (1440) screen, and you can adjust the zoom level of a "canvas" to anything, then you would always be better off with more pixel. The canvas can be the same size, but 4K gives you higher resolution inside that canvas.
@@macmost With 4K i don't have as much spece on the desktop, also in apps. Even MacOS advises you, You'll lose performance if choose some of the scaled resolutions, with 1440p everything runs natively (windows, canvas, desktop, 3D applications, everything). I'll choose 4K monitor if they are 120 Hz, but they are really expensive. 1440p 144 Hz are the sweet spot.
I'm not sure what the issue is here. I have just bought a 27 inch 1440p display to use with my Macbook Pro and it scales absolutely fine, everything is right-sized in relation to the screen. You're not going to mistake it for a retina display, for sure, a 4K panel would obviously be better in that respect but it's perfectly useable in terms of resolution for general use.
The problem is that for a lot of people viewing the interface at 2560x1440 in 27 inches is too small. If you have great eyesight (or wear glasses) and it looks good to you, then fine. But not everyone will be so lucky.
1440 users get by with the larger interface elements AND get more space. The way they do it is by buying ultra-wides: WQHD 3440x1440. Note: this is a 34”, not a 27”.
I have found that using a 34" WQHD ultrawide monitor with Magnet is a great way to overcome the one external monitor limitation on the MBA. At that size, using the native resolution of 3440 x 1440 isn't too small for me and text is crisp. I use a thunderbolt dock to connect my monitor and everything else to my base M1 MBA with one cable. Use a USB-C port with DisplayPort alt mode to get the best results. Magnet allows me to be super-efficient moving everything around with shortcut commands. Most often, I break the ultrawide into two screens as my main work area and use the MBA screen for Outlook or MS Teams. i don't even realize I have a monitor limitation.
@@attika70 It isn’t blurry at all. I am constantly dragging windows from my MBA screen to the external monitor and I don’t notice any issues in clarity. Using USB-C with “DisplayPort alt mode” to connect to my Thunderbolt dock lets me use the full 100 mhz settings on my Dell 34” WQHD monitor. Stay away from HDMI if you can help it. By the way, I am 59 and don’t use cheater glasses for viewing my computer. I am not trying to scale up to enlarge text.
@@markholle3450 do you by any chance use the monitors sharpness setting to make text sharper. A 1440p monitor would 100% be a bit blurry(only text), I am just not sure how bad it is. So if you dont have the monitor sharpening on and you can see that the text is blurry I assume your vision is not clear enough.
@@attika70 I have never adjusted any sharpness settings. Why would it be 100% blurry for text? I mainly use the monitor for accounting software, Teams, and the MS Suite which is primarily text. I regularly swap out the Mac for my 2023 HP Spectre. Windows can scale better than the Mac and I don’t notice a difference. My vision is good enough that I don’t need to blow up the screen to see read small text.
Wishing for 16:10 aspect ratio monitors with high-res resolutions to come to market with more workable screen real estate. Recently my "old" Apple Cinema HD 23 inch display (1920x1200 (16:10) instead of full HD 1920x1080 (16:9)) died after 12 years. The difference might sound insignificant but in reality it's not, you gain the real estate from the top menu bars for document or browser page viewing. Unfortunately 16:9 aspect ratio won the race and it's virtually impossible to find 16:10 monitor these days with a 4K-ish resolution and modern specs.
Very nicely done, Gary!!! Displays on computers are like speakers on stereo systems - they're the component you perceive most directly so they have the biggest impact on your experience. Getting a display that better matches your requirements is probably the single biggest thing someone can do to increase the quality of their system, and these characteristics (resolution, etc.) are important factors when making such a decision. It definitely pays to be informed of these important details!
What i learned from a hard experience, is buying a 27inch 4k, for my m1 mb pro. Windows is fine, on mac, text is ridiculously small. So i actually use 2k scaled. And it’s fine.
Still a little confused: I have a Mac Studio and the Studio Display: The Default resolution is 2560 x 1440. Why is this less than the default for 4K monitors which you enumerated in your (as usual) excellent presentation?
The option you see is likely referring to the image scaling, not the actual resolution of the monitor. The elements of the interface are presented at a size typical to 1440p, but using the extra physical resolution of the display to output the best image quality at that size.
The Studio Display is a 5K (not 4K) screen. Perfect retina resolution is 2560x1440 like you have it set. In this video I'm talking about 4K and 1440 (2K) screens.
This does not make sense. A mac is designed to be run on a 27" 5k display (ie. the Studio display). A 5k screen is essentially double the horizontal and double the vertical pixels of a 1440 screen, and a mac doubles the scale on 5k so that everything is the same size on a 5k screen vs a 1440 (like the old Thunderbolt display). So if you want your mac to look like its supposed to you need a 1440 screen, not a 4k screen. Maybe Gary likes the size on a 4k screen, but thats personal opinion. Its not how Apple intended it.
"A mac is designed to be run on a 27" 5k display" -- where did you read that? If so, then why are most Macs not using one (No MacBook has this, and not even the iMac). Having a 5K screen is great, but expensive. A 4K screen works well if you are on a normal budget. How anyone *likes* it is personal preferences, but Apple did not "intend it" like you suggest. A 1440 display has less than half the pixels of a 4K display.
I use 1280 * 800 as my preferred resolution in the 13 inch macbook pro where the default is 1400 * 900. What resolution should i set in my 27 inch 4k monitor for the similar experience
Always start with 1920x1080 with a 4K. That will always be best. Then adjust up or down from there if you want and see what you like. But I always stick with 1920x1080.
Thanks for the video, makes sense. FYI, I'm running 13.4.1 (Ventura) and noticed there is a toggle button to "Show all resolutions" in Display Preferences - HOW-TO - (1) Go to the Advanced settings and turn on "Show resolutions as list". (2) Then click Done to close the pop-up modal and click the "Show all resolutions" toggle button. This will give you access to more of the in-between resolutions (with option for "low resolution" and regular (OS scaled)). Hope this helps others in setting up their monitors and testing the various resolutions!
Great video!!! Would you recommend me one Monitor to be able to edit photo, watch film, but no so expensive? I am going to use it with a Mac Mini M2...
4k scaling uses heavily gpu. On macbooks with 4k extrrnal monitor you will have fan noise problem. 110 ppi or 220 ppi is the only eay to avoid this issue. 27 2k monitors 110 ppi fits that scale of apple chose. Macmost please test this scenario on macbooks. 2 monitors one 2k and the other 4k than analyze gpu overload and fan cycles.
@@macmost it would not be a problem if you do not use a GPU intensive program, but if you are rendering or using certain programs and of top of that you uses GPU to be scaling everything you will see a problem in performance. It even says it on the display setting when using scaling. I think it depends what programs you use. I have a 2021 MacBook Pro with a M1 Pro. But the architectural program that I use requieres a lot of GPU. So I think it will obviously will look better with 4K but I think you did not get into this info in the video.
Gary, your graphic showing the difference in pixel size between 1440 and 4k displays confuses me. It looks like the 4k display has 4 times the pixel count versus the 1440 display, but that is not the case because multiplying the pixel height and width of each display shows that the pixel count is double for the 4k display. It looks more like you superimposed a 1080 display grid over the 4k grid. Otherwise, great explanation. Love you videos!
I use two Apple Thunderbolt displays (1440) for my daily work. I've never had an issue with lack of screen real estate. Sure the fonts could be crisper, but for my daily work it's more than fine. I tried a 4K screen for a while but the quality was actually worse than the TB display in large part because the display was bigger. Pixels aren't everything. Plus: the TB displays come with webcam and speakers.
@@macmost The monitor is a ~ 7 year old Asus 1080p monitor and the cable was a Best Buy branded usb to HDMI. Going through a Microsoft Surface Dock 2 to a Microsoft Surface. When I had a Mac I used Display Port and so thought why not try it instead of HDMI and it's made a huge improvement. With HDMI I'd say >50% of the time I had to reboot to detect the display. Now works every time.
This was very educational. You always seem to understand what your viewers want to learn. Question for you: How can a viewer like myself understand if I can watch your videos in 1080 or 1440 with my MacBook Air or Pro or iMac, etc..?
Go to System Preferences > Displays and see what resolution your screen is set to. If the lower number is greater than 1440, you can view it (full screen) in 1440. If it's less, then you cannot.
Not sure what you are trying to do. Are you just trying to make the video bigger? Or, are you trying to view it at an ultra-precise resolution? TH-cam is showing you a streaming video with compressing anyway, so what is your goal here?
@@macmost My goal is to view the video in the best resolution possible. The choices range from 240, 480 and all the way up to 1080, 1440 and then 4K. as a mac user how would someone know if their macbook air/pro supports 1080, 1440 or up to 4k?
It doesn't matter for something like a video. The video will use all of the pixels in its rectangle on the screen no matter if you are set to 1080 or 1440. 1080 will make items like the Menu Bar and buttons look bigger, but the video will use all of the pixels regardless.
Thanks, Gary - great explanation. To me, the display is almost more important than things like extra RAM or SSD space. Obviously, it is what we look at all the time - and - any strain (too small or too big) totally crushes the user experience. I realize that many viewers think that bigger is better (32" - 34" - 40" etc) but personally, I have been settled for a long time now on 27" monitors which, in fact, negates my purchasing of the 24" iMac.
This video was helpful, but it convinces me I want a 1440 screen. The entire point of upgrading a 24" monitor to something larger is more real estate, not to get a retina version of the same real estate I already have... so I think the video can be misleading - size is subjective and 1080 virtual would look really big to me on a 27" given that it looks correct to me on a 24 inch.
Update: I bought a 4k 27". I can absolutely confirm I would prefer a 1440p screen than running my 4k at 1080p permanently. Luckily for me I'm a madman - and native 4k is my absolute favourite option. Stuff is tiny - but I have heaps of real estate as a result. And most programs have good zoom controls. I feel like I can breathe with 4k monitor at 4k. Certain tasks like reading a newspaper would definitely need to zoom the browser in, but for most things it's not an issue for me.
Just end up more confused than ever, it’s crazy making. One person says one thing and another the exact opposite, and there’s nowhere to go and compare the options. You just have to order and hope for the best. Clearly there’s no ideal solution except coughing up for an apple studio display which also has a 27” limit and could do with a refresh.
It really depends on your needs and budget. Most people don't need to spend more than $300 on a 4K screen. But others will want to go high-end with a 5K like the Apple Studio Display.
I use 27” 1440p displays at their native resolution, without scaling. I WANT increased screen real estate, NOT “retina” resolution, so I don’t care if the UI elements are small, though in fact at 27”, they’re really not too small for my eyes at all. In fact, HALF the time I’m using that external display at native resolution for a Windows VM or full-screen RDP session, anyway. 😂 I don’t WANT a 4K display for my purposes, because 1080p Retina is TOO LITTLE SCREEN REAL ESTATE for me. I need to look at code and fit a lot of it on the screen, not see it look smoother and have to scroll more.
Switching from Window, I have been using my Mac mini with a 3440* 1440p monitor for a few days and my eyes are popping out... using HiDPI mode gives me so narrow workspace for photo editing...And fonts are directly way too big ( The top menu + browser tab took like 1/6 of the height...) Never realized this problem until today. If i had watched this video...
Hi Sir, whenever I want to anything related to Apple or Mac you are my favorite TH-camr, your channel is the best among all Apple TH-camrs. As I found out from the video Display Post is better than HDMI? Have I understood correctly? Also I have a question I have a MacBook Air M1 (2020) and I just bought a monitor for it (Philips 276E8VJSB 27") It's a 4K 27" monitor, but, I have to connect it with my MacBook Air with HDMI cable. When I turn on the display setting (3840 x 2160 pixels 4K UHD) after connecting via , everything looks very small and is not scalable at all. This thing is troubling me a lot, please tell me any solution to this, I will be very grateful to you.
Sometimes it is better, other times it is the same. Depends on the screen and your settings. But at the very least it is the same so it is better to get a cheaper and smaller DisplayPort cable. Using a 3840x2160 screen AT 3840x2160 will give you everything very small. You should use it as 1920x1080. That gives you a perfect 2x "retina" display.
Thanks for the reply @@macmost This seems a bit strange to me, I already spend money to purchase 4K external display for Macbook Air M1 and now I have to use it in 2K resolution. isn't it sad?
Yep. I do most of my videos at 720p resolution because most of the people viewing them are seeing them in a small TH-cam rectangle in a web page. If I did them smaller, then you wouldn't easily be able to read the menu and button names, which would make for a bad tutorial. When I'm not in my demo account I'm either working at 1080p/4K or 1440p/5K.
I've got a Windows pc where I can just scale everything 150% and it looks great but my work mac looks really small and setting it to 1080 looks awful. This video explains while. I'll upgrade to a 4k monitor.
I always ran my 2013 iMac with 1440 even tho my second display was a 4K so they looked t the same. Now I run two 4k screens with my new 16" MacBook pro with the Max chip and don't use the laptop screen at all for home use.
2560x1440 is better for MacOS and iOS than 4K. MacOS and iOS scaling works the best with ~110ppi or ~218ppi. That's how it's designed for. 1440p is half of 5K which is best for 27" displays. Apple has designed macOS to work best with the following resolutions at the following sizes: At 21”: 4K At 24”: 4.5K At 27”: 5K At 32”: 6K
@Mateusz Graczyk As I responded to you elsewhere here, that other video is not Apple, it is someone else with an opinion. If you like 1440 fine, but others will find it way too small.
@@macmost I think I figured out what he's getting at. Steve Jobs said while back they need to decide what the best user experience is and then work backwards to the technology. Apple targets 110ppi or 218ppi because they think that's the best user experience. I can imagine them saying something like "let's start with 218ppi and we know we want a 27" display size, that means we need a resolution of 5120x2880."
To hit the correct pixel density on a Mac you need either a 27 inch Display @ 1440p (110 PPI / non-retina) or 27 inch Display @ 5k (220 PPI / retina). You can, in theory, use a 40inch monitor @ 4k (110 PPI, non-retina), but one would need a 20-inch 4k display for the right retina pixel density (same screen real state as 20-inch @ 1080).
Anything else will either look too big, too small or require suboptimal scaling techniques. So, IMO, 27inch @ 1440p is still the practical budget option for a Mac.
If you mean a 5K screen at 1440, then that does look good. That's what I use with the 5K Studio Display. But definitely not a "budget" option as 5K screens are pricey.
5k 27 inch displays are ideal. That's what I'm running as well. My main point though is that macOS is somewhat bad at non-fractional scaling and there aren't many 4k displays sitting near the 110 DPI or 220 DPI sweetspots. As a budget option I would take a 1440p / 27 inches display over a 4k / 27 inches or 4k / 32 inches display.
@@macmost Apple's 27" Thunderbolt display is 2560x1440. The next step in Apple's lineup is a 5K 5120x2880 Studio Display, which is double a 1440 display. Macs support 4K but it is not optimized for 4K.
@@brucestarr4438 Apple discontinued the Thunderbolt Display 6+ years ago. Macs work best at a variety of configurations and 4K @ 1080p is definitely one of them too.
hi sorry the off topic but i red some coments and you guys are better than me . i want to daisy chain 2x27 monitors on mac. but there are not many thunderbolt screens. is there somo options to do that with display ports but without dock or hub?
e found this asus PA27AC (have thunderbolt) and it is QHD. can you guys help-? because 4k with thunderbolt are expencive so i drop to QHD but less options.
What!! Sorry but some of your comments miss the mark. 1440P is not 1/2 the resolution of 4K but rather 1/2 the resolution of 5K, 5120x2880 vs 2560x1440. Apple chooses non-standard 5k and 4.5k resolutions for a reason. That reason is to reach a Retina resolution of ~220dpi and the native DPI of the 27in, 5k iMac is 218. I haven't specifically looked but I'm sure the 24in iMac will be close to the same. They get the sharp display by doubling/combining pixels as you mention to get that sharpness and it works very well. 110dpi is an appropriate non-Retina resolution and corresponds well to 1440p and keeps Apple hardware from breathing too hard. Hover over the default resolution under the "Scaled" display settings and what does it show? Exactly, 2560x1440 and Apple will work their display magic on this to get the sharp display. 220dpi and 110dpi are the only resolutions that Apple builds their software to natively work with. If you choose any of the other resolutions, you are warned that they could impact performance and they will for anyone who does a lot of video and possibly photo editing because the display software has to work harder to calculate and then display these non-Retina standard DPI resolutions. This is definitely true on the 5K iMacs and I've personally experienced it. Also, if you "Option - Click" on the "Scaled" button you will see a list of all possible resolutions if someone is looking for more granularity and choices. This is very useful since you can't just change the scaling like you can in Windows. Your point showing the problem with downscaling from a native 1440p to 1080p is valid but a nonsensical thing to do. If you plan on using 1080p then a native 1080p display will be sharper. The problem with choosing a display for a Mac product is complicated due to the way Apple's display subsystem works. 4K and other resolutions will certainly work but anything that uses a resolution very far away from 110 or 220dpi is going to strain the display performance. 6K, 5K, 4.5K and 1440p are the best current choices for maximum graphics performance and sharp display. Search for "Hunter King"'s video from 4 months ago regarding MAC resolutions for a good explanation of the issue and a link includes an article with a calculator so you can compare various sizes and resolutions for an appropriate DPI. Users performing simple tasks such as browsing the internet or streaming will probably not notice a problem but for the more demanding users it's important to know.
I never say that 1440 is half the resolution of 4K. It is half the number of pixels. 2560x1440=3,686,400 and 3840x1920=7,372,800. You get exactly twice the number of pixels with 4K as you do with 1440.
@@macmost Okay, fair enough on that point.
Comentario perfecto, perfecta información sobre las resoluciones y como trabajo apple.. correcto
@@macmost 4k is 3840x2160, not 3840x1920. So 1440p is not half the pixels of 2160p. Obedience!
One big thing is also that if you choose a 1440p size on a 4k display the Apple display subsystem first upscales the 4k to 5k and then uses that to get a 220 dpi. That is what is causing the decrease in performance. Shout out to Hunter King’s video about returning his 4k display who explained this very well.
I do not completely agree. MacOS works internally with 110ppi (non-Retina) or 220ppi (Retina). For Monitors with other resolutions scaling of the ui is necessary, which can lead to artifacts. So I personally prefer for 27" the 2k resolution (which matches the non-Retina resolution without scaling), it's more comfortable for my eyes while e.g. scrolling. The optimum would be 5k, which matches with 218ppi Retina-UI.
I am sorry, but this is a very bad advise! Anyone who wants to combine an Apple computer with non-apple screen has in fact a very limited number of choices. And as a first step, one should always look at what resolutions and physical dimensions Apple selects for their own screens. You will discover that for desktop computers, Apple has a very consistent policy with regard to DPI - that is the number of physicals pixel per inch - it is either 109 for non-retina and double of it - 218 dpi - for retina displays. Why is this important? Because unlike windows or linux, OSX doesn't employ UI scaling depending on resolution - all UI elements are designed to look and work best on either 109 DPI or 218 DPI in retina displays. One should notice, that windows is usually designed for 96 DPI - for instance, Apple has put full HD screen in 21' monitors for iMacs, while in Windows full HD is most suitable for 24 inch screens. There is actually only one combination, at present, that is common to Windows computers and was used by Apple - that is the 27 inch display with 1440p resolution. This combination was used in non-retina 27 inch iMacs - and, in my view, is the most suitable screen choice for anyone that cannot afford Apple screen at present.
So why not 27 inch 4k monitors? Because you simply waste screen real-estate. If you use Apple software (Logic or FinalCut) you will discover that the bigger screen doesn't offer you any advantage - all UI elements are huge. You will have less real estate than 24 inch new iMac which has more pixels. You will, in fact, have the same experience as working on 21 inch retina iMac... I would only recommend this combination if you have eyesight difficulties and normally bring magnifying glass to your computer.
This is a good video, but it misses some key points. About 1-2 months ago, I went through this exercise to get an external display for my MBA M2. I opted for high quality 1440P 27" Dell U2722DE screen. I had multiple 27" iMac's - 1440p and 5K and also had 1080P 27" displays, and I think, unless you go with a 5K display, 1440P seems like the best compromise. 4K display only gets you effective 1080P resolution which is way too low for 27" screen. I believe 1080P is acceptable for 22-24", but not for 27". Ever wonder why Apple's 27" screens are 5K? They are 5K to give people the 1440P effective HiDPI screen estate, not 1080P. I would rather have a slightly less sharp 1440P than 1080P HiDPI with significantly less screen to work.
Also, saying that 1440P is small on 27" is a bit of a stretch since that is what Studio Display is and all 5K iMac's - 4K native on 27" is small, but not 1440P.
Note that 1080p on a 4K is still 4K. You still see images, text and other things in 4K. It is just the interface is drawn at the SIZE of 1080p. You are still using every pixel.
@@macmost i don't know much about this stuff, but watching my mac mini m1 on my Asus 27" VG27AQ(1440p) is great. and it still looks great also on my 4K 28" AOC U28P2G6B. what ive observed differently was on system preferences>display, where AOC display i have to choose the option of a scaled display, while Asus display is at default display.
1440p 27" is small because is not retina like a 5K scaled at 1440p... And a 4K scaled at 1080p is way, way sharper than native 1440p.
when a 21" screen is considered small LOL
didn't you get any fuzzy/blurry text on the external screen?? (1440P)
This is some serious misinformation from a dude who does not understand that Mac does not support GPU scaling for non-integer scales.
Went into comments to say the same thing.
Can you please reference some source? I really want to understand this in more depths.
Also, are we talking about the masOS UI? Or application contents?
Eg, vector graphics should render to any res, right?) thanks
@@a0um google it, its been covered extensively.
true windows handles scaling way better than mac os
1440p looks fine. Apple's Studio Display is 5k (5120x2880) AKA 1440p*2, with double the pixel density for the "retina" effect. Otherwise, a regular 27" 1440p at 1x pixel density would look the same. The sizes of all the windows and text and apps would be the exact same, just non-retina.
Retina has much sharper text than 1440 non scaled!
The bottom line here is this is only really an issue if you need to scale to hd ui because native 1440 is too small for you. 4k will obviously still offer superior clarity compared to 1440p, but the fuzziness is specifically related to the hd scaling and not an inherent problem of the 1440p resolution.
My test shows that text is certainly more clear when operating at 1920x1080 rather than at 2560x1440 (2K, QHD) on a 4K monitor for the same font size. However, on a 27 inch monitor, operating at 1920 x 1080 results in the text still being too large - say for menus, sidebars, etc. It is more appropriate to run in this mode on a smaller monitor - say 24 inches. For example, the LG 24 inch monitor that is made for Mac operates in this mode.
problem is nobody (professional at least) gets a 4k display to have it in retina @HD, but to have a more space for UI. So 2k becomes the best solution since you have more room but the UI is still usable, while in 4k becomes really tiny especially on a 27.
My experience: 1440p on 32” (@ default) for over 5 years, “upgraded” to 4k for like a month. Then went back to 1440p. With a 32” monitor it really is the sweet spot for macs for me (adobe cc).
Because that's the scaling that MacOS prefers below 5K at 110 dpi. For appropriate scaling on a Mac 110dpi or 220 dpi (5K) is what Mac's prefer and scale the best with.
Most of the people who cant afford the extremely expensive 220ppi -s monitors, usually with 5k displays, the best option is a 110ppi solution, like 27 inch 2560x1440 or an ultrawide 34 inch 3440x1440 monitor. Another very beneficial feature is real 10 bit displays which has brilliant colours.
Problem is not with 1440p. It's with Apple as always. 1440p is a universal ratio, but Apple want you to invest in their own overpriced monitors. This could easily be achieved with a software tweak(pixel align with expense of gpu, which I don't mind). My 5 year old windows perfectly connect and scales with my 2 external 4k monitor. But for my brand new mac m1, I had to buy an adapter to support both monitors, and I use 4k in 1080p resolution with mac, because in 4k resolution text is too small and 2k scaling text is blurry. Look reddit everyone have same problem. Apple knows and ingore users. BetterDummy couldn't help. I might buy their paid version to solve this. Apple has good products but too greedy to allow 3rd party devices.
Buy an LG 5K monitor and it works perfect. Yes. Apple close pixel doubling when introducing retina displays. It has not changed, but as far as I know the have been some improvements in the scaling from 5K virtual to 4K real displays.
Lol a lot of windows programs have blurry scaling. Windows has same problems as Apple
@Евгений Мокрушин nope they are not. I'm using the window and Mac side by side every day. I'm a programmer.
@@googleuser211 yes they are. I’m periodically seeing programs with blurry scaling (windows)
@Евгений Мокрушин i don't care what you see. I'm sharing what I see. My 6 years old windows is super crisp when connected to my two 4k monitors, my new mac m1 doesn't even support dual desktop. I have to buy an adapter for it. And its in 1080p. Lol. Windows, no adapter, native support.
I used a 2560x1440 display with my late 2012 Mac mini. It worked great. At the time I bought it Apple was still selling their Thunderbolt 27-inch displays, which used the same resolution. Because my display was 25 inches instead of 27, the pixel density was better on my 25-inch display. My cheaper display was actually better for viewing content. I had to use DisplayPort. Using the normal HDMI at the time would only give me 1920x1080. 4K displays were still new at the time and they wouldn't have worked on my Mac mini anyway.
For a "2K" display, use BetterDisplay (or some such, as you suggest) to render a HiDPI 1920x1080 mode, which will not look blocky and jagged, but rather nice, as macOS will internally render 1920x1080 at 3840x2160 internally, then scale it down to the native 2560x1440 resolution of the display 60 times per second. And no, on modern Mac hardware, this is not a heavy lift. Do not directly display 1920x1080 to the 2560x1440 display without macOS scaling.
Though not a 100% perfectly analogous situation, I am doing this with my 2880x2560 28-inch LG DualUp display to find the right resolution and it looks _superb_, and I came to this config directly from a 27-inch iMac with 5K Retina display, to give perspective as to where I'm coming from. (I've detailed my process and experience in this in a blog post out there on the web.)
This is an easier and a better solution.
5:52 the main reason why I choose 1440p instead of 4k is that it is way better than 1k with just enough details (not too les) while having half the pixel count as the 4k screen. this allows game to run at native resolution while achieving more frames when compared with an 4k screen.
I've been using 27 inch 1440P display next to a 27 inch 4K display for years and to my eye, there is very little difference in the user experience. The 1440p screen doesn't look significantly worse. If I look closely, I can see that 4k is sharper, but the difference is never a distraction while working.
What do you use your Mac for though? Let us know. Coding? Writing? Graphics? Video editing?
@@macmost I swap between my work Windows laptop and my personal Mac. On my Mac I typically work with Photos - Pixelmator - Affinity & iMovie. The UI elements are scaled, but the photo & video content are shown at native resolutions on either screen.
For me, the best part of the video was the tip at the end, that a DisplayPort cable works better than HDMI. Thank you very much for explaining this, Gary! Based on what you said, I replaced my HDMI cable with a DisplayPort one and it's so much better! I use a 1440 monitor for Windows and love it. Occasionally I want to use it as a secondary display for my MacBook Air, and just have to make do with what I have. The smaller font size doesn't bother me too much, the upside is that the display has a lot of screen real estate in this native mode.
where are the improvement of using dp rather than hdmi?
I just said the same thing. Nobody else mentioned using a DisplayPort cable. I just want to buy a 27" 4K monitor for my MacBook Pro, and all the other videos were so confusing. I'm so glad that I saw this video before I bought a 1440 monitor.
@@iamdragonetta How has the 1440p monitor you got been for the M1 Pro? Is the text blurry?
Great informative video, if a bit biased :-) I do not agree with your statement, as I dont see a problem with 1440p on 27” monitors running non scaled native resolution, and not all who would use a 27” monitor with 1440p are gamers. As an architect there is a lot of software which makes use of 3d accelerated graphics, and this is still easier to run on lower resolutions like 1440p as opposed to 4K. It was Apple who introduced me to 2560x1440p resolution on their big 27” iMac back in 2009, and it was a great machine with a fantastic display, and Im not aware of anybody needing to scale the user interface in OSX back then, because text was hard to read or things looked fuzzy. Im actually not sure if this was a even possibly. And as others have also pointed out, Apples new Studio Display uses a 5k retina display where they in their adds run it at a 2x scaling effectively making it 1440p size with the exact same ratio as a native 1440p 27” display. If you do scale the image, I think you have a valid point, but it is a matter of taste, and I would encourage all to try a 27" monitor with 2560x1440p running it non scaled, before they use their hard earned cash for a 4k 27" monitor, if they only want to run a scaled image anyway. I work on a 27" 1440p monitor 8 hours a day, and I sit at a distance of about 75 cm (29 inches) from my eyes to my screen, and for me, everything looks nice and crisp and I have no problems with reading anything on screen or viewing anything in my CAD modelling software.
Great explanation and exactly my experience too. 27" at 1440p is a native scaling for Macs and looks perfect. Not at all too small as suggested in this video.
Which 1440p monitors would you recommend?
This is misleading and sensational. Mac OS has been made to be perfect on 1440p screens since 2009. You can still comfortably use a 1440p display without scaling if you don’t need retina.
Complaining about small UI at 1440p does not mean there “is a problem with 1440p”
Personally I love the native 1440p resolution on my 49 inch Samsung Odyssey Neo G9 (equivalent to two 27 inch 1440p displays side by side) in my Mac. The windows and menu bar are very comfortably sized for my needs.
Thanks, Gary. I have a Macbook Pro 16 (2019) that I view on a 27" 4K monitor. Not sure if what I do works with all Macs - but - I prefer to run at a resolution of 2304x1296 which I get to thru SYSTEM SETTINGS > DISPLAYS > hold down the OPTION key while clicking on SCALED. This brings up a Resolutions Menu to choose from which I turn on the All Resolutions button and then choose. Some resolutions are offered at "low resolution" - which I avoid. Also to prevent flickering I ensure my display is set to 60 Hz and not the other offering of 45-60 Hz variable.
@SteveWhitley - I did this moments ago with the dual AOC (U2790VQ) that I am sporting. AMAZING! Thank You for the tip!
Wow! this is a secret trick. no software needed! Thank You
Does this affect on the performance?
@@Parapsyglider - not sure - Gary would know this much better than I?
@@Parapsyglider So far it looks like performance has improved.
Watching this on two 1440 27" displays hooked up to an M1 MacMini - works perfectly fine without any problems .....
I was a bit bummed learning about this AFTER purchasing my Dell 4K monitor. As far as screen real estate, I like 1440p scaling, but after switching to the default 1080p I can definitely see the difference in clarity. Now, I wish I had just spent the extra $$ on the Studio Display. 🥺
Did you try using 1440p scaling on your 4K monitor? And if so, how did it go?
I remember seeing another video about this exact topic, and the guy that tried this really liked it-said it wasn't really quite "Retina" (since it's like 160-ish DPI vs. 200+ DPI for the Studio Display)-but still very sharp, noticeably more than on a true 1440p display).
For me, the Studio Display is a dream that's still a ways off, so I "settled" on an HP 27mq for now-I get the same exact UI scaling & space to work with as a Studio Display, great colors (I picked HP because I loved how the colors looked on my 1080p, HP 23cw--which is my second monitor now!), and slightly higher DPI than my old HP as well; so while text doesn't look "Retina" by any means, it's still nice and crisp, getting fonts just a bit closer to "Windows sharp." I've had this new dual-HP setup going for almost a month now, and just that small net gain of +13 extra pixels per inch in going from the old to the new as my "main" has really made for a nice improvement!
Now, I don't know what size 4K monitor you bought, but if it's a 27", that's a *+54 DPI* (!) improvement over my 1440p screen right there! (163 vs. 108.8 dots/pixels per inch) That's a night-and-day difference in clarity. From what I understand too, if you have one of the newer M1/M2 machines, you will only take a 1-3% performance hit, using one of these non-integer-scaled resolutions w/your 4K monitor.
@@rblossey I am currently using the 1440p resolution on my 27" 4K monitor. Although I like the look of the default resolution (1080p), there isn't enough screen real estate for my work productivity, so I settled on 1440p. It's not bad and with the M1 chip I doubt there is much of a performance hit (if any).
@@rblossey I have two monitors connected to my Mac Studio: an Apple Studio Display as a primary screen, and an LG 4K 27" Ultrafine as a secondary screen. First of all, because the Apple 5K uses 77% more pixels than a 4K display, it will ALWAYS look smoother, it just a physical fact. My Mac Studio is a fully maxed out (no pun intended ) M1 Max, so I have enough computing power to run the LG 4K at a scale that matches the 5K's native MacOS resolution as close as possible.
To give you an idea, the other day I was watching a 4K Bluray rip (i.e. full 4K quality, no compression unlike streaming), on the LG 4K while working on Adobe Illustrator with multiple tabs open, plus three browsers open with a multiplicity of tabs on the Apple Studio Display, and there was ZERO lag. For reference, I am using a DisplayPort 1.4 to USB-C cable... as HDMI is not a good idea when connecting a second monitor to a computer for several reasons, including HDCP issues.
@@rsr789 that’s amazing!
This is one reason why I’m excited about the new M2 Pro Mac Mini, cause now the multi-monitor limits-both in # of monitors you can (officially) run and in resolution-are effectively gone 😁 So I might for this in-between option instead of a Studio now when it comes time to upgrade.
@@rblossey Just as aside: I used to have that same LG 4K connected to my 2015 27" iMac, connected via miniDP to DisplayPort and I never had any major issues either, while using Illustrator, InDesign, and /or AutoCAD. So an Apple Silicon chip should be a cakewalk for several 4K and/or 5K monitors.
For those who are still wondering which monitor to buy for Mac then go for 5k monitors if you have budget or go for 4k monitors, your last option should be 2k monitors. On 4k monitor you can just scale down to 1080p for Retina like display quality or scale down to 1440p which looks a bit better than the native 1440p display. I’ve tested both 4k and 2k monitors on mac. I preferred 4k monitor over 2k. Currently I own Asus Proart Pa279CV 4K Monitor. I bought it for editing purpose, colors look very accurate out of the box as it has Delta E < 2. It’s mentioned as 10bit monitor but it’s actually 8bit + FRC. Anyway I am very happy with my decision.
May I ask you if working with text is fine with the Asus Proart Pa279CV 4K Monitor? I'm going to buy a Mac Mini M2 and I wanted to connect it to an Asus Proart Pa278CV 1440p Monitor, avoiding the 4K for the reason explained in this video. I do photo editing as well, but I will use it also for office and some graphics as well. And I really don't know which of the 2 monitors to buy. Thank you for your suggestions!
@@monica3484 I haven’t noticed any issues so far. Texts seem crisp. But ai recommend you to try both 1440p and 4k monitors before buying. Windows and Mac are different so you should try it on mac system.
I dont understand why is it better to buy 4k and scale down to 1440p instead of saving money and buying native 1440p, im considering the dell U2724DE that is 2560x1440 and 120hz, the 4k version is only 60hz, since mac works better 1440p I assumed its better to buy the 1440p version, right?
Mac Pro. 5.1.. Radeon 580 XFX MVP flashed... Running a 24" 1920 x 1200 + a Q29 5120 x 1440..
Lovin' it.
For programming, 1440p on 27" is great.
I am absolutely oppose that a high refresh rate isn't as important as resolution. Dragging a window around and scrolling webpages on a 32inch screen in 60 fps is something i am still not getting used to. I think gaming isn't the driver in the success of high fps smartphones, its the fluid navigation and i am pretty shure that high fps in office will common in some years, because people will recognise the discrepancy of their laptops and smartphones to their office screens.
I agree with your conclusion here-that 4K displays will usually offer a better experience for users than 1440 displays-but I don’t think that I quite agree with all of your reasoning.
Yes, a 4K will offer greater pixel density than a 1440p display, and that’s definitely a good thing. But I think that your illustration showing the 1440p’s “mismatched” pixel grid when it’s scaled might be ever so slightly misleading? For instance, you mention that text and photos will look sharper on a 4K display (and I agree with that), but I think that the reason that text and photos will look sharper is because you a 4K screen offers greater pixel density-not because of a “mismatched” pixel grid.
Take photos, for example. If you were to be looking at a 25 megapixel photo on your monitor, you wouldn’t be able to view that photo at 100% zoom (showing every pixel) whether you’re on a 1440p display or on a 4K display-so you’re going to have scaling either way.
Or take text as another example. Modern fonts are vector based, so they don’t have trouble scaling either. And if you might worry that the “mismatched” pixel grid might inherently make things look terrible, you might try this experiment:
1. On your 5K studio display, take a full-screen screenshot.
2. Then, using Photoshop or another image editor, scale that screenshot to 4K and then save that as a PNG (or another lossless image format).
3. Then open that PNG and view it at 100% scale. (At this point, the scaled screenshot should only fill a portion of your screen.)
At this point, the image will be smaller, and I’ll grant you that it won’t be as sharp as the original screenshot. But I’ll venture that the image won’t look inherently terrible-because when Photoshop or other image editors scale down high-res images, they’re are enough pixels to go around to calculate average pixel values when needed.
I bring up this experiment because-as far as I’m aware-macOS does its scaling in the same way (by rendering the screen at an internal virtual resolution that’s higher than the physical display, and then scaling that down before it’s sent to the monitor). And while that sort of scaling might ostensibly have to make compromises if the original image were to have, say, a line within the UI that were to be 1 physical pixel wide, I’m not aware of macOS having any UI elements that are only 1 physical pixel wide.
I love your videos, Gary, my slight disagreement with some of your reasoning here doesn’t change that. And I definitely agree with you that Mac folks will be waaay better off with a 4K display than a 1440p display; I just happen to feel that way because of the difference in pixel densities rather than because of concerns about a “mismatched” pixel grid.
PS If by any chance you had wanted to, Gary, if you were to potentially update the video’s title from referring to “1440” to “1440p”, my Spidey-sense is that the latter, being more specific, might offer slightly better SEO?
I guess my point is when someone tries to use a 1440p screen at a size other than 1440p or 720p. Most find the first too small and the second too large. So they end up going in-between. If neither 1440p or 720p work for you with a 27-inch screen, then getting a 1440 27-inch was a bad idea and a 4K would have been better because 1080p on a 4K is right in-between 1440p and 720p on a similar-sized 1440 screen.
Hahaha, that's a really long and careful way of expressing that he doesn't have any idea of how things are handled at OS level.
I've been using a Dell 1440p 27" screen for 3 years with the "default" setting and it looks perfect. I would love 5K of course but the damned things cost too much and there's not much to choose from. So I don't know why you say 1440 makes everything too small. It absolutely doesn't, at least not on my screen (Dell U2719DC).
The video explains the resolutions very well and the part about using odd resolutions on displays. However the biggest omission is the relationship between the physical size of the display and the resolution (i.e pixel density). It's true that text and UI elements on a 1440p display can be too small too view, but only if you use a smaller display (And that would apply to any resolution). 1440p works very well on a 27inch and above (I have a 25inch 1440p monitor and it's borderline, but I solved it buy moving the monitor a bit closer to me, but should have gone for a 27inch instead.). That also brings in the another factor, which is the distance at which the monitor is placed from the user.
Finally to add, 1440P works fine on Mac, Windows and Linux, I use the same 25inch 1440P display on all of them and never had any issue (unless you start scaling the display)
I have an MBP Retina Late 2012 and just got a used DELL U2518D 25" 1440p display and with mDP to DP cable I get 1440p in 59,98hz which works great but I'm considering getting SwitchResX to scale the UI a bit larger. But it doesn't seem to work fully on Catalina. I got a "application unsupported" message. Which screen modifier apps do you use and how did you set it up?
I tried a 27" 1440p display before but thought the DPI was too bad so I wanted an 24" 1440p display but got this 25" used for cheap. I don't think Intel MBP 2012 is strong enough for 4K 60fps so there's no way I would get 4K for this one. But whenever I get a Apple Silicon Mac I would get a 4K display.
I was actually working on this just the other day. I learned that actually your Mac doesn't expose high DPI mode on 1440p by default. The way to force it is actually to rotate the screen and then rotate it back. Then you get an option to scale in high DPI mode at 720.
One thing I was thinking about during the video was ... can't the mac be smart enough to turn off a few columns on the side or rows at the top in order to make it scale perfectly at any resolution?
write to Apple support about scaling issues!
That's one of the things you can accomplish with SwitchResX. If I need to record a tutorial with my MacBook which is 16:10, I use SwitchResX to force it into 16:9 and pixels on the top and bottom are not used.
@@macmost or use BetterDisplay which does similar and can override default display resolution
@@macmost but are black bars really worth it?
@@IrrationalDelusion For recording tutorials? Yes, since I want to make the videos in 16:9. But I would never do actual work using this configuration.
1080p does not offer enough real estate for me so I scale my 4K 27" to 1440p. Something I have noticed is that Windows scaling at 150% seems superior to that of MacOS. (but it took Windows many years to get it right). Scaling at 200% of course works just as well in both.
How do the Mac OS fonts look when you scale @ 1440p on your 4K screen? Really wondering just how big of a difference 163 DPI (4K) vs. 208 DPI (5K) really makes for that! ("half-Retina" vs. actual Retina, I guess you could say?) And while I have watched some videos on the topic, even screenshots of the monitors don't really capture the difference (empirically, yes; pixel-peeping, yes; overall user experience...definitely not!).
By the way, I think Windows having superior scaling @ 150% might have something to do with the way Microsoft designs their fonts! Historically they've always aimed for "sharpness" and clarity vs. "character" and "faithfulness" to print fonts (as Apple has done before, at least before the age of Retina). I could be wrong about this, but it wouldn't surprise me at all if, in these sub-Retina ranges, Windows would have a slight leg up here (at 5K though, it's a different story! the gloves come off at that point 😉).
@@rblossey Interesting enough, I booted my Mac (I use Windows 95% of the time) and updated to whatever the latest OS is and the scaling of text looks on par with Windows now. There is definitely a difference in scaling between the OS release last year and the release this year.
@@alexmm01 that’s great ! Good news for me too, since I might be making the jump to 4K/27” soon ;)
Apple seems to be making some improvements to the font rendering again over the last few years. I don’t know exactly how they’re doing it, but they definitely got a lot of negative feedback over how badly the fonts were rendering on non-Retina displays over the last 5 years or so (I seem to remember Mojave, or the one that came right before it being the worst offender, and people using workarounds to get the fonts back to an “acceptable” appearance). I was a little worried about this a few months ago when I got the Mac Mini, but it wound up looking pretty good (not perfect, but good) with my 1080p, 24” display, and it looks even better now with my 1440p, 27” display (net gain of +13 PPI, but even that is noticeable!). It’s definitely good enough to get me through the long wait/saving period for the studio display ;)
Gary, you really do go the extra mile with your content.
Translating the technical details in to simple language and visuals helps to cover a wide demographic of viewers. It’s great to see.
Thanks for another great video!
I agree! I've been using a Mac for about two years and this topic was still a mystery to me a few months ago. Videos like this offer great value.
I agree. Can confirm that has helped unconfuse myself with my current display issues
Great video...but why do Apple not solve this issue in their operating system? Windows handles the same problem in a much better way by allowing you to scale the display up whilst still maintaining native resolution, no third party solution required.
Even Linux distros handles this better than Apple. UI is not Linux strongest suit, and still does better.
apple wants you to buy their overpriced Monitors, thats why
I use my 4K display at native resolution so 4x 1080p canvases, and I find it’s perfect. I can’t imagine anyone finding 1440p at 27” too small, that’s exactly what iMac had before going 5k. It’s the perfect scaling.
Wait until your eyes get a little older and you'll see.
@@macmost LOL! I get the feeling Boomers aren't living in the heads of marketers, anymore. Oh how I'd have loved all the tiny screens and tiny fonts as a 60 yr old! Any idea why menus and so many windows have fixed font sizes that can't be changed without altering resolutions? There are many resolutions that would suit different tasks if only I could adjust font sizes of the system information.
After a decade of being really happy with my 27-inch iMac, I finally upgraded to the M1 mini.
I connected it via hdmi to the 54-inch 4k TV I already owned,
The results are perfect.
Most of these TV's these days are better than many computer monitors, and I for one have to say, it's about dang time. Especially if you have the real estate to display the real estate. 🙂
To expand on font fuzziness, here’s what Apple officially does with retina resolutions:
Macbook Air 13.3’ default resolution is HIDPI 1440x900 which is probably 2880x1800 resolution of fonts and media. Native resolution of Air 13.3’ is 2560x1600, which is less. So Apple officially uses HIDPI resolutions with downscaling. It should have been set to HIDPI 1280x800 to perfectly align the pixels, maybe it’s not that important.
Meaning that we must preserve the aspect ratio by using custom options in order to achieve beautifully size adjusted mac os experience
Most important is what you think, subjectively, about how things look on that screen at that setting. If 1440x900 looks OK to you, then that's fine.
FYI, I'm using a MacBook Air right now, at 1280x832 (this model has 1664 vertical).
I will save this tutorial so that when I upgrade my external display I'll meet all of the qualifications for the better screen output. Thank you so very much
Interesting! So if anything to do with image editing and text then 4K is good. BUT... what to buy when one is using a MBPro M1 Max for Blender / Cinema 4d? 1440 is better option right? Thank you.
Why would you want fewer pixels when doing graphics work? Seems like you would want more. You already have a MacBook Pro with a great screen. But if you want something additional and you are doing that kind of work, then I would imagine you'd want a 5K screen even, not to go all the way down to a 2K one.
Thanks for this video. As a mac and pc user I am torn between a 1440p and 4k display. I’m more confident on now getting the 4k display for future proofing as 4k will become the new standard soon with so many powerful GPUs coming out in the next year or two and now due to your explanation for mac users. Thanks!
@@eplugplay8409 I recently tried a dell 27 inch 4k monitor with MacBook pro. It looks great at 1440p as recommended here. I need a 34 inch so will try a 34 inch at 1440p and see if i am comfortable with the display
I use a 4K 32 inch now with my mac mini, the ui is now 1080P and i like it
I have had the 27" Apple Thunderbolt display with my Mac mini for like 3 years and the resolution is great, I love how much space I have for my windows and text is just the right size.
This is great. I have been a Mac user for a long time using a HD Dell screen. It has worked well for what I use it for. Now I want to upgrade to a 27” screen.
My m1 mini is the main 'box' for my 65" 4K tv, and I absolutely love it. It is great for computer tasks, and 4k video. (And I set my display for the larger 'virtual' pixels as well, and it looks great w/ texts).
I had my doubts about how the scaling would work, but the day I brought my M1 Mac Mini home (my first Mac in 29 years! 😲), the very first thing I did was hook it up to my 55" 4K TV...what an experience that was! 😁
It's not something I do much now-I have a more "specialized" dual-HP monitor setup and a big desk that works with both my Mac mini & "mini" HP ProDesk-but I'm considering getting a 30-ft HDMI cable + a cheap switcher just so I can bring that back whenever I feel like it :) It really looks great.
How far away from your head is the 65"?
Excellent as always, Gary. For almost a year I had my M1 Mac Mini running on a 4K Samsung monitor. It looked good but not great. Finally splurged and bought the 5K Mac Studio Display and it looks stunning using the Default settings. You explained why.
What matters most is _Aspect Ratio._ The two screens you named are both 16x9 (called HD). However, most iMacs and MacBooks have screens with a 16x10 (actually 8x5) aspect ratio. You *_cannot_* mix these. If you do, moving something from one screen to another will cause it to balloon up or squish down as you drag it between the screens. Pixel depth is important but dragging windows between the two monitors you mentioned will be fine because they are both 16x9. But, do not "mix and match" different aspect ratios. I have "fixed" this problem for friends who bought a second monitor with the wrong aspect ratio. I had to admonish them with, _"You didn't call me first before you just made a blind computer purchase, did you?"_
Not sure what you mean. If you are using two screens, there is nothing wrong with having different ratios. I use one screen horizontal and another vertical, in fact. That's an extreme difference. Moving icons or windows works perfectly fine.
A lot of people says You have to avoid 4K screens but I personally prefer the look You get with 4K @ 1080p... It's just more comfortable for me
Thank you so much, i faced the same issue with my new 1440 display, as I didn't have the budget to go up to 4k, but then I installed the Betterdisplay, and notched down my res to 1152 with HiDPi and now the screen looks exactly how I wanted it.
You explained very well, thumbs up! I have a 2k 32inch 165hz LG display. I used HDMI cable and it sucked, I now using USB-C to DP. Running at 2k with 144hz! 🎉😊😊
Great video. Although it didn't talk about the issue that for a lot of people a 27inch 4k display scaled to 1080p or 4k is too big or small respectively.
I think that has to deal more with DPI being too high or not high enough. Its confusing because it not only has to deal with screen size and resolution but also DPI which can be different from different manufactures even when both are 4k at 27in for example... But I also think Apple designed everything to be confusing and have limited real life options outside of their own ecosystem...on purpose.
For the "real" advice (if you have the money) - just research whatever manufacture Apple is using to produce their panels...and buy that identical item from the manufacture's brand instead. To be honest...it'll still be expensive...but you'll get the nearly the same experience as you would with the Apple display you researched...since same manufacture and all...and especially if its for a 2nd monitor...money saved is money saved in this economy...
And as for gaming...the best advice is just build a dedicated PC with NVIDIA latest and greatest, and have one of those 0ms latency large OLED 4K screens. I have 5700XT i9 iMac with full on Bootcamp...the last Apple computer to support Bootcamp...which should have the best compatibility with Windows gaming. And its great...for the most part...but there are still certain things I wish I had...such as being able to update the 5700XT with a non-bootcamp driver...and also a Nvidia graphics card because a lottttt of games have options where only Nvidia has boost options to further increase frame rate and lower latency...and not available on any AMD graphics card...and most importantly...not having to shut down and save my work each time I want to take a game break...(but thats probably for the better because I'm gaming less now)
For example...in Valorant...I can only get ~300fps (no complaints for real life usage)...but I know 5700XT is capable of nearly 500~600 fps if I was just allowed to update the driver to a non-bootcamp driver...which I don't think is possible because there were some small changes made to the iMac version of the 5700XT that is not in the Windows/Windows version of the 5700XT. (But with NVIDIA's latest/greatest with the boost on...I'm seeing people get nearly 1000fps)...
But if you're buying a Mac...you're probably not worried about making it into Esports...but yeah...for absolutely top tier competitive gaming...building a dedicated Windows PC is a must...
I went and bought a displayport to USB C for my 2020 MBP and replaced that HDMI....and it is like night and day!!!....Thanks for the info Gary!!.......
Well Apple external displays are 5120x2880 which is exactly 2x 1440p, with that wouldn't 1440p display be the next best thing after 5K with just halved resolution instead of scaling everything to 4K? I don't understand the arguments in this video.
I have 2 1440 25" from dell. And they are not bad at all. Under Windows you are able to scale the font and interface to allmost any in fine increments. Now I bought an m1 Mac mini and I'm still shocked there is now way under macOS to at least scale the fonts systemwide.
Guess there are two ways of locking at it: MacOs sucks in that regard or as apple would say "you have the wrong displays". Don't know what I will doe. I'm not going back to windows! For now I use some reading glasses in the native apps. They are the worst. Adobe lets you tweet to somehow usable.
Thank you for very detailed and informative video. Unfortunately I have to disagree with you. 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x settings is perfectly acceptable working space for many apps and industries. If you want higher fidelity than something Apple or LG 27inch 5120-by-2880px at 2x is much nicer but also a lot more expensive. The important bit missing form your video is the screen physical dimensions. 27 inch screen with 3840-by-2160px (4k) at 2x is nice sharp but not enough real space for many applications and industries. I would not recommend this to everyone. It depends what you need for the job. 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x settings could be better suited than 3840-by-2160px (4k) at 2x for many. Also 27inch with 2560-by-440px at 1x are really great value and you save a lot if you need two or even four screens for your work.
For some people, yes, 1440 on a 4K is fine. For others it the interface items are too small and some things look "fuzzy." Depends on the person and the screen a bit too. I think 1080 on a 4K at 27 inches is better.
Nah 2x is better in every instance
Hey tami, how about an 32 inch 4k monitor?
Agree
27” 4K is too tiny, you need to scale up otherwise you can’t see. By scaling your GPU has to work hard and effect your battery
The biggest problem with Macs is that there is no system font scaling. I have a nice 32 inch 4K display with the Looks like resolution set to 2560x1440 (because I need as much real estate as possible on the screen for apps like Intellij/Pycharm IDEs, terminals, text editors, etc.), yet fonts are too small overall.
Fortunately, I can increase both the UI and editor font sizes in the IDE, Visual Studio Code, and Sublime text (apps I use most often), but Finder (especially the path at the bottom), all system dialogs and menus, the native apps like Numbers, Pages, Podcasts, etc. have so small fonts that, even though my eyesight is okay, I find it very hard to work in these apps, so I just avoid them. Same with Safari - I would love to use Safari, but the text in the tabs is too small, so I use Firefox with the layout.css.devPixelsPerPx option set to 2.8. Tried Chrome, but didn't find a way to adjust the UI font size.
To me, it looks like Macs are made to look good on laptop screens with resolution set to smth like 1400x900, with the font sizes hard-coded. But many people connect their macs to external monitors (Mac mini and 32" 4K Dell in my case) and expect to get the same real estate with nicely readable fonts they had on Linux (my case) or Windows.
Yes, completely agree. For tasks like software development, 900 or 1080 pixels in the vertical dimension is not very comfortable, 1440 is much better.
You can simply use CMD +/- (Mac) or CTRL +/- (Windows) to zoom in/out in your browser window to enlarge or decrease text size, but it will size the rest of the page with it at the same time, though it might help for your situation.
Have you considered scaling @ 1152p (Hi-DPI) or 1200p (Hi-DPI), and then maybe just adding one more monitor for the extra real estate? (maybe a vertical one?) With 4K to work with, all these scaled resolutions should look pretty good. One of those two settings should get close (if not match) the new 24-inch iMac scaling, which is 4.5K (not 5K like the Studio Display, or the previous 27" Intel iMac). The system text gets a little more readable, and the screen real estate lost, I think, could easily be made up for with one extra monitor (and probably expanded!). I'm convinced there'd be a good compromise there somewhere....
I'm in the same situation as you, I'm using a 27" 1440p monitor connected to my mac and the text is too small at native resolution and blurry at scaled 1080p resolution. The eye exam went well, so I don't understand how people don't notice this defect. For my sanity I really think I'll sell the Macbook air M1 for a Thinkpad with Linux
not correct. 27" 1440p is the original resolution for the Apple Cinema Display and should be the default for 27" non retina displays.
Actually, the original Apple Cinema Display was 1600×1024 (1999). There were many models over the years with different native resolutions, but none at 1440p until the 2008 "LED Cinema Display 27-Inch." Then the Apple Thunderbolt Display (2011) was also 1440p. So the last time Apple came out with a new 1440p screen was 13 years ago. The smaller MacBook Air is 2560x1664, but that's at 13 inches diagonal.
@@macmost true (I did not know about the Cinema Display you mentioned, my mistake). The 30" Cinema Display (2004) was 16:10, hence 2560x1600 and that was perfect scaling for a 16:9 2560x1440 for the LED CD (2008). Nonetheless modern 27" macs are based on 1440p resolution, as 5K is a 1440p at 200%. Taking that into consideration 4K screens are not native in MacOS for the usual display size at 27 and 32 inches. Plenty of reviews already discussed this topic. I wouldn't care about any of this... modern M based macs are capable of running anything.
My understanding here is that a 4k monitor with 1440p scaling gives bad picture - rather, scaling it to 1080p scaling gives it a "native" resolution look whilst reaping the benefits of high pixel density of 4k.
Now, 4k's pixel density aside, a 1440p monitor should give good picture if scaling were 720p or 1440p,right?
Yes, but scaling to 720p makes the interface elements pretty big, and 1440 makes them pretty small.
@@macmost ah yes. Makes sense . Thanks!
Sorry but this video is so misleading. 1440 is hardly a bad resolution for macs, in fact it's the perfect native 1:1 resolution for a 27" screen and a great balance between screen real estate, readability and affordability. There is no need to run at retina level dpi, it's nice sure, but not required on a mac or even critical to do so. Have been using a 1440 display on various macs for over a decade in professional 3D work. If you think 1440 at 27" is too small for text & interface elements, then you need glasses or have other eyesight problems. A 4k 27" monitor running retina at an effective 1920x1080 resolution is absurdly large for text and interface elements.
I specifically got a Macbook because of the retina display.
I also got a 4k external monitor and run it at 1920x1080. And it is absolute brilliant!
True, you can get by with a 1440 display. But with 4k it is so much better and it does not cost much more.
P.S. I have very bad eyesight...
The most amazing explanation on various display resolutions particularly for Macs.. i was searching for a lots of display option but this video clarified everything. THanks a lot Gary !! 😇
I don't agree with you. 4K display with mac is horrible to work with. Because using HiDPI you're stock with 1080p real-state (less canvas to work with). Instad, using 1440p display, you use te same canvas (real-state on screen, more windows, and apps at the same time) as the brand new Studio Display, or equal to previous 27 inch iMac non-Retina.
So, i prefer a 1440p 144 Hz display over the 4K 60 Hz.
Using 1440p I have more canvas to work (not with Retina quality), much better smooth moving windows, no issues with scaled.
4k is good to entertainment, but not to work with. 1440p Is a much better choice. BELIVE ME! I come with a 1080p 60Hz to a 1440p 144 Hz, and the difference IS MASIVE!
You mention "less canvas to work with." Canvas in which app? Most (all?) apps have an adjustable canvas. So you can set the zoom level to whatever you want. Since a 4K screen has twice as many pixels as a 2K (1440) screen, and you can adjust the zoom level of a "canvas" to anything, then you would always be better off with more pixel. The canvas can be the same size, but 4K gives you higher resolution inside that canvas.
@@macmost With 4K i don't have as much spece on the desktop, also in apps. Even MacOS advises you, You'll lose performance if choose some of the scaled resolutions, with 1440p everything runs natively (windows, canvas, desktop, 3D applications, everything).
I'll choose 4K monitor if they are 120 Hz, but they are really expensive.
1440p 144 Hz are the sweet spot.
Totally agree, same experience I had !
I'm not sure what the issue is here. I have just bought a 27 inch 1440p display to use with my Macbook Pro and it scales absolutely fine, everything is right-sized in relation to the screen. You're not going to mistake it for a retina display, for sure, a 4K panel would obviously be better in that respect but it's perfectly useable in terms of resolution for general use.
The problem is that for a lot of people viewing the interface at 2560x1440 in 27 inches is too small. If you have great eyesight (or wear glasses) and it looks good to you, then fine. But not everyone will be so lucky.
1440 users get by with the larger interface elements AND get more space. The way they do it is by buying ultra-wides: WQHD 3440x1440. Note: this is a 34”, not a 27”.
I have found that using a 34" WQHD ultrawide monitor with Magnet is a great way to overcome the one external monitor limitation on the MBA. At that size, using the native resolution of 3440 x 1440 isn't too small for me and text is crisp. I use a thunderbolt dock to connect my monitor and everything else to my base M1 MBA with one cable. Use a USB-C port with DisplayPort alt mode to get the best results. Magnet allows me to be super-efficient moving everything around with shortcut commands. Most often, I break the ultrawide into two screens as my main work area and use the MBA screen for Outlook or MS Teams. i don't even realize I have a monitor limitation.
Yeah but you forgot to mention the most important part. Is your monitor blurry or not?
@@attika70 It isn’t blurry at all. I am constantly dragging windows from my MBA screen to the external monitor and I don’t notice any issues in clarity. Using USB-C with “DisplayPort alt mode” to connect to my Thunderbolt dock lets me use the full 100 mhz settings on my Dell 34” WQHD monitor. Stay away from HDMI if you can help it.
By the way, I am 59 and don’t use cheater glasses for viewing my computer. I am not trying to scale up to enlarge text.
@@markholle3450 do you by any chance use the monitors sharpness setting to make text sharper. A 1440p monitor would 100% be a bit blurry(only text), I am just not sure how bad it is. So if you dont have the monitor sharpening on and you can see that the text is blurry I assume your vision is not clear enough.
@@attika70 I have never adjusted any sharpness settings. Why would it be 100% blurry for text? I mainly use the monitor for accounting software, Teams, and the MS Suite which is primarily text. I regularly swap out the Mac for my 2023 HP Spectre. Windows can scale better than the Mac and I don’t notice a difference. My vision is good enough that I don’t need to blow up the screen to see read small text.
@@markholle3450 because macos using scaling resolution so anything with less then 218PPI is blurry by nature
Wishing for 16:10 aspect ratio monitors with high-res resolutions to come to market with more workable screen real estate.
Recently my "old" Apple Cinema HD 23 inch display (1920x1200 (16:10) instead of full HD 1920x1080 (16:9)) died after 12 years.
The difference might sound insignificant but in reality it's not, you gain the real estate from the top menu bars for document or browser page viewing. Unfortunately 16:9 aspect ratio won the race and it's virtually impossible to find 16:10 monitor these days with a 4K-ish resolution and modern specs.
I know what you mean. The Dock works better in 16:10 than 16:9. Small difference makes a big difference.
Very nicely done, Gary!!! Displays on computers are like speakers on stereo systems - they're the component you perceive most directly so they have the biggest impact on your experience. Getting a display that better matches your requirements is probably the single biggest thing someone can do to increase the quality of their system, and these characteristics (resolution, etc.) are important factors when making such a decision. It definitely pays to be informed of these important details!
A very useful and informative video tutorial today! Great information given today with great clarity! Thank you, Gary! 👏🏻❤️
What i learned from a hard experience, is buying a 27inch 4k, for my m1 mb pro. Windows is fine, on mac, text is ridiculously small. So i actually use 2k scaled. And it’s fine.
I do day trading, and use a 43” 4K/UHD monitor. Text is small… it’s a good thing you can easily change the font size. 😎👍🏽
Yes, you should use a 4K screen as 1920x1080. You still get 4K resolution, just the interface elements are normal sized.
@@macmost - A 4K monitor, at full resolution, with the font size increased for readability… works perfectly for me. 👍🏽😎
Still a little confused: I have a Mac Studio and the Studio Display: The Default resolution is 2560 x 1440. Why is this less than the default for 4K monitors which you enumerated in your (as usual) excellent presentation?
The option you see is likely referring to the image scaling, not the actual resolution of the monitor. The elements of the interface are presented at a size typical to 1440p, but using the extra physical resolution of the display to output the best image quality at that size.
The Studio Display is a 5K (not 4K) screen. Perfect retina resolution is 2560x1440 like you have it set. In this video I'm talking about 4K and 1440 (2K) screens.
"2560 x 1440" or "2560 x 1440 (HiDPI)" ? There is a difference!
@@rblossey Right. A 1440 screen would give you 2560x1440. A 5K screen would give you 2560x1440 HiDPI. Huge difference.
This does not make sense. A mac is designed to be run on a 27" 5k display (ie. the Studio display). A 5k screen is essentially double the horizontal and double the vertical pixels of a 1440 screen, and a mac doubles the scale on 5k so that everything is the same size on a 5k screen vs a 1440 (like the old Thunderbolt display). So if you want your mac to look like its supposed to you need a 1440 screen, not a 4k screen. Maybe Gary likes the size on a 4k screen, but thats personal opinion. Its not how Apple intended it.
"A mac is designed to be run on a 27" 5k display" -- where did you read that? If so, then why are most Macs not using one (No MacBook has this, and not even the iMac). Having a 5K screen is great, but expensive. A 4K screen works well if you are on a normal budget. How anyone *likes* it is personal preferences, but Apple did not "intend it" like you suggest. A 1440 display has less than half the pixels of a 4K display.
I use 1280 * 800 as my preferred resolution in the 13 inch macbook pro where the default is 1400 * 900.
What resolution should i set in my 27 inch 4k monitor for the similar experience
Always start with 1920x1080 with a 4K. That will always be best. Then adjust up or down from there if you want and see what you like. But I always stick with 1920x1080.
@@macmost thank you
Thanks for the video, makes sense. FYI, I'm running 13.4.1 (Ventura) and noticed there is a toggle button to "Show all resolutions" in Display Preferences - HOW-TO - (1) Go to the Advanced settings and turn on "Show resolutions as list". (2) Then click Done to close the pop-up modal and click the "Show all resolutions" toggle button. This will give you access to more of the in-between resolutions (with option for "low resolution" and regular (OS scaled)). Hope this helps others in setting up their monitors and testing the various resolutions!
Great video!!! Would you recommend me one Monitor to be able to edit photo, watch film, but no so expensive? I am going to use it with a Mac Mini M2...
macmost.com/recommendations
4k scaling uses heavily gpu. On macbooks with 4k extrrnal monitor you will have fan noise problem. 110 ppi or 220 ppi is the only eay to avoid this issue. 27 2k monitors 110 ppi fits that scale of apple chose. Macmost please test this scenario on macbooks. 2 monitors one 2k and the other 4k than analyze gpu overload and fan cycles.
What model MacBook? Only daily recent shouldn't have a problem. M1/M2 shouldn't be any problem at all.
Thanks for the video. I use an Apple Thunderbolt Display which is 110 dpi and it looks great. Not as good as a Apple 5K display but still very good.
4k scaling isn’t an issue because it’s only 2x 1080p. Fractional scaling effects gpu tho because it’s more computationally intensive.
@@macmost it would not be a problem if you do not use a GPU intensive program, but if you are rendering or using certain programs and of top of that you uses GPU to be scaling everything you will see a problem in performance. It even says it on the display setting when using scaling. I think it depends what programs you use. I have a 2021 MacBook Pro with a M1 Pro. But the architectural program that I use requieres a lot of GPU. So I think it will obviously will look better with 4K but I think you did not get into this info in the video.
@@dafp3479 Have you tried it? I really don't think you will have an issue.
Gary, your graphic showing the difference in pixel size between 1440 and 4k displays confuses me. It looks like the 4k display has 4 times the pixel count versus the 1440 display, but that is not the case because multiplying the pixel height and width of each display shows that the pixel count is double for the 4k display. It looks more like you superimposed a 1080 display grid over the 4k grid. Otherwise, great explanation. Love you videos!
I use two Apple Thunderbolt displays (1440) for my daily work. I've never had an issue with lack of screen real estate. Sure the fonts could be crisper, but for my daily work it's more than fine. I tried a 4K screen for a while but the quality was actually worse than the TB display in large part because the display was bigger. Pixels aren't everything. Plus: the TB displays come with webcam and speakers.
I just switched the cable from my dock to the monitor from USB to HDMI to a USB to Display Port. All my problems went away! Glad you brought that up.
Cool! Would love to know, for future reference, which model display you are using and which HDMI adapter you had.
@@macmost The monitor is a ~ 7 year old Asus 1080p monitor and the cable was a Best Buy branded usb to HDMI. Going through a Microsoft Surface Dock 2 to a Microsoft Surface. When I had a Mac I used Display Port and so thought why not try it instead of HDMI and it's made a huge improvement. With HDMI I'd say >50% of the time I had to reboot to detect the display. Now works every time.
@@ccroy2001 Thanks!
This was very educational. You always seem to understand what your viewers want to learn.
Question for you: How can a viewer like myself understand if I can watch your videos in
1080 or 1440 with my MacBook Air or Pro or iMac, etc..?
Go to System Preferences > Displays and see what resolution your screen is set to. If the lower number is greater than 1440, you can view it (full screen) in 1440. If it's less, then you cannot.
Not sure what you are trying to do. Are you just trying to make the video bigger? Or, are you trying to view it at an ultra-precise resolution? TH-cam is showing you a streaming video with compressing anyway, so what is your goal here?
@@macmost My goal is to view the video in the best resolution possible. The choices range from 240, 480 and all the way up to 1080, 1440 and then 4K.
as a mac user how would someone know if their macbook air/pro supports 1080, 1440 or up to 4k?
It doesn't matter for something like a video. The video will use all of the pixels in its rectangle on the screen no matter if you are set to 1080 or 1440. 1080 will make items like the Menu Bar and buttons look bigger, but the video will use all of the pixels regardless.
That for another great video. I rock a 27" 4k at 1920x1080. Absolutely brilliant!
Thanks, Gary - great explanation. To me, the display is almost more important than things like extra RAM or SSD space. Obviously, it is what we look at all the time - and - any strain (too small or too big) totally crushes the user experience. I realize that many viewers think that bigger is better (32" - 34" - 40" etc) but personally, I have been settled for a long time now on 27" monitors which, in fact, negates my purchasing of the 24" iMac.
This video was helpful, but it convinces me I want a 1440 screen. The entire point of upgrading a 24" monitor to something larger is more real estate, not to get a retina version of the same real estate I already have... so I think the video can be misleading - size is subjective and 1080 virtual would look really big to me on a 27" given that it looks correct to me on a 24 inch.
Update: I bought a 4k 27". I can absolutely confirm I would prefer a 1440p screen than running my 4k at 1080p permanently. Luckily for me I'm a madman - and native 4k is my absolute favourite option. Stuff is tiny - but I have heaps of real estate as a result. And most programs have good zoom controls. I feel like I can breathe with 4k monitor at 4k. Certain tasks like reading a newspaper would definitely need to zoom the browser in, but for most things it's not an issue for me.
Just end up more confused than ever, it’s crazy making. One person says one thing and another the exact opposite, and there’s nowhere to go and compare the options. You just have to order and hope for the best. Clearly there’s no ideal solution except coughing up for an apple studio display which also has a 27” limit and could do with a refresh.
It really depends on your needs and budget. Most people don't need to spend more than $300 on a 4K screen. But others will want to go high-end with a 5K like the Apple Studio Display.
I use 27” 1440p displays at their native resolution, without scaling. I WANT increased screen real estate, NOT “retina” resolution, so I don’t care if the UI elements are small, though in fact at 27”, they’re really not too small for my eyes at all. In fact, HALF the time I’m using that external display at native resolution for a Windows VM or full-screen RDP session, anyway. 😂 I don’t WANT a 4K display for my purposes, because 1080p Retina is TOO LITTLE SCREEN REAL ESTATE for me. I need to look at code and fit a lot of it on the screen, not see it look smoother and have to scroll more.
Another great tutorial thank you
What a wonderfully detailed but simple explanation!
It really depends on how well you can see. I use a 1440p monitor with my Mini and it looks perfectly fine to me
Switching from Window, I have been using my Mac mini with a 3440* 1440p monitor for a few days and my eyes are popping out...
using HiDPI mode gives me so narrow workspace for photo editing...And fonts are directly way too big ( The top menu + browser tab took like 1/6 of the height...)
Never realized this problem until today. If i had watched this video...
Hi Sir, whenever I want to anything related to Apple or Mac you are my favorite TH-camr, your channel is the best among all Apple TH-camrs.
As I found out from the video Display Post is better than HDMI? Have I understood correctly?
Also I have a question I have a MacBook Air M1 (2020) and I just bought a monitor for it (Philips 276E8VJSB 27") It's a 4K 27" monitor, but, I have to connect it with my MacBook Air with HDMI cable. When I turn on the display setting (3840 x 2160 pixels 4K UHD) after connecting via , everything looks very small and is not scalable at all. This thing is troubling me a lot, please tell me any solution to this, I will be very grateful to you.
Sometimes it is better, other times it is the same. Depends on the screen and your settings. But at the very least it is the same so it is better to get a cheaper and smaller DisplayPort cable.
Using a 3840x2160 screen AT 3840x2160 will give you everything very small. You should use it as 1920x1080. That gives you a perfect 2x "retina" display.
Thanks for the reply @@macmost This seems a bit strange to me, I already spend money to purchase 4K external display for Macbook Air M1 and now I have to use it in 2K resolution. isn't it sad?
@@ranjansvivek No, it is still 4K resolution. It is just the sizing of the interface that changes.
@@macmost ohh, that sounds great, Thanks a lot for your answers, You are the best.
not even a word about macOS Scaling...bad video. 1440p works much better for macs than 4k in most cases.
1440p nativ resolution and sharp Fonts. thank you so much! betterdisplay made it possible
Love how the video is uploaded at 1440p max!
Yep. I do most of my videos at 720p resolution because most of the people viewing them are seeing them in a small TH-cam rectangle in a web page. If I did them smaller, then you wouldn't easily be able to read the menu and button names, which would make for a bad tutorial. When I'm not in my demo account I'm either working at 1080p/4K or 1440p/5K.
I've got a Windows pc where I can just scale everything 150% and it looks great but my work mac looks really small and setting it to 1080 looks awful. This video explains while. I'll upgrade to a 4k monitor.
Thank you. One of the most clear explanations I’ve seen on this topic.
He doesn't know what he's talking about.
Best video on display choice for Mac.
HDMI for TV.
DisplayPort for computer monitors.
Thank you! Buying a usb c to display port lead right now
Thanks for the video. You have a new subscriber.
it's mac os issue with scaling
thanks buddy you saved my life
I always ran my 2013 iMac with 1440 even tho my second display was a 4K so they looked t the same. Now I run two 4k screens with my new 16" MacBook pro with the Max chip and don't use the laptop screen at all for home use.
2560x1440 is better for MacOS and iOS than 4K. MacOS and iOS scaling works the best with ~110ppi or ~218ppi. That's how it's designed for. 1440p is half of 5K which is best for 27" displays.
Apple has designed macOS to work best with the following resolutions at the following sizes:
At 21”: 4K
At 24”: 4.5K
At 27”: 5K
At 32”: 6K
Cite your source for that. Explain why MacBook screens are a different ppi then?
@Mateusz Graczyk As I responded to you elsewhere here, that other video is not Apple, it is someone else with an opinion. If you like 1440 fine, but others will find it way too small.
@@macmost I think I figured out what he's getting at. Steve Jobs said while back they need to decide what the best user experience is and then work backwards to the technology. Apple targets 110ppi or 218ppi because they think that's the best user experience. I can imagine them saying something like "let's start with 218ppi and we know we want a 27" display size, that means we need a resolution of 5120x2880."