High Res Screen Causing Eye Strain

Well, you can simply use the standard Apple (command) and + key to size up, and Apple (command) and – key to size down text.
Regards,

Part of the problem I think is that you are trying to "fix" something that is not really broken. I find the HR awesome and would never go back to the lower resolution, but I can see how some people may find the text too small. But the reality is it is doing exactly what it is supposed to be doing.

It is something you should probably see in person before making the decision to buy one, but therein lays the problem. They are only available as CTO as far as I know and I have not seen one in store.

Which may lead to another problem. That is that Apple does not accept returns on CTO products. So unless you purchased it from a vendor who has a different return policy she may be stuck with it.

This is not all bad news if you can wait until October. Among Leopards features is a scalable user interface which will probably address the "fix" you are looking for.

Until then your options may be limited however.

At least one Apple store, the Burlingame, CA one, has a high-res 17" on display (or at least they did about three weeks ago). They had a regular and high-res one back-to-back, so I spent about a half hour in the store going between the two, browsing, reading documents in Word, etc. I finally decided that the high-res, while a great display, displayed things too small for my not so great eyesight, and any pre-Leopard scaling wouldn't have helped. So I went with the 1680x1050 version (yes, I bought it from that store, so they were well reimbursed for letting me take up two machines for half an hour :-)).

I agree that you should see the machine in person before buying. I don't know how many Apple stores have them, but as I said, at least one does. Or if you're some place with a relatively high population of Apple users, you may be able to find someone who has one and will let you play with it for a few minutes.

It's nice that they had one on display there. It is definitely something I would recommend spending some time with if you can.

It was actually kind of a no-brainer for me though. I actually came from having a Dell M60 Notebook which has a 1920X1200 resolution on a 15.4" screen. If you think the text one a 17" MBP is small try that <g>. But when I switched a year ago to the 17" MBP CD I kind of missed the 1920X1200 resolution having become used to it. The new HR display was actually one of the most appealing options in my decision to upgrade my CD MBP to the SR.

My mother on the other hand has a hard time with the 1920X1200 on her 24" iMac and complains about the text being too small.

When I use command + to make the fond size larger in Safari, it does not become blurry, but seems quite crisp.

One way of making all text larger is to use the displays system preference to change the resolution of the screen. You can always have a lower resolution if you want it. This does seem to blur the text a bit, as you would expect at lower resolution.

I often use the Universal Access system preference keyboard commads to temporarily magnify small text. People who use Windows and see me do this are amazed. I still haven't figured out how to do the same thing on a PC.

He he. It's a Dell that caused me to want to look at the high res before buying. A colleague at work had a Dell 15" 1920x1200 that I would have found impossible to use. The extra 2" and Mac OS X vs. Windows on the MacBook Pro does make a difference, but for me at least, not enough of one.

Increasing the font size in Safari uses a larger font, instead of scaling up a smaller font, so it will remain crisp (as will increasing the font in other browsers, or applications that allow it). However, it only increases the font size of the page, not Safari's chrome, or the menu bar, or the contextual menu. And you'd have to do it in every application you use, not all of which allow changing font sizes, and those that do usually just changing some font sizes, not the entire application's.

Until Leopard comes out, I don't think using anything other than a laptop's native resolution is really an option for long-term use.

That particular 17 inch upgrade is not really designed for reading loads of text - its designed to be able to view and edit hi-definition video at its native resolution. One of the reasons why its an option (and a bargain at £60).

Viewing at a non native resolution size just makes the os look ugly, especially on LCD's. When Leopard comes out, that should solve your problems, but if your not using it for video editing or viewing high def video, its not really what you need. It would give my poor old eyes murders. If you run it out to a 23 inch monitor, it will look amazing.................................