Why is 1440 x 900 "Best" for the Retina Screen per Apple?

There are several articles around you can search for that explain exactly how the different resolutions are produced based on the screen's native resolution. I recall that to produce the 2880 x 1800 screen the display software uses pixel doubling (creating a pixel in software based on one that is hardware.) This is in a way how some printers that have, say, 300 dpi real resolution can produce images with 600 dpi resolution.

Hey Kappy what's up?

I'm about to take the plunge on the new MBP - Retina.

Loaded to the max, 2.7GHz, 16GB and 768GB for a total of $4123.90 (taxes included).

Your opinion, should I go ahead or wait for the next version that might have ironed out the bugs?

Cheers...

Beats me! I've always stepped up to the latest and greatest by being the first on my block. I bought the first Intel MBP, the first Mac Pro, the first unibody MBP, the first 11" MBA, the first 2006 iMac, the first iPod and iPod Touch, the first iPad. Need I say more? I must say that I've been very lucky that I've never had problems with any of them. I've sold the 2006 MBP and 2010 MBA. The iMac was a give-away to a friend who managed almost a year before it died. The 2006 MBP now belongs to two Spanish girls and is still working. The rest of them I either still have or have donated.

I would go for that Retina model but I've already got too many notebook computers that i don't use, so it's hard to justify except for fooling around. I've got my eye on something to replace my Mac Pro because it can't run Mountain Lion.

But I'd love to see yours when it arrives!

That's way too generous. I'll be happy just to see it in action. I'm guessing you're going to love it especially between Thursday and Monday. 😎

I'm guessing you paid for it in less than an hour this past week. 😉

GTCA wrote:

...Peformance concerns aside, can't I have confidence that all resolutions will be crisp as all are scaled as none are actually native (2880 x 1880)?

Then, Anand Tech has an article on how Apple handles this scaling, and they say,

"Retina MBP ships in a pixel doubled configuration. You get the effective desktop resolution of the standard 15-inch MacBook Pro's 1440 x 900 panel, but with four physical pixels driving every single pixel represented on the screen. This configuration is the best looking, . . ."

...Can someone explain why this middle setting is inherently "Best"...

Thanks!

I think the fundamental advantage of rendering at one to one (native resolution) is that each pixel of what's being rendered gets one physical pixel devoted to it on the screen. Any other lesser resolution will require that a combination of physical pixels be forced to represent one image pixel in either the vertical or horizontal direction or both even though not quite lining up with the image pixel, thus resulting in some fuzziness around the edges; the only exception (on the MBP Retina Display) would be four pixels neatly taking the place of one image pixel both vertically and horizontally. In one sense the image isn't being scaled per se by software; rather, the monitor is just making a four pixel square represent each one square pixel of the image being rendered, giving a perfect fit.

And a perfect fit can pay off, whether one to one or four to one. A companion Anand Tech article described a Windows 8 Boot Camp installation using all 2880x1880 pixels with a screen shot pretty much one to one. While the text on the web page shown is pretty small, enhancing contrast made it readable, and I suspect it's much sharper in real life. Now that's a lot of screen real-estate.😉

GTCA,

Glad you made this post.

I was in the Albany, NY store earlier this week and I was looking at the Retina MBP and something didn't look right. I opened up Photoshop and created a blank 1600x1200 image and surprisingly (at the time), it had to be viewed at 50% to see all of it.

I went in to Displays thinking that it was not set to 2880x1800. To make a long story short, I figured out that the display is really running at 1440x900 and utilized the extra resolution for font/image rendering...which is exactly how 'Retina' displays work on the iPhone/iPad.

It would be nice to see it run at the native resolution and still get the benefits of the font/image rendering. That way, I could see text/menus the way they are now, but still see my 1600x1200 image completely at 100%.

The analogy under Windows would be where I have my screen (4:3) set to 1600x1200, but then I pick large fonts so I can comfortably read text. I still get the benefit of extra resolution in various apps in that case.

Not sure if that can be done here.

Regards, Patrick

Patrick123 wrote:

...The analogy under Windows would be where I have my screen (4:3) set to 1600x1200, but then I pick large fonts so I can comfortably read text. I still get the benefit of extra resolution in various apps in that case.

Not sure if that can be done here.

Regards, Patrick

Actually, it looks like it can, sort of. This MacWorld review http://www.macworld.com/article/1167286/macbook_pro_with_retina_display_redefine s_the_concept_of_a_pro_laptop.html describes successfully running Windows in Parallels at the Retina Display's real native resolution, and as mentioned above, Windows 8 in Boot Camp does too. So using the larger font option would give the best of both worlds, at least in Windows.

GTCA wrote:

Can someone explain why this middle setting is inherently "Best", is it because the native resolution is divisible by this setting (2880 divisible by 1440; and 1800 divisible by 900)? And why does Anand Tech say there might be a quality impact in the other four? When would quality be compromised, when wouldn't it?

Thanks!

Basically the native resolution of the retina display is 2880x1800.

so if you're using 1440x900 then everything is perfect (which is why apple recommends it). Every pixel can be mapped to 2 pixels of the retina display, and everything is sharp.

for other resolutions,

Every single (clear) pixel, gets blurred with it's neighbors, or displaced and doubled, changing the size and shape of the displayed images.

Imagine two grids. One is 2x2 (4 pixels total). The other is 3x3.
Now if you scale up the 2x2 to the 3x3, you'd think you'd be ok, because the 3x3 is bigger, but what do you do with the middle pixel? Which corner's color does it get?

if you choose any of the 4 original pixels, you distort the image, so the only choice is a blurred mix of all 4 colors. It's a mess.

This is what happens when apple tries to display a 1920x1200 resolution desktop on a 2880x1800 resolution screen.

It *****.

As a photographer all I can say is...

no thanks.

I'm waiting for a 17" macbook pro with a decent native resolution, or it's time for another brand of computer.

"Basically the native resolution of the retina display is 2880x1800.

so if you're using 1440x900 then everything is perfect (which is why apple recommends it). Every pixel can be mapped to 2 pixels of the retina display, and everything is sharp."

Well, 4 pixels. But I'm sure that's what you meant. :-)

Whoah, for a second I thought you were the person who gave me her retina Macbook to prep while she was away for Friday to Sunday.

But she drives a Z3 ;-)

My take on it is that althought the native rez is 2880, only specially written apps and specific parts of the quartz engine will take advantage of it.... text rendering, UI elements, icon renderin, etc.

In my quick tests, if you run a 3D game, and the MacBook is set to 1440 mode, all you get is pixel quadrupled 2880. The only way to get true 2880 in an appilcation that doesn't know about retina is to find a cheat like SwitchrezX like SoldOnMac found (or get close with the built-in setting of 1920x1200). Of course all the other UI elements are tiny! I'll be someone finds a plist setting to get 2880 without SwitchResX.

I think you are right.. Typing this right now on my MBP-R

You see, when apple says Retina optimized apps, I think they are saying that if it is not optimized, it will run in pixel doubling mode and show up as 1400 x 900, so the text size and quality etc. renders beautifully. However, if it is retina optimized, the app can access the native resolution.. So the menus will use pixel doubling and the image will be rendered 1 for 1 pixel. This is how they showed the full HD 1920 video running on native pixels in Final Cut Pro. They also mentioned the Adobe is busy working on a release for photoshop, which should provide the same capability - ie. the image will use 1:1 pixels..

Well, that's what I think is going on :-)

Nick

Nicholas Dawes wrote:

So the menus will use pixel doubling and the image will be rendered 1 for 1 pixel. This is how they showed the full HD 1920 video running on native pixels in Final Cut Pro. They also mentioned the Adobe is busy working on a release for photoshop, which should provide the same capability - ie. the image will use 1:1 pixels..

Yup, and that's the problem.

If a video editor want's to run an HD video full screen, it has to be interpolated pixels since 1920x1080 doesn't map well to 2880

so if you want to play back full HD with native pixels... it'll be small. Already small on a 15" screen, and then only partially over half the screen

Also If you run any resolutoin other than 1440x900 all graphics that you see on the web can't be shown 1:1, so they have to be reinterpolated, also blurring all the pixels.

SoldOnMac wrote:

"Basically the native resolution of the retina display is 2880x1800.

so if you're using 1440x900 then everything is perfect (which is why apple recommends it). Every pixel can be mapped to 2 pixels of the retina display, and everything is sharp."

Well, 4 pixels. But I'm sure that's what you meant. :-)

ha. yes. thank you.

good to know people read these things 🙂

2 pixels both horizontally and vertically, or 1 pixel maps to a 4x4 area (referred to as pixel doubling because it doubles both horizontally and vertically)

GTCA wrote:

...There is no option for native 2880 x 1800 as presumably the text would be so tiny...

FWIW, here is supposed to be a way to run the Retina Display at 1 to 1: