richmcnabb
Level 1 (0 points)

Q: Everything looks blurry on my Thunderbolt display

I have a thunderbolt display connected to my rMPB.

 

Whenever I veiw anything on the Thunderbolt display it looks blurry.

 

Anything I need to configure?

MacBook Pro with Retina display, Mac OS X (10.7.5)

Posted on Dec 2, 2012 7:05 PM

by Malcolm J. Rayfield,Solvedanswer
Malcolm J. Rayfield Malcolm J. Rayfield
Level 5 (7,945 points)
A:

Are you sure the blurring is not just due to the big display not having as many dots per inch as the retina display?

Posted on Dec 4, 2012 5:56 PM

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richmcnabb

Q: Everything looks blurry on my Thunderbolt display

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  • by Malcolm J. Rayfield,

    Malcolm J. Rayfield Malcolm J. Rayfield Dec 2, 2012 8:27 PM in response to richmcnabb
    Level 5 (7,945 points)
    Dec 2, 2012 8:27 PM in response to richmcnabb

    Turn off mirroring in the Arrangement tab Displays system preference.

  • by richmcnabb,

    richmcnabb richmcnabb Dec 3, 2012 11:33 AM in response to Malcolm J. Rayfield
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 3, 2012 11:33 AM in response to Malcolm J. Rayfield

    Mirroring is turned off.

     

    My current display configuration is:

    rMBP = Best for Retina Display

    Thunderbolt Display = Best for display

     

    Any help would be awesome!

  • by Malcolm J. Rayfield,Solvedanswer

    Malcolm J. Rayfield Malcolm J. Rayfield Dec 4, 2012 5:56 PM in response to richmcnabb
    Level 5 (7,945 points)
    Dec 4, 2012 5:56 PM in response to richmcnabb

    Are you sure the blurring is not just due to the big display not having as many dots per inch as the retina display?

  • by richmcnabb,

    richmcnabb richmcnabb Dec 4, 2012 5:59 PM in response to Malcolm J. Rayfield
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Dec 4, 2012 5:59 PM in response to Malcolm J. Rayfield

    That's what I am beggining to think now too.

     

    I took a walk down to the apple store today and had a look at their thunderbolt display. It looks like the exact resolution I have here - sorry for wasting your time. I really appreciate all your help!

     

    - Rich

  • by nzdave,

    nzdave nzdave Oct 16, 2015 4:32 PM in response to richmcnabb
    Level 1 (0 points)
    Oct 16, 2015 4:32 PM in response to richmcnabb

    This blurry thing has got a lot worse for me in the last few OS upgrades. Now on El Capitan it is noticeably bad, particularly in preview of PDF's, but also apple app store (search top right is particularly blurry).

    Before jumping to the conclusion that it is my macbook (2012 MBP) or my eyes, I would say; there is no blurriness in microsoft word or acrobat.

     

    I also tried a few things to make it better;

    • I tried turning off 'smooth text and line art' in preview but it didn't help.
    • I tried turning off 'use LCD font smoothing when available' in system preferences and this didn't help.

     

    I did a screen shot of side-by side the same PDF at 100% view size for acrobat and preview.. to illustrate the point.

    https://sites.google.com/a/nzvink.com/web/_/rsrc/1445037972553/photos/blurry-pre view.png 

     

    I can only conclude, this is an apple introduced font blur.

    ..Hopefully this is not to try to drive people to buy the retina display MBP by introducing crappy display in the older models.. that would be shameful.