Lower resolutions on iPhones. Does it matter?

[WelshBloke]

The way I see it is that technology progresses, but it doesn't always make sense. You can make faster and faster cars, but at the expense of fuel consumption. It's not like we're driving much faster than we were 20 years ago.

Cars are faster and have better fuel economy nowadays. In the same way phones are better and bigger and are going the same way.

 

[tsupersonic]

The way I see it is that technology progresses, but it doesn't always make sense. You can make faster and faster cars, but at the expense of fuel consumption. It's not like we're driving much faster than we were 20 years ago.

The same with planes. All jetliners are still subsonic. It doesn't make sense to go supersonic. Who cares if military jets are getting faster and faster. The 787 cruises at the same speed as a 30 year old 747-400.

Like some people push bigger better, blah blah blah, but there's a limit. We kept going bigger and bigger with phones until someone realized it doesn't make sense anymore. It's not like you couldn't build a tablet 3 years ago that was 6 inches and call it a phone. Remember the HTC Flyer? Now people are realizing ergonomics matters, and Motorola went with a small 4.7" form factor with minimal bezels. Maybe someone will realize that pushing 2560x1600 might not make sense until we get battery technology to be half decent.

The car analogy is really bad. Modern vehicles are far more efficient than older cars and have a lot more power.

Ex: 1994 Toyota Camry XLE V6 - 188 HP/203 TQ - 16/23 MPG
2014 Toyota Camry XLE V6 - 268 HP/248 TQ - 21/31 MPG
New car has 80 HP / 45 TQ more and far better economy

Ex. 2: 1994 Mercedes Benz E500 V8 - 315 HP/ 347 TQ - 14/18 MPG
2014 Mercedes Benz E63 AMG V8 - 577 HP / 590 TQ - 16/23 MPG
New car has 262 HP / 247 TQ more Modern technology + use of turbos result in better economy.

Sure no one needs 577 HP for everyday driving, but it is very fun Highway speed limits have increased where I was in Mass, and one road on Texas is 85 MPH.

Airline analogy is also bad. 747's aren't designed for speed. They engineered it for cargo/passenger capacity. Want a fast plane? Engineer one that is designed for speed, not cargo/passenger capacity. The 787 is also far more efficient than a 30 year old 747-400. Besides modern airlines don't go for speed! They go for the most cost-effective way to fly passengers aka. cut down flights/fill up more planes. BTW, 747-400 was replaced by 747-8 around 2010. The 747-8 is about 15% more fuel efficient than its predecessor.

 

[Kelvinz]

Because I honestly can't see any single pixel on my iPhone 5s. Why would I need a higher resolution phone? Wouldn't that just be a waste of battery life if I can't actually see anything better?

I get that increasing screen size is a completely different argument.

Because it doesn't matter if you can't see the pixels or not. The eyes can see a difference in higher resolutions. Doesn't matter what you can see now, you have to see the difference side-by-side.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Because it doesn't matter if you can't see the pixels or not. The eyes can see a difference in higher resolutions. Doesn't matter what you can see now, you have to see the difference side-by-side.

Is this actually true or are people just rehashing one argument that someone threw out?

You're basically saying resolving pixels is not the same as resolving detail. Please show me where this is the case? So for example, you're arguing that beyond 320ppi or whatever on a handset, your eyes can't see the pixels, but your eyes can actually see more detail? What's the limit in terms of ppi of that detail then?

To me if you can't see the pixels anymore, I don't see how you can see more detail. If you're seeing a difference in detail, then you're resolving the pixels...

 

[WelshBloke]

Is this actually true or are people just rehashing one argument that someone threw out?

You're basically saying resolving pixels is not the same as resolving detail. Please show me where this is the case? So for example, you're arguing that beyond 320ppi or whatever on a handset, your eyes can't see the pixels, but your eyes can actually see more detail? What's the limit in terms of ppi of that detail then?

To me if you can't see the pixels anymore, I don't see how you can see more detail. If you're seeing a difference in detail, then you're resolving the pixels...

There might be something in that.

I cant see the pixels on my S3 but I can see a difference in smoothness (or something, its hard to describe) when I put an S4 next to it.

That said I dont really see any point in going above 1080 on a phone (although I said that about 720 ).

 

[rh71]

does PPI effect battery life?

Because if there's a direct trade-off on these portable phones, I'd rather have the latter. Tablets I'd rather have a good balance.

 

[bearxor]

Essentially, everyone in the "expert" realm has different opinions of what Retina means. This is why it's so hard to pin down an exact number. One doctor says 300 is fine. another says 477 is the magic number. This is why I want just a little bit of overkill in this area. It's better to be above the "magic number" by a bit, just to cover differences in everyone's viewing ability. But, once you've hit 500, you're just in the realm of overkill for the sake of overkill. That's why I still feel the sweet spot is between 400-500. Anything in that range is perfectly acceptable and doesn't fall in to the category of diminishing returns for me.

You're basically saying resolving pixels is not the same as resolving detail. Please show me where this is the case? So for example, you're arguing that beyond 320ppi or whatever on a handset, your eyes can't see the pixels, but your eyes can actually see more detail? What's the limit in terms of ppi of that detail then?

To me if you can't see the pixels anymore, I don't see how you can see more detail. If you're seeing a difference in detail, then you're resolving the pixels...

It's not the same. Having more pixels available means you can use them to fine tune detail in fonts. But this is really applies more to character-based languages than something like english. For something like Chinese, you can smooth out some lines, add some extra lines, give it a little more pop. I'd agree that it's harder to quantify the difference in a language like english.

But there's more benefits to higher ppi than just text smoothing. Higher ppi's would basically eliminate the need for AA.

If you were to hit 900+ ppi, then each group of three pixels can, essentially, act as subpixles and emulate a 300ppi screen at 48-bit color accuracy. Because each subpixel of the 300ppi screen would be accurately lit by it's own subpixels. Think Pixception!

 

[SlitheryDee]

The car analogy is really bad. Modern vehicles are far more efficient than older cars and have a lot more power.

Ex: 1994 Toyota Camry XLE V6 - 188 HP/203 TQ - 16/23 MPG
2014 Toyota Camry XLE V6 - 268 HP/248 TQ - 21/31 MPG
New car has 80 HP / 45 TQ more and far better economy

Ex. 2: 1994 Mercedes Benz E500 V8 - 315 HP/ 347 TQ - 14/18 MPG
2014 Mercedes Benz E63 AMG V8 - 577 HP / 590 TQ - 16/23 MPG
New car has 262 HP / 247 TQ more Modern technology + use of turbos result in better economy.

Sure no one needs 577 HP for everyday driving, but it is very fun Highway speed limits have increased where I was in Mass, and one road on Texas is 85 MPH.

I don't think the car analogy is that bad. Technology that makes the bleeding edge of performance cars possible can often be adapted to lower performance vehicles to make them more efficient. The same could be said for smartphone technology. Whatever technology and tricks companies develop to make a 4k phone screen get acceptable battery life would probably scale down to make a 1080P screen get insane battery life. Without the line of flagship products that are constantly blazing the trail in pursuit of performance we could lose out on a lot of real improvements in lower tier products.

 

[Rdmkr]

Three things:
- just that you can't consciously discern the pixels doesn't mean you aren't subconsciously affected by the lower detail in the shape of a lower "wow-factor" of your experience.

- retina is defined relative to a viewing distance and it is a fallacy to say this distance is fixed. Overkill PPI means you have the ability to zoom in on content simply by holding the device closer to your face, which is leaps and bounds ahead of pinch-zooming in terms of convenience. Taking this in account, even PPI figures well beyond the technical "retina" level (at "standard" viewing distance) can have substantial merit.

- the contrast and color depth (broad gamut) of a screen are inputs to the formula of where the retina cut-off point lies; high PPI amoled makes sense from more points of view than just the fact that its often arranged like pentile. See: http://microsoft-news.com/microsoft...erceived-resolution-than-ipad-retina-display/

On a personal note, I think I can see the difference between 5 inch 1080p and 4.5 inch 720p fairly easily. Not by counting pixels, but simply by sensing that the former is WOW and the latter is just "not bad".

If the SGS5 has a 1440p amoled screen I will go for it (not so sure about SHARP LCD).

 

[Commodus]

One thing to consider about a larger iPhone's resolution versus battery life: as I understand, neither the iPhone 5 nor 5s is using high-efficiency screen technology. It's entirely possible that Apple could use IGZO (or similar) for a greater-than-1080p display without compromising battery life. The device could actually last much longer on battery if there's room for a larger cell, or if the A8 is more efficient.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Essentially, everyone in the "expert" realm has different opinions of what Retina means. This is why it's so hard to pin down an exact number. One doctor says 300 is fine. another says 477 is the magic number. This is why I want just a little bit of overkill in this area. It's better to be above the "magic number" by a bit, just to cover differences in everyone's viewing ability. But, once you've hit 500, you're just in the realm of overkill for the sake of overkill. That's why I still feel the sweet spot is between 400-500. Anything in that range is perfectly acceptable and doesn't fall in to the category of diminishing returns for me.



It's not the same. Having more pixels available means you can use them to fine tune detail in fonts. But this is really applies more to character-based languages than something like english. For something like Chinese, you can smooth out some lines, add some extra lines, give it a little more pop. I'd agree that it's harder to quantify the difference in a language like english.

But there's more benefits to higher ppi than just text smoothing. Higher ppi's would basically eliminate the need for AA.

If you were to hit 900+ ppi, then each group of three pixels can, essentially, act as subpixles and emulate a 300ppi screen at 48-bit color accuracy. Because each subpixel of the 300ppi screen would be accurately lit by it's own subpixels. Think Pixception!

Right. I'm not arguing 300 is the limit or whatever for phones. It could be a different number, but my point is that if you can't distinguish the pixels anymore, then you can't pick up more detail. If you're able to see more detai like in the Chinese text you're mentioning, then you are seeing the pixels. I guess there's another issue and that's anti-aliasing, but let's assume the characters are properly aliased so you don't have jaggies. Either way, anti-aliasing isn't a limitation of your resolution but rather how the text is rendered.

My point is that if you're saying higher resolution benefits Chinese text to make it sharper, then that means the eye is seeing those pixels. You can't be beyond retina yet claim to be able to add more detail. Are there any articles out there that show two different limits of what the eye can pick up?

 

[ponyo]

Anti-aliasing is definitely limitation of the resolution. If the resolution is high enough, you don't need AA.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Anti-aliasing is definitely limitation of the resolution. If the resolution is high enough, you don't need AA.

If it is high enough, yes, but even a sufficiently high resolution image can be improved upon by introducing anti-aliasing. That's just an artifact of the rendering process.

My point is that there's two different things going on. You can have a high resolution image and jaggies, introducing anti-aliasing improves the image quality, but it doesn't add more pixels. It just reduces the distortion.

I'm trying to address the potential issue where you could potentially have a retina display that shows jaggies, and then someone claims that it's because you're not at a high enough ppi. But the issue there isn't a ppi issue but an anti-aliasing issue. Sure you can solve it with ppi, but the root cause isn't in pixel density.

 

[bearxor]

Right. I'm not arguing 300 is the limit or whatever for phones. It could be a different number, but my point is that if you can't distinguish the pixels anymore, then you can't pick up more detail. If you're able to see more detail like in the Chinese text you're mentioning, then you are seeing the pixels.

But that's just not true. I can switch to a Chinese keyboard on my iPhone and see that the characters are a little jagged, but I can't see the individual pixels. I think you're trying to make the argument that it is the same thing, but it's not. There is room for detail improvement even if you can't see the spacing between pixels.

Are there any articles out there that show two different limits of what the eye can pick up?

You can try looking for articles on it, but it's all hit and miss. I don't think anyone has done a thorough study of ppi in relation to vision. I read one article mentioning that somewhere in the 2k range would be what the human eye can make out. DisplayMate guy says 477. Some other analyst says 350. It's kind of all over the board.

 

[tsupersonic]

I don't think the car analogy is that bad. Technology that makes the bleeding edge of performance cars possible can often be adapted to lower performance vehicles to make them more efficient. The same could be said for smartphone technology. Whatever technology and tricks companies develop to make a 4k phone screen get acceptable battery life would probably scale down to make a 1080P screen get insane battery life. Without the line of flagship products that are constantly blazing the trail in pursuit of performance we could lose out on a lot of real improvements in lower tier products.

Um no - what technology is in the S class that will make a C class more fuel efficient? Sure, the S class and performance/luxury vehicles have many gadgets, and yes, they will trickle down to your Camry/Accord type cars given time. I was merely talking about engine technology; what you're talking about is features. Note the post I was responding to, the person was making references fuel efficiency/speed.

 

[magomago]

Three things:
- just that you can't consciously discern the pixels doesn't mean you aren't subconsciously affected by the lower detail in the shape of a lower "wow-factor" of your experience.

- retina is defined relative to a viewing distance and it is a fallacy to say this distance is fixed. Overkill PPI means you have the ability to zoom in on content simply by holding the device closer to your face, which is leaps and bounds ahead of pinch-zooming in terms of convenience. Taking this in account, even PPI figures well beyond the technical "retina" level (at "standard" viewing distance) can have substantial merit.

- the contrast and color depth (broad gamut) of a screen are inputs to the formula of where the retina cut-off point lies; high PPI amoled makes sense from more points of view than just the fact that its often arranged like pentile. See: http://microsoft-news.com/microsoft...erceived-resolution-than-ipad-retina-display/

On a personal note, I think I can see the difference between 5 inch 1080p and 4.5 inch 720p fairly easily. Not by counting pixels, but simply by sensing that the former is WOW and the latter is just "not bad".

If the SGS5 has a 1440p amoled screen I will go for it (not so sure about SHARP LCD).

I agree but you can't argue that with the same level of contrast for two different resolutions... 720P looks great, but that 1080p makes me go WOW.

Just because the eye lacks the ability to resolve beyond a certain point doesn't mean we can't perceive the overall picture.

It reminds me of HDDs in a simplified fashion - data is so tightly clustered that the drive head can't exactly read if its a 0 or 1; the probability of 0 or 1 is computed to get the actual answer because multiple data blocks are seen; thus data can be read despite not having the resolutional measurement down to a single 0 or 1 data block.

I can't see no reason why this doesn't apply to the brain; and its most likely why 1080p screens give me that wow factor that a 720p screen doesn't for the roughly same form factor...twice as many pixels is something that does influence the overall picture! However, it is more than a simple argument of pixels, and ensuring that other relevant metics are also satisfactory is important for the overall experience!

 

[Zaap]

I don't think the car analogy is that bad. Technology that makes the bleeding edge of performance cars possible can often be adapted to lower performance vehicles to make them more efficient. The same could be said for smartphone technology. Whatever technology and tricks companies develop to make a 4k phone screen get acceptable battery life would probably scale down to make a 1080P screen get insane battery life. Without the line of flagship products that are constantly blazing the trail in pursuit of performance we could lose out on a lot of real improvements in lower tier products.

I'd just toss the car analogy altogether (they hardly ever work and just lead to useless dickering) but your point is a great one. The bleeding edge ends up benefiting the low-end.

 

[StrangerGuy]

does PPI effect battery life?

Because if there's a direct trade-off on these portable phones, I'd rather have the latter. Tablets I'd rather have a good balance.

The increase in higher resolution is offset by using less power hungry IGZO and LTPS substrates. Of course using both for reduce power draw compared to traditional A-Si on the same resolution but chances are 720P and below screens won't get them due to manufacturers prioritizing IGZO/LTPS for flagships.

 

[Kelvinz]

There are many, many ways to lower battery consumption for displays.

Dimming the screen, reducing the number of pixels and using specific substrates are three of the most common methods.