Office Environment - LCD Resolutions are too high

B

br0k3nman

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jan 27, 2005
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I'm in IT and a student at UC Davis and we run nothing but dells on our network because of UC contracts and whatnot. However, when fixing systems and helping people out I notice that almost none of them use the 17" lcd's natural resolution of 1280x1024. Most people complain that "it's too small". Now I know as a bunch of hardcore users that we all run maxed out for best picture quality and viewable area but joe sixpack doesn't.

We are effectively wasting money, time, eyes, and everything else on expensive LCD's that do nothing more than save a little desk space. There are so many blurry and interpolated screens around the building it's ridiculous.

I think Dell, etc should be making budget LCDs for the work environment that run naturally at 1024x768. This would save money, people's eyes, and not be a waste.

What do you guys think?
 
I think the problem for most people with higher rez is not the graphics, but the text. Set the system display to use larger fonts and most would be happy. :)
 
Yeah, that's what I do. At 1920x1200, it's incredibly hard to read text (for me and my family at least) even close-up...so I just set the fonts to "Large Fonts" and immediately the text is much more legible. :)
 
I may just increase text sizes, but it still leaves wonky proportions that way. I guess most people wouldn't care and it would be easier on the eyes.
 
I know exactly what your talking about bud. Even though my main job is CAD and GIS programming of county water and sewer systems, I am also the local IT guy for our tri-county office location(s). It drives me nuts to get on to some of these 20" Dell machines to find the resolution set at something ridiculous like 1024x768 or even worse, 800x600. Then I ask them if they know how to adjust this. Some do, but most don't. Then they complain when you try to give them "more desktop space" by increasing the resolution just because they are use to using 800x600. What a waste of possible increase productivity.
 
Yeah, I hear yeah. I love the idea of LCDs at work - they save on space and backpain ;) - but the higher res models tend to confuse people. I had a user which I was lucky enough to get a 17 inch LCD for call me up and said our new website was broken. I went over and it was fine, but the 800px fixed width design confused him since it took up the entire screen on the old CRT.

I've had to go with typical monitors sometimes or 15in LCDs (1024x768) to keep people happy. I do understand when those with less than perfect vision don't want something high-res. Hopefully as time goes on, everyone else will start to get used to a slightly higher res.

I think 1280x1024 is quite readable on a 19LCD and I'm not much for small text. Heck my 19in CRT runs at 1024 - mainly b/c its sharpest there.

I myself am just starting to come around. One thing keeping me from a nice 20in LCD is the whopping 1600x1200 resolution. While it would be cool for most things, a lot of what is on the web is made for 800x600 or 1024 and many sites have static font sizes. I still have to get used to videos and pictures that took up over 1/4 of my screen looking like thumbnails on a 20in widescreen. Again, it will change with time.
 
You could always buy a 26/27 inch lcd tv that has a native res of 1280x768 :D

The best thing to do is mess with the fonts but yea a lot of people want the lower res. I personaly think that 1920x1200 on my 23 inch lcd is too big. I use to love those notebooks with 15 inch screens that were 1600x1200.
 
Try changing DPI settings in the advanced settings of your display properties. This can make text bigger without actually having to change font sizes.
 
Static font sizes only works in IE, you can't lock them in FF I believe. Doing what the post above me says also helps a lot. Dell makes large DPI a default on their widescreen laptops.
 
swatbat said:
You could always buy a 26/27 inch lcd tv that has a native res of 1280x768 :D

The best thing to do is mess with the fonts but yea a lot of people want the lower res. I personaly think that 1920x1200 on my 23 inch lcd is too big. I use to love those notebooks with 15 inch screens that were 1600x1200.
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I actually wanted to buy one of those nice 30" NEC LCD's (it has a sweet 1280x768 resolution), but after seeing the $3000 pricetag... :( well... I had to go for something a bit more affordable... ;)
 
You can get a 26/27 inch lcd tv for less then a grand. Picture on them is pretty good. I almost got one insted of my 23 inch apple lcd but ended up wanting the higher res. For gaming though a 27 inch lcd on the desk is insane.
 
Hey, i go to UC Davis too. What department do you work for? I used to do IT for Thermochemistry, then jumped over to AFS. Then i left Davis altogether and am now working in Sac. I still go to school though.
 
Well imagine Dell 1901FP's running at 1024x768... That's the situation at my university's library computers. I can't stand it, so I have a script I keep on my USB thumb drive to temporarily change the resolution to native everytime I logon.
 
Bugster said:
Hey, i go to UC Davis too. What department do you work for? I used to do IT for Thermochemistry, then jumped over to AFS. Then i left Davis altogether and am now working in Sac. I still go to school though.
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{brag}
Mondavi Center, yo. Free tickets, I hang with the techs backstage and the chillest bosses and staff ever. I love it. Tons of free food, too, since they have so many green room functions and special events to court new season ticket buyers and artists. Plus I can see how everything happens to keep a large concert hall/event center running. Also, I'm the only young guy in the administration building so the women (most of the staff) mother me, bringing me food and flirting. :){/brag}

26/27 inch LCD tv's aren't really an option man, and I don't choose the equipment we order. I can advise but I'm a "student" so I have very little say although the boss repects my opinion and knowledge. The other IT staff that oversees our department go to me with questions since I know the building and all the users like the back of my hand.
 
Display Properties->Settings->Advanced->General->DPI Setting: Large Size (120 DPI)

Problem solved without distortion or out of proportion fonts. Sadly almost no one knows this so they're looking at stretched difficult to read displays.
 
anyway to do this without the windows cd? my friend needs to change it and he doesn't have the XP cd...
 
DistributedBen said:
I myself am just starting to come around. One thing keeping me from a nice 20in LCD is the whopping 1600x1200 resolution. While it would be cool for most things, a lot of what is on the web is made for 800x600 or 1024 and many sites have static font sizes. I still have to get used to videos and pictures that took up over 1/4 of my screen looking like thumbnails on a 20in widescreen. Again, it will change with time.
Click to expand...

1600x1200 is beautiful, I can't stand using machine with lower resolution displays.

For the big text apps - word and web browers, font size changes are easy. Just change the zoom in word, and Opera and Firefox both have zoom features (Opera's zooms up images too to keep formatting similar, FF just does the text).
 
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