Anyone here who moved from a 17.3" display to a 15.6" display?

I have the m17x r3 and I have been thinking of shifting to a 15.6" display. For me, a major upside to having this huge display is being able to work with 2 documents side by side easily. I love how I can have an editor open on one half and a pdf on the other half.

For those of you who have gone from a 17.3" display to a 15.6" display, what are your thoughts on the matter? How much does that 1.7" difference matter?

P.S. I don't have access to another monitor and it is not possible for me to setup a monitor either since I am not at home.

 

Came from a 17.3 to 15.6 as well (sager np8170 to np8268), for me it took a few days of getting used to in terms of documents, browsing and email but really not so bad. For gaming however I still use an external monitor so I can't comment much there

 

it is a matter of habits, for example, I work for are also used to work on 11 "and it makes no difference, to start you notice the difference of inches

 

It is not always as easy as that for some folks. If you are used to 17" or larger laptop, it might be a challenge to tolerate the downgrade. Being used to the M17xR3 and appreciating its display, you may have a hard time putting up with a 15.6" display.

I have had numerous 14" and 15" laptops for pleasure and business. I never minded because I didn't know what I was missing. I accepted it as being a compromise for the sake of being portable simply because I did not know any better. That was until I moved to a 17" (my first was an XPS M1730) and then 18" screens. Now that I am used to the larger screens, I find 15" and smaller displays are absolutely miserable to use. I totally despise my Lenovo ThinkPad (provided by my employer) primarily because of it's insufferably lame 14" display and crappy chicklet keyboard. (It also sucks that ThinkPads are made of plastic now, but that's off topic.) It actually makes me grumpy and causes me to feel frustrated whenever I have to use my ThinkPad on the road with its little display panel.

If all you are going to do is surf the web and play games, it might not be as challenging, but using documents like Word and Excel on a frequent basis--based on your post, it sounds like you probably do--is unpleasant, and trying to view them side-by-side is a joke.

 

I have gone from a M11x to a M17x R4 back to the 14 and now the 17, etc. I myself just get used to the screen size each time and roll with it, though I would prefer the bigger screen when possible.

 

I do a lot of work with Microsoft Word and Adobe Acrobat, so being able to have both documents side-by-side and easily readable without futzing with the zoom options is a really nice thing. In the back of my mind I'm considering a 15.6" display because money is a factor on the next laptop and I can save a decent amount by not having a 17.3" display... but ugh, once you've gotten used to more real estate, it's really hard to go back. Also, I like having a 10-key setup on my keyboard, so I'd have to sacrifice that if I went with the smaller display.

 

I am actually considering the rMBP for its screen and Yosemite. Windows 8 was horrible. And AW didn't provide official support for Windows 8 whereas rMBP will get new OSes properly supported. I don't play games on my AW. Anyone here who has moved to the rMBP?

 

I have a friend that used a 17' for years and dropped to a 15 mainly due to the cost when he bought his Malibal and the difference didn't really affect him. I use other people's 15"s when I work on computers and those don't seem to bother me but then that isn't my own personal computer that I game on so maybe that would be different. I have given serious thought to getting a smaller AW to pack back and forth to work just to make things a little easier but gave up on the idea because that is basically what I bought my 17 for.