Inspiron 9300 screen - concern...

I am looking to order an Inspiron 9300 in the near future and I decided on all my specs but one - the screen.

My specs are:
Pentium M 750, 1.8GHz
1GB RAM
60GB 7200RMP HD
256MB Go 6800

Im trying to decide if I want to go with the WXGA or the WUXGA with TrueLife. I like the glossy screens but I am afraid that I will get lower FPS in high-end games on the native resolution. How much of a effect does the resolution have on FPS?

Also, if the game, say, only supports 1280x1024 will I have to strech the image to fill the screen or will I be able to have a "black frame" around the 1280x1024 image? How does this work?

Please bring any other arguments concerning either screen to help me decide.

Thanks in advance for the time

 

It all depends on what GPU you get. I run CS:S at 50-55 FPS with 1900x1200 resolution (With the 6800GO).

Also, running CS:S at a lower resolution (next set down, 1600x1000 or something like that) doesn't look terribally bad, the text just looks a bit blurry.

 

Im getting the Go 6800 256MB...

Have you tried playing either Doom 3, FarCry or BF 2?

 

No, HL2 is the only modern game I have to benchmark on. Sorry :\

 

What happens when you play games in full-screen mode with a resolution lower than the native? Does it stretch the image to fill the screen or does it let you keep it in its original res?

If it was the 1600 by XXX resolution, I wouldnt even hesitate, but 1900 is way high and I'm worried it'll lower my fps a lot or the windows text will be too small...

I wish the 1440 came with a TrueLife gloss!

 

it depends on how you want it. you have the option of either stretching it to fit or having the black bars in the nvidia control panel. stretching a game to fit the screen doesnt look right at all.

i play all my games at 1024 by 768 with the black bars on the side.

i have the wuxga :glossy: and use it at 1440 by 900 (wxga+ resolution)

 

Doesn't everything look blurry in Windows at 1440x900 on a WUXGA? and games at 1024x768?!?!

A question for those with the WXGA+ screen: when you play games at 1024x768, do they look pretty good? not blurried due to stretching?

 

it looks like aa is on. its not blurry at all. just not as sharp at that resolution. ive had both versions of the 9300, and i prefer 1440x900 on the wuxga.

like i said earlier, its up to you if it is stretched or not. ill take some pics and have them up in a little bit.

 

Thanks. Im definetly going with the WUXGA TrueLife since it supports 1440x900 (Sony's 17" WUXGA didn't support any lower widescreen resolutions than the native, so I thought DELL would be the same)

 

i bought the one with the truelife and 256 6800. and let me tell you that it has not let me down

 

I strongly recommend the WXGA+ screen and NOT THE WUXGA one, for gaming on the wxga you can use all the eye candy, on the wuxga your card is working much harder to render all those extra pixels and you will see a frame rate drop of 20-40 fps and not be able to use all the eye candy. Add to that the text is too tiny on a wuxga panel and web sites and games do not suppor the wuxga resolution anyhow. So what do WUXGA users end up doing? paying 125 dollars to squint and run their panel at lower resolutions. I know, Ive had both of them. The WXGA is very bright and ultra sharp, plus you dont see your reflection and all the background lighting reflected on the screen which is a big annoyance with the wuxga true life(glossy) panel.

 

not me, i love my wuxga and i'm using a 15.4" screen. i use my notebook 7 days a week and have no problems whatsoever with the size of the fonts (running at 96 dpi).

 

If you have used WUXGA and you like it then great for you. But what I see often times is newbies and first time laptop buyers looking at these posts thinking that they should get the WUXGA screen because someone makes a generic comment like the wxga sucks all the while the unwary buyer/newbie does not realize what they are getting themselves into especially if they have no previous experience with an LCD panel.
Anyone considering a purchase of a WUXGA panel should do some homework first. These panels have a 1920x1200 resolution, most people normally use a resolution of 1024x768 on their desktops and will find this resolution far too high for decent sized text and comfortable reading. Not to mention all the reflections you will see in its glossy "truelife" panel that are quite distracting when youre actually using one and not looking at some game being played on it in dell kiosk display. (note dell runs these wuxga panels at lower non native resolutions at their kiosks). The trouble with a resolution that high is that there are no web pages which support it and I cant think of any games that do either so you end up having to use your LCD panel at a non native resolution which on LCD's is not recommended as text becomes fuzzy and Icons become jagged. Sure you can use some software to kind of fix these problems but this is clearly an eample of where often people think more is better when generally speaking it is not. At least not for lcd panels 17 inches or smaller. I dont see any wuxga 1900x1200 panels from sony, hp, compaq or toshiba for that matter. Ask yourself why??? Non of their laptops go beyond the WSXGA resolution of 1680x1050 or perhaps a few 1600x1200 which are the most common lcd panel resolutions available for desktop lcd monitors of 19 inches or more (thats roughly 33 percent more viewing area than a 17 inch screen if memory serves correctly let alone a smaller 15.4 inch widescreen.
Thats something you need to think about before taking the plunge on one of these high res screens from Dell.
As for the WXGA resolution, its a perfect size for the 17 inch panel but it is a matte finish and "ultrasharp" some dont like matte finish but I prefer it for business and everyday use, really the reason why you get a slightly better contrast on those wuxga panels is because they have in essence, slapped a glossy film over it, not because the panel has such a higher resolution. Alot of people mistakenly think that the wxga panel is darker and the wuxga panel is brighter, NOT SO, in fact on the 9300 these panels all have the same nits of brightness. On my wxga I rarely use my panel at its maximum brightness, usually a few notches below that.
Another thing is that the WUXGA is really going to work your graphics card to render all of those extra pixels which means in some cases you will not be enabling all the eye candy on a game because you are using it on such a high resolution.
These are all things to think about, especially if you are not accustomed to these panels, I have used all three resolution panels that Dell offers, WXGA, WXSGA and WUXGA, on the 9300 I recommend the WXGA< best overall panel for overall purposes, better frames per second on games at an average of 20to 40 FPS, non glossy which means you dont see your face and all the background lights ( the kind of laptop displays that have been used faithfully for years, if yo want a glossy panel I suggest another company like fujitsu, their panels have 300 nits or more of brigthness and the reflection problem isnt as much of an issue but they do kill a battery ALOT quicker and cost twice the price of a dell 9300).
My Two Cents, Enjoy, Good Luck and Do Thy Research HEHE

 

Could you perhaps tell the people your age, what you use the laptop for and how good is your vision? Do you wear corrective lenses?

These are all considerations that one should make when looking at your vague statement that you love your wuxga.

Mine is 20/15 vision and I dont like WUXGA.

Thanks

 

Conghelach: Very nice posts regarding the WUXGA. I happen to be a new owner of a 9300 with WUXGA and I love the display. I usually do games in 1024x768 because I really don't need anything smaller. The ability to have two full page apps open side-by-side is really cool on the WUXGA (possible on others as well, I suppose?). What sold me was the glossy screen - it just seems brighter than absolutely anything else I'd ever seen before. Reflections? Yes. But I've worn glasses since the 4th grade, so reflections are no prob. Small icons? Yes - but it's a laptop - sit closer! At 3", 96dpi is huge dude !!

 

Sorry but I dont and cant think of many people who would find it comfortable to be only three inches away from their screen, that cant be good for your eyesight.

 

i don't know what my vision numbers are but i am nearsighted (i think? the stuff far away is blurry). i wear glasses for driving and if i have to look at anything more than, say, 6 ft away i wear my glasses... like going to the movies.

my computing habits would not be any different if i had a higher resolution screen. what i mean is, i sit/type/distance-from-screen is the same if i had wxga or wuxga. it honestly isn't that small. in fact, when i did the screencaps for the other thread to help people see the difference in resolution real estate, i literally laughed out loud at how big and clunky the wxga (1280x800) looked on my screen. it kinda looks like a kid's toy to have that high of resolution.

anyways. it really comes down to personal preference. that's why i created that thread with the screencaps so people could see the different on their own instead of having to listen to people like us go back and forth about what res we like.

 

I too worried about the size of the font. After I got mine I actually re-adjusted the dpi to 96 also. I don't think that I would be able to read text of this size on a crt but the high contrast of the lcd screen or something makes it easily readable.

I had an eye doctor once who explained the problem this way, in order to read you eye has to change shape in order to focus on the letters. After 40 (I use my menory for that) you eyeball hardens and cannot change shape thus cannot focus. My eyes are totally gone now but I can still read this text from a distance. The real answer is to go to BestBuy or someplace like that and look at the HP zd8000 series. the screen is similar to the hi res screen here. If you like that you will probably like the high res screen here if not then get the low res screen. Decide for your self by looking at a similar screen. The shiny HP screen is very similar to this screen.

 

You will average 20-40 fps drop in frame rate with a wuxga panel, its resolution is just toooo high. WXGA is great, bright and ultra sharp, I can use ALL the eye candy on my video settings and games perform excellent.