Minimizing Eye Strain! Different Laptop Screens and 4K

Hi, I'm Dan.
I use my computer almost excessively, on a work, study, and entertainment basis.
Eye strain is a bit of a problem, and now that I'm on the hunt for a new computer which I'll use for a long time, I figured I would ask if anybody knows anything about this.

I've heard rumors, along with personal experience stories, that 4k screens actually strain the eye less than FullHD (1920x1080) screens do, because of higher pixel density making images clearer and making it impossible for the eye to determine individual pixels.
Is this true? Should I invest my money into a 4k screen to reduce eye strain during use?
4k screens can be a tad expensive, but if it reduces eye strain even a bit, it's a worthwhile investment.

I plan on getting a 15 inch laptop, but I don't want the discussion to be limited by this, since I want to know in general how to reduce eye strain.
I did some research on this, but none of the results were conclusive.
If anybody is knowledgeable about this, or has personal experience, let me know what you think!
Thanks for all your help!

 

Different people have different tolerances for eye strain. The resolution of a monitor is only one aspect of quality.

The only definitive way for 'you' to know if monitor 'a' is less straining than monitor 'b' is to use each for a day to a month and compare.

I would not put too much effort on finding a 'less stressful' monitor, nor would I buy different resolutions based on possible differences between them w/regard to eye strain.

What I would do is buy a resolution that an operating system can display natively on at a screen size that is comfortable to my eyes. Anything beyond 1920x1200 is usually not beneficial at the notebook sizes possible today.

Buying a higher resolution screen may give additional benefits in color accuracy, gray scale renditions and/or perceived sharpness and more. But all of these are not mutually inclusive of decreasing eye strain by any stretch.

For me, a low brightness, high matte finish (~100 to 150 nits (max), about the brightness of a piece of white writing paper indoors) but still good/high contrast monitor is the most comfortable monitor to look at continuously over long periods of RAW image editing. Most younger people have issues with this setup. All I know is that cartoonish, oversaturated and over bright settings do not increase my viewing comfort/pleasure. And they are definitely harder to look at over the long term especially when the brightness is maxed on those screens.

Turn down the brightness, use a matte screen and optimize the resolution to the monitor size and the O/S used to get a running start on comfortable long term viewing. Concentrating on only one aspect will lead you down a wrong path.

Good luck.

 

Thanks for the reply!
It's true that there are so many different factors it is really hard to say.
I have not had personal experience with this because of the cost.

I would say you are most likely right though. I can't differentiate pixels on a 1920x1080 screen already, so 4k shouldn't really make a difference.
If anyone has contrasting experiences, where 4k really made a difference, let me know though!

 

I got rid of eye strain by lowering brightness and using warm color schemes on all devices.

 

Also try to reduce the blue spectrum as much as you can, especially for the backlight. You can also wear Gunnar glasses for filtering the blue spectrum.

 

That's new to me. Why does that help? I haven't heard of it before. Also, wouldn't the screen look gaudy if there isn't any blue?
I have heard before, claims that the color blue in screens makes you less sleepy, because the sky is blue or something, indicating day, and your brain determines if it is day or night by the amount of blue it sees, but I haven't heard of getting rid of blues to reduce eye strain...

 

Damage___, as an example, I can't use my 4740s' display as is because its very cold (blueish) colors cause tiredness and eye strain unless I adjust color temperature with f.lux.

 

Sorry, I forgot to mention my name (Damage___ is a bit awkward to write). I'm Dan.
Also, downloaded f.lux. I'll try out f.lux, and see how it works out for me. It'll likely need some adjustment before I'm comfortable with it, but we'll have to see. I might have to opt to not use it in the end, because my college colors include blue, so I'll likely have a lot of blue color on my computer.

Thanks for all the help so far!

 

It's hit after sunset for me.
It's quite a noticeable difference, although I can still discern blues, which is good.
It kind of feels less straining on the eyes, but perhaps that is just placebo effect.
On a separate note, f.lux probably works better on IPS displays rather than TN. The color distortion from viewing at different angles is immense.

 

You can google search "lcd blue tint eyestrain"

Some lcd makers start to care about the blue spectrum.
http://techlife.samsung.com/7-ways-prevent-eye-strain-computer-screen-1471.html
http://www.benq.com/microsite/eye-care-monitors/lbl.html

I learn this from my Toshiba Tecra R850 because the default setting of the color temperature was "too cool" (blue tint). I noticed I have eyestrain with this laptop but don't have this problem with my very cheap acer aspire 5253. By trying to calibrate the color of the Toshiba to match my acer aspire, I learned the blue spectrum was in fact harmful for the eyes.

http://texyt.com/bright+blue+leds+annoyance+health+risks

 

Thanks. Those links were definitely helpful, and extremely informative.
I downloaded f.lux. Maybe it'll make a big difference.

So I guess my original question was answered.
4K screens don't really pose an advantage in terms of eye strain. Reducing blue light does.

 

I don't know about 4K but my very cheap Acer Aspire 5253 has better screen display than the one on the five times expensifier Toshiba Tecra R850

 

Yeah; price does not necessarily mean quality.

Note to self: select and right click on 'expensifier' and add to dictionary.

 

Ha Ha. FYI, I copyrighted this word. You are not allow to use it without my consent

 

Do you mean trademarked? I don't think you can copyright a word. Perhaps I'm wrong, since a made up word is technically original content.
Also, the -fier suffix makes the word seem like a verb. The definition of your word would be, probably, "to make expensive," or as a noun, "a device that makes (something) more expensive."

The (non-existent) word you are probably looking for is expensiver. Which I have trademarked and copyrighted. Checkmate, SteveT.

 

My lawyer will contact you soon for unauthorized use of the word expensivier. You'd better have 4K to spend.

Joke aside, let us know if you solved the eyestrain problem.

 

I agree with this, these settings also help me for editing documents in LaTeX, PDF reading, code developing, and similar kinds of things.

 

The single biggest thing for me is the screen real estate to resolution ratio. I've tried about 25 laptops in the past few years and I finally went back to a 17" screen (IPS). I've tried everything, reducing brightness usually gives me more eye strain, I've tried different color temps. I tried retina screens, windows 3k/4k screens, but all of those laptops were 15 and under. Until I went back to a 17" screen with 1080p resolution, my eyes would get tired after a few hours.

I also have 27" IPS screens on my desktop and I can sit on those all day long without strain, brightness and color temp don't seem to have much affect on the strain. Their resolution is 2560 x 1440, but it's 27" of real estate that makes the difference.

My situation might be different than most though, I'm far sighted and about a +4.25 prescription. I think most people are near sighted (where you can read but can't see things at distance without contacts/glasses).

The best 15" laptop I had was a retina MBP, and I'd have to leave it on the default scaling which equates to about 1440 resolution at their aspect ratio. If I tried to scale up to 1680 or 1920 on the 15", eye strain would come on after an hour or less. I could have kept this resolution or used windows laptops with scaling, but I really wanted to be able to code and work on my laptop with what would effectively be at least 1080p for real estate. I'm a lot more efficient fitting more on the screen, but fitting more on the screen below 17" screen meant eye strain for me, no matter what the pixel density was.

I don't think that anyone really needs a "retina" or 4k style monitor to reduce eye strain. I believe that people probably need to focus on finding the right size screen for their particular eyes (prescription if you have one), and the scale (resolution) you run per inch of screen. While I do prefer IPS screens, I have used 17" laptops with good TN screens that didn't cause me strain either.

Hope this helps provide another angle at the problem, and more things to try/think about.

 

I just got the 4k joke. Just now. After reading it a second time. I feel slow.

I see. This definitely brings some insight. I don't have the option of getting anything larger than 15 inches for a laptop, but I certainly have heard similar sentiment, that larger screens are better, and matter more than whether the screen is high quality or 4k. And it seems like the 4k being less straining is effectively busted. It probably is only less straining when working with extremely large screens where you can actually see pixels.

It seems it might be worthwhile to purchase a large monitor. I have tried to avoid doing so, because college dorm desks are tiny, but it might be worth it.

P.S. I am nearsighted, but have corrective night contacts, which effectively make me not need glasses as if I had perfect vision. In the end, eye strain is the same all around. I'm glad you gave me your experience!

 

Ahh yes my wife is nearsighted as well, she's almost exactly the opposite of me at -4.25. Just to give you another little story, I purchased a 12" Dell XPS for her which has a 1080p screen, still really high pixel density for a 12" laptop. She has eye strain if she's just using the laptop, but she has no trouble at all on an external monitor. On the 12", she has to scale it to 125 or 150% in Win 8.1 to be happy with it (not using the external).

I think you'd be happy with just about any decent 23 or 24" monitor from any retail store (TN or IPS would work fine, but IPS would be preferred). You can find some nice smaller 21" monitors too, the save space, have almost no bezel, and still at 1080p. I don't think you'd ever see eye strain on a 21" at 1080p....that's my opinion anyway.

 

1080p resolutions on Windows suffer as text is not scalable yet in a friendly fashion. Downgrade for better text to lesser display if text clarity is critical. Or consider a MacBook Pro Retina.

 

Once Windows 10 releases, the crappy scaling system shouldn't be a problem anymore.
The MacBook Pro Retina with 5k screen is nice (I am a Windows user, but always open to suggestions), although darned expensive. I am using my computer for engineering and computer sciences purposes, and while Mac is fine for computer science and can run the software for engineering, the processing power per amount paid is not good enough.

I have also been considering (from past posts) getting a larger (maybe 21 ~ 27 inch) monitor for my laptop, perhaps even with a 4k screen.
In the end, I'm still not sure if it is worth it. 4K is still expensive. College dorm desks are tiny, so I would need a really thin (thus expensive) monitor.
Any I'll be moving my laptop around a lot, so having to plug in every time might be a hassle. I'll either have to purchase a Dell with WiDi (Dells are expensive) or wait for WiGig to be integrated in both monitors and laptops.

 

Very true. Windows 10's type face handling and scaling will be a major advantage. And so will the multiple desktops for many power users.