Why is everything widescreen now?

In the computer world, widescreen doesn't make sense. The internet and document pages are all laid out in 4/3. Having a widescreen computer for example means you will see much less of the internet page that a 4/3 computer owner will be able to see.

Is widescreen just so you can watch TV on your computer? I've heard some say they can put documents side by side. But this is useful in only limited circumstances, and again the bottom third of your document will be cut off with a widescreen display.

 

Because it is cheaper to produce, it has become a trend now, people like watching DVD's on notebooks, more games support widescreen.

That's all I can name.

 

games like Counter Strike source, allow you to see more to your left and right with a wide screen. It is pretty cool, but again, it is MUCH cheaper to produce.

 

Why or how is it cheaper to produce a widescreen?

 

i, to tell you the truth, do not know. I just remember my father telling me something about it when he worked with View Sonic.

 

Economies of scale. More people want widescreen, so when you make more of them, the per-unit cost goes down. There's still a market for standard screen, but by and large, it's not common any more. I personally like widescreen better, because you can get a smaller laptop with a larger keyboard.

 

How do u figure that you will see less than a 4:3 screen? I don't get it??

Let's compare a 14.1 inch 4:3 display with a 14.1 widescreen.

4:3 has a 1024 pixels wide and 768 up...
WS has 1280 pixels wide and 800 up...

So how does having 254 more pixels horizontally and 32 more pixels vertically translate to seeing less?

 

Plus its more natural for human eyesight. You do not see in 4:3

 

I only see widescreen being useful in two places, very small screens (12" down) and very large screens (24" up). In every other situation you're stuck with empty margins or useless slivers of desktop. On a 12" display the extra width is still useful for most applications like email clients, web browsers, and even word processing, or you can just use it for a IM contact list. On 24" and larger displays you've gone beyond the point where you can tile windows, and doing so becomes much more efficient.

That and in the middle resolution ranges you're usually giving up pixels for the sake of widescreen, instead of gaining them.

 

You don't see in any of the widescreen aspect ratios either, this arguments is BS.

Because in a 14" screen you can get 1400x1050.

 

Because it is much easier to carry around a widescreen notebook with the same viewing area (width x height).

 

I bought mine in widescreen for two reasons.

1st: I wanted a full size keyboard with the smallest screen possible to make it as light as possible (5.33lbs makes for easy carrying). The widescreen gave a 14in sceen and keys that my fat fingers could still push.

2nd: Ergonomics. With the full screen the portion of the laptop between yourself and the keyboard is large (to me). It didn't feel comfortable to me when I rested my hands there to type. The widescreen shortens that space considerably and felt better to me.

I don't watch movies on it and I hate widescreen tv's but I love my widescreen laptop.

Leon

 

Obviously a sxga resolution will have more screen estate than an xga resolution.

I'm comparing apples with apples here, meaning an xga 4:3 and an wxga widescreen.

 

You know what, you're right aren't you?

We all know human eyesight sees more horizontally than vertically. 16:9 isn't ideal (actually my laptop is 16:10 ), as the ideal aspect ratio would be 2:1. But it is still closer to it than 4:3. To confuse it even more, 16:9 isn't true widescreen. It is a compromise between really widescreen at the cinema and 4:3. I know some people don't watch films on their screens. But the masses have spoken. You don't really lose pixels, so you'll have to accept it

 

I agree with Ethyriel. Widescreen has its place, but not on the typical monitor sizes found on computers. For the web at least, I find it a real pain to surf on a widescreen laptop. If you are lucky enough to have a 24" or larger widescreen display desktop with a high resolution like 1920 by 1200 though then the widescreen is not a problem.

 

That's usually the problem, isn't it?

This is just like the glossy vs matte, IPS and *VA vs TN, and mechanical vs rubber dome arguments.

 

Most computers are widescreen but not 'everything'. Most business class computers are still 4:3.

Documents are not 4:3, nor are most web sites. They are 3:4 and have only ever fit on a rotatable 4:3 display.
EDIT: Admittedly 16:9 makes this worse.

Computers have become about more than documents and websites. 16:9/10 is closer to the standards for most visual media.

AND we do see closer to 16:9 than 4:3. Humans see in a kinda widescreen format. We tend to disregard more of our top/bottom than our side peripheral vision, this with the placement of our eyes causes us to actually see in an sideways elyptical shape. 16:9 fills more of our vision before it is too big. This is why movies/pictures evolved from thier original 1:1 format.

 

I love widescreen and I would never think of getting a non widescreen notebook.

 

Plus I can see two pages at one time, or a video (non wide screen) on one side and a cropped web page on the other. Multitasking!

 

I have both kinds, but I only like the widescreen.

 

Bingo - Its not like they are offering you 1920 x 1050 when they say "widescreen". They are fobbing off low-resolution, low-usability junk on laptop users with this name.

I got a 14" laptop with 1400 x 1050 for exaclty this reason. People can talk all they want about "widescreen", but if you have a 1280 x 800 or even a 1366 x 768 widescreen, guess what - I still got more pixels than you, in all directions.

I'll be more interested when "widescreen" on a laptop can actually me offer more pixels than what I can get right now. If ever.

 

But the comparable resolution to 1400x1050 - which is SXGA+ - would be WSXGA+, or 1680x1050. Same height, larger width. And indeed, that's how it goes, or should. I understand that's not how it usually actually goes, but some companies (such as Dell) offer WSXGA+ and even WUXGA+ as options on smaller notebooks, though I question the usability of 1920x1200 on a 15.4" screen.

I own predominantly widescreens. They're better for most media, and they're much better for gaming (usually, barring all EA games except the wonderful C&C3). And it is a more natural aspect ratio for human sight. And a lot of websites (including all that meet W3C standards, which is admittedly very few) are optimized for widescreen these days, including this one.

It remains a matter of personal preference, of course, just like matte vs. glossy, but to just say "all widescreens suck" or "all 4:3 screens suck" is a gross over-generalization you can't possibly support. Both have their merits.

And I have never seen a 4:3 piece of letter paper in my life, unless you count turning regular letter paper on its side. (Actually, even 11x8.5 isn't quite 4:3 - it's wider.)

 

Guess what... your 14" laptop is probably larger than a widescreen 14" laptop. You have more pixels due to higher pixel density, for sure... but your screen is physically larger in area as well - no doubt about that. You've gotta make some sacrifices for your choice.

Lowlymarine has a number of good arguments otherwise. Why manufacturers decided to make higher pixel density screens in 4:3 aspect more than in 16:10 is something I don't know, but it's because of the manufacturers choice or constraints that it is higher - not because your screen aspect ratio inherently has it that way. Your field of vision certainly is quite a bit wider in aspect than a 4:3, and otherwise it is personal preference - perhaps you don't watch movies often and don't mind having large black bars on the top and bottom of your screen when you do, or you work on documents that tend to have a better fit on 4:3 screens.

Another less rational reason for 16:10 screens becoming more popular might be their close approximation to the mathematical 'golden ratio'; some might say that this screen size is more appealing in a natural sense as a result and sells better.

 

The HP dv9000 series 17" notebooks are very close if not exactly in Golden ratio proportion.

 

Less rational sure is right. I might add crazy... and absurd...

 

Absurd? Not at all.

I bought a widescreen cos the increased wideness of the laptop (in comparison to a 4:3 laptop with comparable overall size)
a) allows for a fullsize keyboard at 13" and 14" (w/o number block of course).
b) makes for a more comfortable form factor for daily carrying in a shoulderbag together with plenty of (A4 format) papers.

The differences in "screen real estate allocation" (or whatever you want to call it) are very small. On a 4:3 you get to see more of the height of a work paper or website or you use some of the height for an additional notepad window on the bottom (need to do lots of paper research, taking notes all the time). On a widescreen on the other hand you've got room for e.g. the paper on the left and the notepad on the right.

After using it for a while now I wouldn't ever go back to 4:3. After several hours of work on that 14" widescreen my eyes feel much more relaxed than they do after just an hour or two of working on a 14" 4:3.

 

I was speaking of using the 'golden ratio' as reasoning. I wouldn't call widescreens absurd in public, I use a tiny little bit more tact than that.

 

Aw misreading. My bad, sorry.

 

There is a 15.4" laptop with FULLSIZE keyboard + Numblock and that's the LG S1. 4:3 beat that... but i know they never will... Widescreen FTW!

 

If I want to watch TV, I can chose from a 42" screen or a 28" screen on a proper TV. Why then would I have let movies determine the choice of screen on my computer, especially a puny 12" so called "widescreen".

I buy a laptop to do work. And if I happened to stick a DVD in the laptop on the train or something, no a 4:3 isnt going to kill me. Especially when I know I have 1400x 1050 pixels when I need to do proper work, which is what I bough the thign for, not movies.

Its kind of laughable if you ask me. The tail is wagging the dog there. A widescreen computer is nothing to do with a business laptop. For me, it betrays that the manufacturer is interested selling a playtoy, for movies, not a proper tool.

 

Here's another take on the advantages of widescreen: my main sources of income are software engineering and technical writing. In either case, maximizing my document management software on a widescreen monitor is counter-productive; the document viewing area is just too wide.

If, however, you need to multitask and work with several documents at a time (as I do), the widescreen format is a great boon. Thanks to the added width, I can have two or three documents, web pages, or source references open and accessible simultaneously by laying them out across the long axis of the display. With standard 4:3 displays, this kind of layout is possible but unwieldy.

I would rather have a 2:1 display, but 16:10, especially at WUXGA or higher resolution, is a good enough compromise that I no longer require a multi-monitor setup to be productive.