High-end smartphones now have full-HD, 1920x1080 pixel displays. High-end laptops also have full-HD, 1920x1080 pixel displays. The majority of high-end televisions also have full-HD, 1920x1080 pixel displays.
This is patently ridiculous. Packing the same 2.1 million pixels into a 5-inch phone display, 15.6 inch laptop screen, and 60 inch television panel makes absolutely no sense. In fact, the current situation is more a byproduct of coincidence than of a concerted effort between smartphone, laptop, and TV manufactures to "standardize" screen resolutions across devices: five years ago, phones, laptops, and TV's sported completely different screen resolutions. It's almost certain that five years from now, this will again hold true.
Smartphones
More than five years ago, the first-generation iPhone launched with a 3.5 inch, 480x320 resolution screen. The first mainstream Android smartphone arrived more than a year later, but with a noticeably higher-resolution 854x480, 3.7 inch screen. Nothing (screen-resolution wise) really changed until mid-2010, when the 4th generation iPhone doubled the pixel-density of the previous three generations with a 960x640 pixel display. At around the same time, Android smartphone manufacturers began adopting 960x540 as the new standard. This "standard" was short lived: Late 2011 marked the arrival of the first "HD" phone display, a 1280 by 720 pixel matrix aligned on a 4.6 inch screen. Only one year later, the Taiwan-based HTC released the first "full-HD" smartphone with a 5-inch, 1920 by 1080 pixel sceen.
In less than 6 years, smartphone screen resolutions have exploded from the 0.15 megapixel (480 * 320 = 153,600) first generation iPhone screen to the 2.1 megapixel (1920 * 1080 = 2,073,600) HTC "DNA" screen. This ~13-fold increase (which, ostensibly, can be almost exactly modeled by Moore's law over 6 years) in screen resolution has no analogy in the laptop and television markets.
Laptops
Laptops running Windows have boasted a relatively slim gamut of screen resolutions over the past five years. The majority of medium to high-end 13-15 inch laptops contain "HD" 1366x768 screens (a messy widescreen approximation of the more traditional 16:10 aspect ratio, 1280 x 800 resolution). Astonishingly, until perhaps 2011, barely any laptop contained anything higher-resolution than a 1600 x 900 screen. Laptops that did came with a hefty premium: Around $200 to upgrade from 1366 x 768 to a full-HD 1920 x 1080 display on a 15.6 inch laptop. Though computer hardware manufacturers have recently adopted 1920 x 1080 as the new standard for any laptop between 11 and 17 inches, "premium" laptops are still being released with 1600 x 900, or even more egregiously, 1366 x 768 screens.
Unlike the smartphone market, the laptop market has remained relatively stagnant in regards to screen resolution. It is peculiar, especially considering that text and graphics rendered on 15 inch 1366 x 768 displays is noticeably pixelated. Even more paradoxically, laptops marketed as "entertainment hubs", complete with requisite blu-ray drives and advanced sound systems, often didn't even have the hardware to display blu-ray at full resolution.
An explanation may be found by considering the one laptop available today that does take advantage of a high pixel-density display: a 15 inch Macbook Pro (with "retina" display). The 15 inch Macbook Pro, by default, renders text and graphics at 1440 x 900 on a 2880 x 1880 screen. Thus, text and graphics remain the same physical size as they would on a lower resolution 1440 x 900 screen, but contain four times as many pixels and are thus twice as "clear". However, this comes at a cost: All user interface elements (graphics, bitmapped fonts---anything that was initially coded as an array of pixels) must be laboriously redrawn at high resolution. Microsoft hasn't done this to Windows as Apple has with OS X, so the Windows OS rendered at 2880 x 1800 looks ridiculous: mouse pointers, buttons, and text are all minuscule.
To usher in high-resolution laptop screen standards, Windows OS must first be partially rewritten to accomodate higher-resolution graphics, icons, and OS animations.
Televisions
Although the longest extant technology compared with smartphones and computers, television screen resolutions have been consistent. Right now, a high-end television will contain a "Full HD" 1920 x 1080 screen. Even the cheapest and smallest televisions will at least sport an "HD" 1280 x 720 screen. Five years ago, the situation was very similar, although Full HD televisions were more a premium than the norm.
Televisions, unlike computers or smartphones, are limited by availability of content (recorded movies, TV shows, and live broadcasting). Content, in turn, is limited by recording technology and/or storage technology. The least common denominator becomes the limiting factor in TV resolution.
The limiting factor right now isn't display technology nor recording technology--it is storage technology. A digital resolution equivalent of a standard 35mm or IMAX analog film is around 3840 x 2160 pixels (more of a convenient approximation, really, since 3840 x 2160 is just four full-HD televisions joined together.) In fact, digitally animated films are actually rendered at 3840 x 2160 before being printed on to film. However, no good digital medium exists to store 4K (3840 x 2160) videos: An uncompressed 4K movie consists of 24 8-megapixel images displayed consecutively every second for over two hours--too much data to store on a flash drive or even Blu-ray disk. Streaming 4K video is also out of the picture: only a fraction of U.S. households have enough internet bandwidth to flawlessly stream full-HD video, much less 4K.
Nevertheless, the first 4K televisions have arrived on the consumer market, complete, unfortunately, with the exorbitant price tags all-too-familiar to early adopters. While the chicken-or-the-egg problem of no 4K content leads to no 4K televisions leads to no 4K content sorts itself out, early adopters will be able to enjoy, at the very least, crystal clear user-interface graphics on their televisions.
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Smartphone, laptop, and television screens are at varying stages in their evolution. We aren't going to see smartphones with resolutions higher than 1920 x 1080; any further increase in pixel density would be visually imperceptible. The limiting factor wouldn't be screen technology; it would be the perceptibility of the human eye. That's the way it should be for laptops and televisions. We're slowly getting there with the advent of 4K televisions and high-resolution laptops. Perhaps this painfully slow adoption is merely a testament to the evolutionary eons nature took to create the human eye.
This is patently ridiculous. Packing the same 2.1 million pixels into a 5-inch phone display, 15.6 inch laptop screen, and 60 inch television panel makes absolutely no sense. In fact, the current situation is more a byproduct of coincidence than of a concerted effort between smartphone, laptop, and TV manufactures to "standardize" screen resolutions across devices: five years ago, phones, laptops, and TV's sported completely different screen resolutions. It's almost certain that five years from now, this will again hold true.
Smartphones
More than five years ago, the first-generation iPhone launched with a 3.5 inch, 480x320 resolution screen. The first mainstream Android smartphone arrived more than a year later, but with a noticeably higher-resolution 854x480, 3.7 inch screen. Nothing (screen-resolution wise) really changed until mid-2010, when the 4th generation iPhone doubled the pixel-density of the previous three generations with a 960x640 pixel display. At around the same time, Android smartphone manufacturers began adopting 960x540 as the new standard. This "standard" was short lived: Late 2011 marked the arrival of the first "HD" phone display, a 1280 by 720 pixel matrix aligned on a 4.6 inch screen. Only one year later, the Taiwan-based HTC released the first "full-HD" smartphone with a 5-inch, 1920 by 1080 pixel sceen.
In less than 6 years, smartphone screen resolutions have exploded from the 0.15 megapixel (480 * 320 = 153,600) first generation iPhone screen to the 2.1 megapixel (1920 * 1080 = 2,073,600) HTC "DNA" screen. This ~13-fold increase (which, ostensibly, can be almost exactly modeled by Moore's law over 6 years) in screen resolution has no analogy in the laptop and television markets.
Laptops
Laptops running Windows have boasted a relatively slim gamut of screen resolutions over the past five years. The majority of medium to high-end 13-15 inch laptops contain "HD" 1366x768 screens (a messy widescreen approximation of the more traditional 16:10 aspect ratio, 1280 x 800 resolution). Astonishingly, until perhaps 2011, barely any laptop contained anything higher-resolution than a 1600 x 900 screen. Laptops that did came with a hefty premium: Around $200 to upgrade from 1366 x 768 to a full-HD 1920 x 1080 display on a 15.6 inch laptop. Though computer hardware manufacturers have recently adopted 1920 x 1080 as the new standard for any laptop between 11 and 17 inches, "premium" laptops are still being released with 1600 x 900, or even more egregiously, 1366 x 768 screens.
Unlike the smartphone market, the laptop market has remained relatively stagnant in regards to screen resolution. It is peculiar, especially considering that text and graphics rendered on 15 inch 1366 x 768 displays is noticeably pixelated. Even more paradoxically, laptops marketed as "entertainment hubs", complete with requisite blu-ray drives and advanced sound systems, often didn't even have the hardware to display blu-ray at full resolution.
An explanation may be found by considering the one laptop available today that does take advantage of a high pixel-density display: a 15 inch Macbook Pro (with "retina" display). The 15 inch Macbook Pro, by default, renders text and graphics at 1440 x 900 on a 2880 x 1880 screen. Thus, text and graphics remain the same physical size as they would on a lower resolution 1440 x 900 screen, but contain four times as many pixels and are thus twice as "clear". However, this comes at a cost: All user interface elements (graphics, bitmapped fonts---anything that was initially coded as an array of pixels) must be laboriously redrawn at high resolution. Microsoft hasn't done this to Windows as Apple has with OS X, so the Windows OS rendered at 2880 x 1800 looks ridiculous: mouse pointers, buttons, and text are all minuscule.
To usher in high-resolution laptop screen standards, Windows OS must first be partially rewritten to accomodate higher-resolution graphics, icons, and OS animations.
Televisions
Although the longest extant technology compared with smartphones and computers, television screen resolutions have been consistent. Right now, a high-end television will contain a "Full HD" 1920 x 1080 screen. Even the cheapest and smallest televisions will at least sport an "HD" 1280 x 720 screen. Five years ago, the situation was very similar, although Full HD televisions were more a premium than the norm.
Televisions, unlike computers or smartphones, are limited by availability of content (recorded movies, TV shows, and live broadcasting). Content, in turn, is limited by recording technology and/or storage technology. The least common denominator becomes the limiting factor in TV resolution.
The limiting factor right now isn't display technology nor recording technology--it is storage technology. A digital resolution equivalent of a standard 35mm or IMAX analog film is around 3840 x 2160 pixels (more of a convenient approximation, really, since 3840 x 2160 is just four full-HD televisions joined together.) In fact, digitally animated films are actually rendered at 3840 x 2160 before being printed on to film. However, no good digital medium exists to store 4K (3840 x 2160) videos: An uncompressed 4K movie consists of 24 8-megapixel images displayed consecutively every second for over two hours--too much data to store on a flash drive or even Blu-ray disk. Streaming 4K video is also out of the picture: only a fraction of U.S. households have enough internet bandwidth to flawlessly stream full-HD video, much less 4K.
Nevertheless, the first 4K televisions have arrived on the consumer market, complete, unfortunately, with the exorbitant price tags all-too-familiar to early adopters. While the chicken-or-the-egg problem of no 4K content leads to no 4K televisions leads to no 4K content sorts itself out, early adopters will be able to enjoy, at the very least, crystal clear user-interface graphics on their televisions.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Smartphone, laptop, and television screens are at varying stages in their evolution. We aren't going to see smartphones with resolutions higher than 1920 x 1080; any further increase in pixel density would be visually imperceptible. The limiting factor wouldn't be screen technology; it would be the perceptibility of the human eye. That's the way it should be for laptops and televisions. We're slowly getting there with the advent of 4K televisions and high-resolution laptops. Perhaps this painfully slow adoption is merely a testament to the evolutionary eons nature took to create the human eye.
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