The state of external retina displays

Re:The state of external retina displays by henvic on Monday December 27, 2021 @05:44PM (#29707803)

I really wanted the 27-inch LG UltraFine 5K (https://www.lg.com/us/monitors/lg-27md5kl-b-5k-uhd-led-monit...), but I heard many complains about it not being as reliable as you'd expect, then I decided to get the LG UltraFine 4K (https://amzn.to/3qs2pFW) a little over a year ago, and I don't regret at all spending so much more for a display, than I'd normally expect to.

Now, I want to update to Apple's Pro Display XDR, but can't justify paying ~7 times more on it for now. Although 24-inch and 4K was a huge improvement for someone like me, used to only using a MacBook display (I spend the workday programming, and love photography), I still feel like 4K isn't enough.

I can't comfortably open my editor/browser, while also watching a video, for example. For some time I've tried to use my MacBook 15 Pro as a second display, but that didn't work either. I hate the fact that there're small differences in color/brightness, even though the quality of either individually is superb (the external is slightly better)... The only thing that helped a little bit with regards to using multiple displays was using the iPad to play videos thanks to AirPlay, but this is suboptimal.

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Re:The state of external retina displays by brandonmenc on Monday December 27, 2021 @05:47PM (#29707837)

I have owned the LG 5K UltraFine monitor for 6 months and it's the greatest thing ever. I will never go back to 4K.

I drive it with an OWC Thunderbolt 3 dock with CalDigit Thunderbolt cables and a maxed out 13" 2020 MacBook Pro, and as of the latest version of macOS Big Sur it is rock solid.

It's mounted on a monitor arm, so I can't comment on the included stand.

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Re:The state of external retina displays by thebean11 on Monday December 27, 2021 @08:54PM (#29709429)

How is the OWC dock? I just got the CalDigit, but super disappointed that the monitors often don't reconnect on wake from sleep.

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Re:The state of external retina displays by brandonmenc on Monday December 27, 2021 @09:55PM (#29709779)

I have both of these docks.

The OWC is my primary dock, but I did try the CalDigit one for a bit (both TB3.) Why? Same problem you're having - the monitors would never wake from sleep.

At the time I was using a Dell P2415Q with macOS and this monitor would just refuse to wake up from sleep or when I swapped laptops on the dock. It "just worked" far less than half of the time. I would have to hard power cycle by unplugging the monitor power cable - power button recycle was rarely sufficient.

I could never find a fix for this, but after a lot of searching I was led to believe that it was a problem with EDID and macOS with this particular monitor. I never confirmed this though.

The problem was almost entirely fixed with the latest macOS Big Sur update. I have to power cycle the monitor only a couple times a month now. Huge difference, and seems to be the case with both docks.

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Re:The state of external retina displays by never_a-pickle on Monday December 27, 2021 @06:06PM (#29708048)

Slight differences in white balance, even after calibration, preclude the use of multiple monitors for myself as well. Even if they are the same monitor, same model our nervous system is very good at detecting these differences.

I have no settled on a new monitor either, I'm using a 24" that is slightly too small for split screen use, but doable. 27" would be nice but 32" would likely be the best here.

There are a few good ones in the works. LG announced a new "IPS black" technology, which offers better contrast than your MacBook screen (claimed 2000:1, we'll see). As well, LG is manufacturing a few monitors for Apple this year. Some of these will be miniLED like the XDR display, but cheaper as manufacturing costs have likely reduced significantly.

The only monitor I'd even consider right now is the LGGN950 or one of the 5k2k displays, though the latter are notoriously finicky I've heard and currently not usable on Mac without a dedicated GPU.

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Re:The state of external retina displays by henvic on Monday December 27, 2021 @06:21PM (#29708194)

The mount for the 4K display sucks. I don't know why the hell they designed it this way, but it's a rectangle that protrudes about 5cm in front of your display. This mean that it forces your keyboard to be placed closer than it should depending on the distance you use it.

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