4 ms·

Does anyone else think it weird that the first mainstream hi-res displays weren't pushed by Microsoft? Let me explain... Back when WPF was still called Avalon,

by stusmith1977 14y ago

Does anyone else think it weird that the first mainstream hi-res displays weren't pushed by Microsoft? Let me explain... Back when WPF was still called Avalon, Microsoft were pushing the technology as a solution for the soon-to-be-arriving high-dpi displays (which, we were assured, were right around the corner). As an example, see a contemporary blog post: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/marcelolr/archive/2004/12/03/274213.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/marcelolr/archive/2004/12/03/274213.... Given that Microsoft were (are?) deseperately trying to hold back the tide of web-based applications, wouldn't displays like this, combined with tchnology such as WPF, have been a killer feature of a desktop OS? And hence, shouldn't they have been a high-priority for Microsoft? So why did Apple get there first? Why didn't Microsoft research/fund/introduce these high-dpi displays? Edit: More links from a Coding Horror post from the same year: http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2004/11/trapped-in-a-bitmapped-world.html http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2004/11/trapped-in-a-bitmap...

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
taotetek 14y ago
The "first" main stream hi-res display? I have some Sony Trinitron CRTs in my basement that would like to talk to you.
- stusmith1977 14y ago
  Sorry, didn't really clarify what I meant by mainstream: easily available to purchase, by non-techie consumers, from a high-street shop.
  - taotetek 14y ago
    Sony multiscan trinitrons weren't exotic - you could purchase them in any reasonable electronics store. I have several that go up to 2048x1536 @ 75hz. Viewsonic had monitors that did the same. While I look forward to higher resolution LCDs becoming a standard option, LCD's set us back resolution wise for quite a long time. LCD does have other advantages over CRT of course.
    - abacabb 14y ago
      I had and loved a similar NEC CRT. But 2048x1536 on a 22" display is ~116ppi. Apple's non-retina laptops have been higher than that for years (with the MacBook Air being highest, at ~135ppi), and Sony, at least, has offered configurable 1080p displays in 13" laptops (~165ppi) for some time. It was pretty nice a decade ago, when everyone was moving to LCD monitors that were vastly inferior in every measure beyond size or weight, but, at least in terms of ppi (and on consumer grade equipment), display technology eclipsed the CRT quite a while ago. edit: I'd forgotten that CRTs were measured with the bezel included, so at 20" viewable, the display is 128ppi. So closer, but still pretty far behind.
      - taotetek 14y ago
        Viewsonic had a 19" display (with 18" viewable) that did 2048x1536. I think that was the smallest size that the 2048x1536 CRT's came in.
- dexen 14y ago
  Thousand times this. I still own a 22'' Trinitron (20'' working area) that beats any `FullHD' hands down, by resolution and by any other measure as well -- from lag to colorspace -- and it wasn't even top of the line back then. Heck, it even starts up faster than many LCDs. I refused to let go of it for so long exactly because there was no LCD that would be an upgrade, with the sole exception of the expensive T221. Guess now's the time :-)
MetaCosm 14y ago
Microsoft isn't a hardware company. Apple's supply chain dominance is what brought this to market. Microsoft sells some rebranded hardware products (manufactured and designed by Samsung, Acer, IBM, ATI, Nvidia and Asus)... but it makes PROFIT by selling software. Apples makes software, but it makes its PROFIT by selling hardware.
- calpaterson 14y ago
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Natural_keyboard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Natural_keyboard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LifeCam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LifeCam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox
  - lawnchair_larry 14y ago
    All whitelabel products.
    - UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
      The X-Box is a whitelabel product?
      - MetaCosm 14y ago
        Depends how you define it. But, X-Box (the original) was a PIII + Nvidia + Other PC Hardware... none of it made by Microsoft. The 360 I give them more credit with, because they worked closer with partners and got off the WinTel brand... opting for PowerPC chips with ATI ... again, not manufacturing the hardware.
        dualogy 14y ago
        "again, not manufacturing the hardware" -- well, you noticed all Macs have nvidia or amd/ati GPUs and Intel processors, and are assembled by Foxconn? "That's because Apple isn't a real hardware company, it's all white-labelled." I guess?
rsynnott 14y ago
> Back when WPF was still called Avalon, Microsoft were pushing the technology as a solution for the soon-to-be-arriving high-dpi displays Although they were quieter about it, it has been quite clear that Apple was interested in resolution independence since at least 10.4, when such features started to show up. Remember that very few third-party Windows applications use WPF. Most first-party stuff, even, doesn't use WPF. We're seeing on the retina Macbook that, while most Cocoa apps work well enough, most non-Cocoa apps are at least somewhat broken; imagine how much worse this effect would be on Windows, where so few apps use the current UI toolkits.
- stusmith1977 14y ago
  It's a chicken-and-egg situation, agreed, It just seems really strange to me that they spent so much effort pushing and developing the software side, without putting any effort into the hardware, when the two clearly have to go hand-in-hand. Microsoft had the software stack ready - imagine if they had released (via partners) high-dpi laptops and screens shortly afterwards? That actually might have made a Windows machine a compelling and desirable product, instead of just an expensive way to run a browser.
  - rsynnott 14y ago
    Apple had a rather similar software stack ready, though; both worked on the basis of a point being a fractional number of pixels. The trouble with this is that while it tended to more or less work for simple things, for complex things, particularly where the programmer was drawing stuff, it was (a) somewhat inefficient and (b) very hard to get right. Apple used to periodically have talks at WWDC about how to get ready for independence back in 2006 or so, but it was clear that few developers were doing so successfully. This new approach, where you have a point be an integer number of pixels, possibly with scaling after the fact (as with the non-standard resolutions available on the retina MacBook) is far simpler for developers, so more likely to work out okay.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

taotetek 14y ago

The "first" main stream hi-res display? I have some Sony Trinitron CRTs in my basement that would like to talk to you.

stusmith1977 14y ago
Sorry, didn't really clarify what I meant by mainstream: easily available to purchase, by non-techie consumers, from a high-street shop.
- taotetek 14y ago
  Sony multiscan trinitrons weren't exotic - you could purchase them in any reasonable electronics store. I have several that go up to 2048x1536 @ 75hz. Viewsonic had monitors that did the same. While I look forward to higher resolution LCDs becoming a standard option, LCD's set us back resolution wise for quite a long time. LCD does have other advantages over CRT of course.
  - abacabb 14y ago
    I had and loved a similar NEC CRT. But 2048x1536 on a 22" display is ~116ppi. Apple's non-retina laptops have been higher than that for years (with the MacBook Air being highest, at ~135ppi), and Sony, at least, has offered configurable 1080p displays in 13" laptops (~165ppi) for some time. It was pretty nice a decade ago, when everyone was moving to LCD monitors that were vastly inferior in every measure beyond size or weight, but, at least in terms of ppi (and on consumer grade equipment), display technology eclipsed the CRT quite a while ago. edit: I'd forgotten that CRTs were measured with the bezel included, so at 20" viewable, the display is 128ppi. So closer, but still pretty far behind.
    - taotetek 14y ago
      Viewsonic had a 19" display (with 18" viewable) that did 2048x1536. I think that was the smallest size that the 2048x1536 CRT's came in.
dexen 14y ago
Thousand times this. I still own a 22'' Trinitron (20'' working area) that beats any `FullHD' hands down, by resolution and by any other measure as well -- from lag to colorspace -- and it wasn't even top of the line back then. Heck, it even starts up faster than many LCDs. I refused to let go of it for so long exactly because there was no LCD that would be an upgrade, with the sole exception of the expensive T221. Guess now's the time :-)

MetaCosm 14y ago

Microsoft isn't a hardware company. Apple's supply chain dominance is what brought this to market. Microsoft sells some rebranded hardware products (manufactured and designed by Samsung, Acer, IBM, ATI, Nvidia and Asus)... but it makes PROFIT by selling software. Apples makes software, but it makes its PROFIT by selling hardware.

calpaterson 14y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Surface http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Natural_keyboard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Natural_keyboard http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LifeCam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LifeCam http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_SideWinder http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox
- lawnchair_larry 14y ago
  All whitelabel products.
  - UnoriginalGuy 14y ago
    The X-Box is a whitelabel product?
    - MetaCosm 14y ago
      Depends how you define it. But, X-Box (the original) was a PIII + Nvidia + Other PC Hardware... none of it made by Microsoft. The 360 I give them more credit with, because they worked closer with partners and got off the WinTel brand... opting for PowerPC chips with ATI ... again, not manufacturing the hardware.
      - dualogy 14y ago
        "again, not manufacturing the hardware" -- well, you noticed all Macs have nvidia or amd/ati GPUs and Intel processors, and are assembled by Foxconn? "That's because Apple isn't a real hardware company, it's all white-labelled." I guess?

rsynnott 14y ago

> Back when WPF was still called Avalon, Microsoft were pushing the technology as a solution for the soon-to-be-arriving high-dpi displays Although they were quieter about it, it has been quite clear that Apple was interested in resolution independence since at least 10.4, when such features started to show up. Remember that very few third-party Windows applications use WPF. Most first-party stuff, even, doesn't use WPF. We're seeing on the retina Macbook that, while most Cocoa apps work well enough, most non-Cocoa apps are at least somewhat broken; imagine how much worse this effect would be on Windows, where so few apps use the current UI toolkits.

stusmith1977 14y ago
It's a chicken-and-egg situation, agreed, It just seems really strange to me that they spent so much effort pushing and developing the software side, without putting any effort into the hardware, when the two clearly have to go hand-in-hand. Microsoft had the software stack ready - imagine if they had released (via partners) high-dpi laptops and screens shortly afterwards? That actually might have made a Windows machine a compelling and desirable product, instead of just an expensive way to run a browser.
- rsynnott 14y ago
  Apple had a rather similar software stack ready, though; both worked on the basis of a point being a fractional number of pixels. The trouble with this is that while it tended to more or less work for simple things, for complex things, particularly where the programmer was drawing stuff, it was (a) somewhat inefficient and (b) very hard to get right. Apple used to periodically have talks at WWDC about how to get ready for independence back in 2006 or so, but it was clear that few developers were doing so successfully. This new approach, where you have a point be an integer number of pixels, possibly with scaling after the fact (as with the non-standard resolutions available on the retina MacBook) is far simpler for developers, so more likely to work out okay.