Advice Requested - AW13: FHD or QHD Question

Hi all,
A little background first. I'm currently using an Alienware M11x R3/i7, max spec, Red, and love it. I'm a huge fan of it's size, styling, speed, basically everything EXCEPT for its crappy screen. 1366X768 means I'm scrolling all the time -- Even horizontally now, which is bugging the fire out of me.

My concern is that I'm getting "burned" by scrolling, and I'll overcompensate by getting the QHD screen on the new 13 and just can't see/use the darn thing without a magnifying glass.
Unlike probably most who buy AW, I don't use this primarily as a gaming rig. (My gaming rig is an AW X51r2 with GTX980 mod on 3 Dell U2412@5760x1200.) Instead, as a business consultant, I want something portable-ish (don't care about 5 vs 3lbs though), that's semi-stylish, unique (not to get lost in a corp environment), and won't show me the hourglass for long.

Since I don't really use this for gaming, and don't care about framerate as a primary issue, I'm curious from AW13 owners if the QHD screen makes things too small/hard to read?

I'm planning on staying Windows 7 until a little ways into Win10 (I'm not an early adopter in anyhting that touches business applications), which means I'll most likely have to fight scaling issues, but the thought of a touch screen capable sounds nice, esp. since my dealings with Dell's clickpad (a la XPS 12's, etc) haven't been all that....reliable (sometimes it just doesn't work until a reboot, esp on the XPS12 9q33's)...

So, Anyone with an AW13, could you weigh in on your opinions about the QHD/FHD screen? If the clickpad was indeed a true touchpad, I'd probably just go with the FHD screen for "compatibility"/useability, but since they don't offer either 1)real touchpad 2) touch-aware FHD, I'm not really sure what's best....The thought of a 13" screen with more real estate than my 24" U2412's sounds nuts though.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
MM

 

I haven't seen a comparison between the two, but I'm positive that some apps will be super small. I've heard many mentioned, like Origin and business/productivity apps, that require the use of the magnifying option. I would imagine that the icons, both on the desktop and on the favorites bar (chrome), would be similar to when I put my Alienware 14's 1080p screen on the "small" text setting. Unlike the 4k displays, the 13's won't be able to cleanly downscale to 1080p without blurriness. You might ask the Razer Blade owners, how this situation is on their machine. You also have to decide whether you prefer the non-glare matte 1080 or the mirror reflections of the QHD. If you are using it in the office, as you mentioned, those overhead lights will be pretty miserable for viewing.

 

If you plan on getting QHD, make sure to get Windows 7 Pro. Ghosting appears not as often (even as frequent as not at all) in Windows 7 on the OHD panel compared to Windows 8.1 where it'll happen.
I use the QHD panel, and it isn't as bad as some people might think. I find it tolerable without any magnification if that helps with imagining.
Oh, and the touchpad is a clickpad. It's fine for what a clickpad can be.

 

I felt the same...coming from an m11x wanting as much screen real estate as possible and ordered the QHD 13. Print and windows were much to small without scaling (IMO). I returned it and got the FHD. I still have to use a little bit of scaling, but I think that is mostly due to my eyes, and not the screen. Note that I had win 8.1 on both.