Ideal Screen Ratio?

So, after seeing that Ideal Screen Res poll, I decided to make my own poll about screen ratios.

So which do you prefer? The standard but slowly dying 16:10? Or the new 16:9 screen? Or even the dead 4:3?

I personally prefer the 16:10 ratio.

 

16:10 (I think) is clearly an improvement over 4:3 in the ability to view documents side by side without having to scale.

16:9 however I think is going too far because for general computing, vertical space is important in terms of websites, document scrolling, etc.

 

I prefer 4:3 because for most of what I use the computer for, vertical space is important. Rarely watch movies.

Also, have you tried putting two documents side by side on a WXGA widescreen like the standard displays on notebooks? Doesn't really work until you get to 19" or bigger.

 

I like 16:10 mostly because I often have several documents open that I switch between. My movies also look pretty good on it.

 

16:10 is the golden ratio for me

 

16:10 is good but I use 16:9 at home because its a 37" HD TV and often times I find that its better due to movies fitting perfectly and many console ports have great 16:9 support but little or no 16:10.

So as far as aspect goes I think I choose 16:9, however currently in almost all cases the 16:10 screen has a higher resolution than the 16:9 screen making it the better screen. Not the better aspect though.

Meaning I would rather have a 1920x1200 16:10 screen than a 1920x1080 16:9 screen since it can display all the content plus more however if they had like a 2033x1200 16:9 screen I would like that even better as then it would have a higher resolution and the aspect I like.

In games you get a slightly wider FOV, Movies fit better, HDTV broadcast fit better, and it lets you place applications side by side easier.

 

i like the current 16:10 display.


the 4:3 display is not wide enough, it is not natural for the eye to see such a narrow screen.

the 16:10 is a nice ratio on most screen sizes. especially the larger one.

the 16:9 i think its too narrow on top and bottom, ever since when reading it is more important to have more space in top to bottom, rather than side to side. this will have too narrow top to bottom when having small screen and having too wide side to side when having large screen.

but, saying that, i do understand the idea of standardising things.

 

i dont really care. i dont want 4:3 but come on, do any of you honestly care about the difference between 16:9 and 16:10?

 

i prefer 16:10 i need my vertical space >.>
16:9 is too narrow for my liking

 

I think it is obvious that most people will vote for either 16:10 or 16:9, therefore it'll turn out to be a 16:10 vs 16:9 debate and we already have one here : monitors 16.9 and 16.10.

 

Doesn't really matter to me either. As long as I have enough space to do what I need, the rest is more or less cookies. I even had this old 4:3 monitor at one point and was perfectly happy with it >.>

16:10 is pretty neat. 16:9 also has its advantages.

 

4:3 for me. Why so many people want to view documents side by side? Following that logic, then you should have a 16:5 screen where you can view 3 or 4 pages side by side

Besides, I'm with Mark Larson. I don't think laptops are a good way to watch movies.

 

Well at least this thread has a poll

But what's with the poll? No love for 5:4? Oh wait, there aren't any 5:4 laptops... xD only monitors. My bad!

Jokes aside, I'm all for 16:10. I don't mind black bars.

 

You're following my logic off a cliff of absurdity, nobody would ever take it that far.

4:3 has a bit too much vertical space that is underutilized, 16:9 has too much horizontal space that is underutilized. 16:10 hits the sweet spot.

 

No to 4:3, fine with either 16:10 or 16:9

 

I prefer 16:9. It uses the most efficient space for watching movies. My 16.4" 16:9 screen is just as big as 17" 16:10 screen when it comes to watch movies. I don't have any problem using it for work. 1600x900 is good enough for me.

 

Almost every reply so far as been in reguards to screen space or screen size. That would be about the size of the monitor or the resolution of the monitor. Not the aspect.

The aspect is simply the ratio of horizontal to vertical pixels.

If you think of that and only that I think 16:9 offers the most advantages.

Things like games can be rendered to fit any ratio screen in most cases. The FOV is what will change and the slightly wider FOV of 16:9 makes the game more immersive. Triple monitor setups for extreme FOV are totally awesome.

Working on websites or documents, 16:9 and 16:10 are equal both will hold two documents side by side depending on the resolution.

Now think of things you cant move/resize like a movie. Most widescreen movies are made in 16:9 so you get to use your entire screen. I use a 37" monitor at home, tossing bars on there is a loss of quite a bit of screen space. Luckily its a 16:9 display though, but man if I have some old content that is 4:3 its horrible I lose like 5" of each side of the screen.

Many movies are actually wider than 16:9 infact cinema almost always is, just its already cropped when its put on a DVD.

Also when it comes to scrolling I find it much easier and more natural to scroll up and down via a mouse scroll wheel than it ever has been to go side to side. A 16:9 ratio offers more width so less chance to scroll side to side.

You know those people that post 1920x1200 pictures on the forum instead of using thumbnails. I can care less about the vertical scroll but when it adds that side scroll it ruins the whole page.

So again the topic is "Ideal Screen Ratio" that means just the ratio. It has nothing to do with screen size, or screen pixels so you have to take that into mind to give a true answer.

There are quad hd displays now that have like 3840x 2160 resolution that are 16:9 and they will hold more stuff than any current 16:10 screen.

 

Square would be optimal.

 

I prefer 16:10 widescreen displays, although I can deal with either 16:9 or 4:3 (although I accidentally voted for 16:9).

 

16:10 is the most comfortable, i my opinion.

 

Does anybody have a comparison picture between 16:9 and 16:10?

 

I'll add my comment but I won't vote.

I "love" 4:3 - but, ever since I've had my "little one" (Sony Vaio SZ71VN/X) i'm OK with 16:10

I suppose there are some aspects to 16:10 that are advantageous over 4:3 (side by side windows, have the "lower" window partially visible)

But I think this has been discussed numerous times...

However, I join in with the people who say more vertical pixels is useful for less scrolling - its getting annoying to read a newspaper online, and needing to scroll every 15 seconds because I run out of screen...

 

It really depends on what I'm using the laptop for. Since I really only use it for office apps or web, I much prefer 4:3 to 16:10.

I have a 14.1" 4:3 and a 13.3" 16:10 and I like the 14.1" more. Both screens are just as wide, but the 13.3" is 1.5" shorter than the 14.1". Now the 13.3" model also has a battery that sticks out about 1" from the back so the maximum length and width dimensions of both my 14.1" and 13.3" laptops are basically the same.

I don't watch movies and I don't compare documents often so I for me 4:3 works. On my 13.3" it seems I have to scroll more often feel like I don't have nearly enough vertical space when working compared to the 14.1".

 

Maybe not 100% accurate, but very close to the real thing. I resized both images according to their relative actual screen area

 

Thanks!
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