alt Hacker NewsOLED, Not for Me
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If your job involves detailed text review (such as coding) then splash out on a display with a pixel density of at least 250 PPI.
The screen shown in this blog looks like it's ~140 PPI. Sure these screens are cheap, but they're best used for moving graphical content.
In the demonstration image the text is just 9 pixels tall, while thatis legible, it is unacceptable for long term reading and is completely reliant on subpixel rendering to produce an impression of smoothness.
The issue is with font rendering software not properly accounting for the subpixel arrangement of the display. I guess it’s a valid concern from a simple pragmatic perspective as a consumer, but as an enthusiast it’s not strictly a problem with OLED. Surely there’s some work out there that tries to improve font rendering on nonuniform subpixel layouts, right?
As the article states, this is why RGB Stripe layouts are the next big things in OLED. Quite exciting, and sub pixel layouts that aren't good for text are exactly why I have an XG27AQMR in front of me for work/gaming instead of an OLED (27" IPS LCD, 1440p, 300hz)
I have been using a 48" LG OLED TV as a monitor for about 2 years. I thought I would love it. But I hated it. Text looked horrible. I was going mad and then Google'd a bit to see if others hated it too. And found that they did. But luckily there are settings that can be changed to turn it into an excellent computer monitor. Once I changed the right settings, it was love. I have 3 monitors on my desk. 32" LG LEDs on the side, 48" OLED in the middle. All 4K. I love this setup. I do occasionally think about replacing the LEDs. I just need the OLED pricing to drop a little more.
This was a validating read. I used a Samsung G9 OLED for the better part of a year and eventually had to stop because the eye strain was terrible. I found myself avoiding my desk because it was a chore to look at the display.
I've moved back to using a pair of 4K LCDs that I had, and honestly the resolution and aspect ratio are better for text and programming anyhow.
Author doesn't mention it but he should try to use BetterDisplay. MacOS interface scaling works well for screens around 200 PPI (2K 13inch, 4K 24inch, 5K 27inch). 4K 32inch is 138 PPI, which likely means he is not using default interface scaling which causes some distortion and out of grid pixel rendering. BetterDisplay fixes this by using an integer multiple of intended GUI scaling resolution before projecting it (3X -> 1.5X).
Something to consider is that the sub pixel layout of OLED is an engineering necessity to achieve longevity and cost (panel yield) objectives.
LCD can have a uniform layout because it's a passive layer doing the filtering. In OLED, each pixel is active and that blue one is trying to burn itself out much faster than the other two.
I can't bring myself to get an OLED when I know it will get the taskbar and window decorations burned into it after a few years. One day if they invent one with truly zero burn-in I'll consider it.
According to Hardware Unboxed this problem goes away with the new generation displays. They are switching over to using a standard (LCD-like) striped pixel layout.
Must say my first generation Samsung display looks amazing both for gaming and programming though. If it wasn’t for the annoying smart-tv stuff, and the mini connectors, it’s a perfect monitor.
It's especially important for people trying to use lower-resolution OLED (e.g., for gaming) - the text fringing can look quite bad. At higher DPI it can be less noticeable, though horizontal lines still have noticeable fringes.
Here is a more detailed look at several different subpixel arrangements: https://pcmonitors.info/articles/qd-oled-and-woled-fringing-...
And encouragingly both LG and Samsung were demoing RGB (LED-style) arrangements at CES this year.
Dell monitors are very hit or miss for me. I’ve got two with very similar model numbers to the OP. One of them has a straight vertical line of red pixels at (30%, 0%). The other doesn’t have an integrated webcam.
Meanwhile I’ve got an MSI OLED 32” 240Hz @ 4k monitor which was super expensive but is absolutely incredible. It takes getting used to a monitor that performs a maintenance routine on itself any time you leave it active for more than a few hours. But it’s great for work (with some aggressive zoom levels) and gaming (with some aggressive black point levels).
> OLEDs make great TVs and gaming monitors [...] But on desktop monitors for still things — text and fine lines — OLEDs currently just aren’t great
It seems that LCD has long been the best technology for desktop monitors - but interestingly, despite its popularity, may never have been the best technology for TVs. CRT, plasma and now OLED have all had better image quality than contemporary LCDs.
I recently replaced my Google Pixelbook with a Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14 with a 1920x1200 14" OLED screen. The text definitely feels off to me. It's bearable, but I wouldn't want this effect on a primary device.
It's a pity such basics as displaying text properly are not prioritized by the OS vendors (one of the many ignored Windows issues https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/issues/25595) while a lot of effort is wasted on stuff users dislike
I have sympathy because it's the kind of problem you probably cannot pick up in the shop, or quickly. You need time in your home, with your HDMI or D-Link, your ambient lighting, your settings.
I begin to feel like we may need the equivalent of what audio shops used to have: a listening room with normal furniture and a big switch to test different things, but for eyes not ears.
I only buy s/h Dell monitors 3-5 years behind bleeding edge because I am a cheapskate with old eyes, who can't see past the dust on my glasses anyway. But I genuinely can relate to this problem. It would suck to invest in the best you can afford and find it's not doing what the dollars expect for you.
I experienced the same issue with the Alienware 27" 360 Hz OLED monitor. While it was great for gaming and I loved the refresh rate, it was terrible for everything else. Text always looked blurry, my eyes would keep trying to focus it and tired themselves out. I started getting headaches and began to doubt my prescription. After months of investigation, visits to the optometrist, I finally narrowed it down to the monitor being the culprit. I gave it away to my son, who on the other hand was thrilled to receive a bonafide gaming monitor. He uses it at 2x scaling and couldn't be happier.
These monitors are great when scaled but have real issues rendering text and other fine details at their native resolution.
Got a nice swyve 34 inch UWQHD with a Samsung panel that is really nice for gaming, and really bad for coding/studying. It's not nice on eyes either. Not making the same mistake again.
I know it's the panel, because I have an office BenQ 21 inch with technology called sth like EyeCare on the side as the second monitor. Compared to the gaming one - it's a balm on my eyes. Sometimes I'd put a document or LLM window there even when the main screen is empty, just because of how nice it feels on the eyes.
Except for few situations where the poor man's HDR does help me see more details in the dark (small edge in multiplayer), I believe that I would be better off with a monitor engineered for office work.
Think about it, I got lured by all the gaming hype, but what I really needed is a monitor that is 80% office and 20% gaming, not 100% gaming. And I believe that's the case with others complaining about the eye strain.
Moisturizing eye drops and Safeeyes (eye exercising Linux app) help a lot though. Safeeyes has an alternative on Mac called EyeLeo (but never used that). Recommend them both to everyone in this thread. Take care of your eyes. They are the most suspectable to drying part of our body - eye exercises help for that. And they are fed with only a miniscule artery, eye exercises help keep a good throughput on that too.
I guess that's why the two most important suppliers of OLED panels for PC monitors (LG and Samsung) are rearranging their subpixel to use LCD-like RGB stripes:
https://www.heise.de/en/news/OLED-with-true-RGB-LG-and-Samsu...
For me the solution to subpixel issues with tiny fonts is to not do subpixels. I have been looking at bitmapped fonts my whole life so I don't see any reason to give up all that perceptual context.
Which is why I ended up buying a replacement 24" 1920x1080 recently. I needed pixels large enough to distinguish with my fave small font. If I want more pixels at once on the screen I need a larger screen.
If the author is sensitive to this level of detail, they should just get a color calibrated high-DPI screen (like an Apple Studio Display) and call it a day.
I’ve recently bought the LG with 4th generation OLED, and for me that works for long coding sessions (I use it for work). They shifted or did something with the pixel arrangement for this generation just for text legibility.
I picked up the same monitor as the author. I'm pretty happy with it myself - I have the Pro-Art display that the author has as well, and the volume of color makes a huge difference for me.
But OLED is a remarkably personal technology. Some people also have issues with how the images are "strobed" during upgrades, etc.
Not on Oled issue but I've noticed that vscode fonts appear much sharper than visual studio fonts. It's subtle, but just enough to make me dislike looking at code in visual studio.
The gaming community has known this forever, it’s a personal preference for how much it bothers someone.
But fret not, they announced at CES there will be OLED with vertical pixel arrangements really soon.
I use two monitors, one is a MSI and the other is a Samsung NVIDIA g sync. The MSI is fed through a PD cord and the Samsung is fed through a HDMI cable. I see the OLED at best buy and while they look great I'm not thrilled about the price tag attached to them. I have broken monitors from moving or accidentally dropping them. I don't feel bad about buying another for $250 and replacing it after two years.
I really love my qd-oled but the eye strain over the last 2 years when using this particular monitor is quite a bit more than my previous monitors. I just recently got better backlighting and went through some settings tweaking but it's still a bit harsh.
The tradeoff is worth it in a lot of scenarios, but I've been thinking about getting a "coding only" monitor that I use for long sessions instead.
It's a bit sad to see hardware manufacturers changing the pixel layout because we weren't able to adapt modern software to do sub-pixel font rendering that works with different layouts out of the box.
The text fringing can be an issue, but the benefits of OLED more than make up for it. Going from IPS to OLED was a step-function improvement, like upgrading from a HDD to SSD.
I haven't really noticed color fringing since changing from a 1st gen panel to a 3rd gen panel at a higher PPI. What I've been curious about though is why the fringing on vertical stripe RGB isn't as noticeable. I would expect to see fringing horizontally for that layout.
I never had any problems with QD-OLED and never saw any color fringing. But it turns out I'm red-green colorblind, so I probably just can't see enough contrast between red and green to notice the fringing.
I just recently picked up a 49" Samsung G9 OLED and also had a similar experience. It felt like the picture was moving and I couldn't focus correctly. I first chalked it up to the low PPI, but after some googling, it was text fringing.
New WOLED panels from LG have an "RGWB" pixel layout so this is no longer an issue.
Yes, I noticed this on OLED laptops.
OTOH the OLED panels on Apple's iPad Pro series are outstanding, and I'm excited for them to come to MacBooks. Yet another example of Apple's hardware team taking its time to do things right.
I always find these articles really interesting, maybe it's just the way my brain works but I can't ever find any meaningful differences or issues with any of the examples.
> but as noted we found this quite obvious to the eye as well
... and then 2 images that look exactly the same to me :(
Buying an OLED screen three years ago was the best tech investment in a long time. Nowadays most tech is "the same, but 5% faster" while OLED truly felt like a revolution. For a year after buying it I was still excited about it. Whenever I use LCD panels I feel pain in my everything. The fact that Ally X uses an LCD panel is its worst problem.
> but sir, what about fringing
Skill issue. Just configure your text rendering correctly.
> but sir, what about burn-in
Didn't happen to me.
OLED is the best current display technology and I can never go back to IPS panels, and VA panels are right out.
It's so hard to find OLEDs with a sensible subpixel layout these days. I wish this stuff were documented and that you could find traditional horizontal subpixel layouts in the OLED mass market.
I have at least one friend who wants individually-addressible bayer layouts, but that likely won't happen.
Oh my god! Why such a long-winded product review/ complaint story with 65 upvotes? Jesus.
tl;dr
The display the author doesn't like is a specific model Dell QD-OLED with a sub pixel arrangement that causes a fringe above / below text.
There are macro screenshots that reveal the sub pixel details of a preferred LCD compared the disliked Dell OLED, and it's easy to agree with the author's discontentment.
But the categorical complaint about "OLED" is an over generalization.
Treat the report as a warning to investigate the sub pixel characteristics of any monitor you may be considering.
I love how he blames OLED for this, but doesn't care to learn the actual cause: that isn't an RGB subpixel orientation. There are many OLEDs with correct subpixel orientation.
He bought a factory defective monitor. LCDs like this exist, Samsung sold them as AMOLEDS called Pentile. They are hideous.
Until subpixel is eradicated from existence, we shall continue to suffer this.
The problem is such:
1) Windows exists.
2) Windows invented Cleartype for Vista, it was ugly and fringed hard because they misunderstood human perception, the sRGB standard, and math.
3) Windows then readjusted Cleartype for DirectWrite. OSX before Retina and Freetype use subpixel tuning also compatible with human perception, sRGB, and math.
4) Many applications on Windows do not know how to ask Windows what the subpixel orientation is; either they assume RGB all the time (do not do this!) or they only read the first monitor (do not do this!). Windows can tell you per monitor, this is the only correct way. This API has existed since Vista.
5) This problem also effects DPI: they either cannot scale or only scale for the first monitor. Windows scaling for you causes _exceptionally bad_ color fringing for subpixel rendering. Again, the API for that has existed since Vista.
6) Many monitors do not list their subpixel orientation in their EDID. Ones that do and also are rotation sensitive do not set their EDID for RGB->VRGB->BGR->VBGR as you rotate them. Windows assumes RGB for any monitor missing that EDID field.
7) Windows only knows (V)RGB and (V)BGR. It does not know W+RGB, it doesn't know any sort of complex multi-row arrangement (such as Pentile).
8) Many applications ignore your Cleartype settings in Windows, and use RGB at default color weights no matter what you do, even if you turn subpixel off and do greyscale only.
9) And the worst sin of all: people embed screenshots in their documentation and websites, and they never update them. The Internet is full of Vista-era fringe-filled Cleartype text. This ties into 5, but is worth mentioning as its own.
Edit: On second reading, the author says they're on a Mac. Macs don't have subpixel rendering anymore. I don't understand the author's complaint, they have greyscale and avoid all these problems.
I will bitch about Apple's mistakes over the past decade, but removing subpixel rendering from their ecosystem was a smart move: makes all their text rendering compatible with all future monitors forever, and moving to HiDPI eliminates the need for it anyways.
This guy is complaining about fringing...on 9- and 10-pixel high fonts. That works out to 1.6mm or 1.8mm high characters on a 140 dpi screen, or about 1/16 of an inch.
He's also got Cleartype on and set to RGB stripe even though the OLED is not RGB stripe (though to be fair, Windows doesn't really make it clear what each page of the ClearType tuner does).
But yeah, if you use a _tiny_ font and sit _really_ close to the screen, you see fringing. In practice for me, it's been unnoticeable.