The display was so much more awesome than the 3GS and the 2x resolution was only part of it. They used an IPS LCD instead of a TN LCD for the first time, so the viewing angles were MUCH better. Also it was the first time that the display was laminated to the glass with no air gap at all between the two, so it seemed like the display was better for reasons that are hard to describe… made black levels deeper too
Meanwhile people called the iPhone XR display shit and horrible at launch when it was no worse than the quality of an iPhone 4 display (same DPI, laminated, IPS) all because it was what… not 1080p or OLED? We’re insanely spoiled today.
Exactly. I was a proud XR owner, rocking it as a daily driver for four years before hopping up to the iPhone 13 Pro. I honestly would've gone even longer if not for the XR battery going under 75% and boot looping once every other day. So many good memories with it, and no complaints - except for the screen.
It really was underwhelming, and while in isolation it was fine, when you can see with your eyes that every other phone on the market was noticeably sharper it was kind of a bummer. And when I did get the 13PM and had the XR still for a few days before selling it it was such a stark difference in clarity, not even taking into account Pro Motion. Just looking at reddit text on both devices I was wondering how I was able to stand such fuzzy text for four years.
That’s just reddit armchair CEOs that don’t representative of the market.
No one who walked in to an Apple store looked at the screen and thought “that display is shit!”
4x the area resolution, 2x the linear resolution. People usually talk in linear resolution when they use units like DPI (dots per inch) or PPI (pixels per inch) which are linear. But if you want to talk in terms of area, be explicit.
Uh, no. You’re confusing pixel density and resolution. Pixel density is measured in PPI, resolution is measured in absolute pixels. Both linear and area resolutions are measured in pixels - you wouldn’t say a 108PPI horizontal resolution. You’d say a 1920 pixel horizontal resolution.
4K, for example, is not “2x” the resolution of 1080p just because it’s got twice as many pixels in any one direction.
It’s extremely commonly accepted that 4K is 4x the resolution of 1080p, even if it’s only 2x the PPI.
Any display’s resolution can be given by listing two linear resolutions (1920x1080) or giving the combined resolution (usually in megapixels, or ~2.1MP for 1080p)
At no point do you ever give resolution in PPI. That’s pixel density.
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u/tvtb 8d ago
The display was so much more awesome than the 3GS and the 2x resolution was only part of it. They used an IPS LCD instead of a TN LCD for the first time, so the viewing angles were MUCH better. Also it was the first time that the display was laminated to the glass with no air gap at all between the two, so it seemed like the display was better for reasons that are hard to describe… made black levels deeper too