Ultra HD vs Full HD. Which one is better?

[R-T-B]

Problem is scaling is far from perfect.

Yeah, except for Integer scaling, I never use scaling. Integer is ok though when going from like 4k->1080, for the obvious reasons of essentially being like native.

 

[Frick]

Yeah, except for Integer scaling, I never use scaling. Integer is ok though when going from like 4k->1080, for the obvious reasons of essentially being like native.

Still not perfect in my experience. Looks like something new has happened the past few years in that area though...

 

[R-T-B]

Still not perfect in my experience. Looks like something new has happened the past few years in that area though...

Mostly, they actually did it. Just setting the res and depending on your monitor or TV scaler never worked. It was always just doing bilinear scaling or similar.

And Integer is still only OK, not perfect. It's not as great as native res, obviously. It just beats blurry crap.

 

[ARF]

It's all about the pixel structure, which isn't visible on a 4K display. I sit in front of a 1 meter 4K TV and I cannot discern the pixels, if it was a 1080p panel I could see the pixel grid from as far back as 2-3 meters.

Yes, exactly. It's because the letters' thickness is one or two pixels with some hacks around them like games with the shades/colours.

Look how ugly this is:

In some extreme cases the font itself is so bad, that some letters are slanted in one direction while other letters are slanted in the opposite.
Like italic to the left and right and no italic all in one word or sentence.

Meh!

 

[Vayra86]

Perhaps this might interest you:

Terms and Functions - TFTCentral

Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) Pulse Width Modulation is something you will hear talked about quite a lot nowadays. We have a full detailed article about PWM which is worth reading....[click link for more]

www.tftcentral.co.uk

This is bigger than resolution and at the same time its even smaller than a single pixel. The subpixel layout has an influence on how each pixel 'looks' and this shows well on any high contrast edges due to the hard cutoff of colors. So text applies in a big way.

Now, why do I mention this, after all, if you run your examples above at native res, wouldn't it just be native and no interpolation in play? WRONG
> https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/typography/opentype/
Windows, and especially Windows 10, loves to screw with your fonts, always has, too. What is new these days is dynamic resolution for fonts and windows in the OS. Especially when working over the cloud, lower resolutions are often used to accomodate faster rescaling of windows and improve general performance. Case in point: the pixels in your 4K example text are not being rendered natively either Its easy to see the blurry mess. Its just filled up a bit more than it is on the 1080p example.

Pixel count is indeed the key difference between 4K and 1080p but you can achieve sharpness irrespective of resolution. Much bigger factor of influence is the source material. Its like your stance on that image sharpening deal.... if the source material is shit, you're just polishing turds no matter how good your equipment really is. And if the source material is high quality, any special sauce to make it 'better' is going to be counter productive. This is a universal rule for media content... it also applies to audio. Shitty source content will never become a high quality mix, it just becomes a shitty source with tricks applied.

Either way... it also seems like you're yet again trying to push some sort of non existant advantage for some technology into people's faces... this is a tech forum. Your observations are yours alone, the rest is just simple spec and fact, and you're often missing that part of things in your considerations.

There is no practical difference between a pixel on a 4K panel and one on a 1080p panel. Pixel density is tied not to resolution alone but also to screen diagonal, and thát is what gives you higher sharpness while retaining all information for each pixel. So the primary concern is not resolution, it is FIRST monitor diagonal, and then the resolution you choose on that diagonal, that determines sharpness for you.

Mostly, they actually did it. Just setting the res and depending on your monitor or TV scaler never worked. It was always just doing bilinear scaling or similar.

And Integer is still only OK, not perfect. It's not as great as native res, obviously. It just beats blurry crap.

This is certainly a big step forward. Blur is just a total killer for anything except movie, there its just not so nice.

 

[Vya Domus]

The problem with scaling, at least in games, has been largely solved by in game GPU scaling and sharpening filters. I can run 1800p, 1600p, etc and it looks fine.

 

[agent_x007]

Yes, exactly. It's because the letters' thickness is one or two pixels with some hacks around them like games with the shades/colours.
Look how ugly this is:

View attachment 162862

In some extreme cases the font itself is so bad, that some letters are slanted in one direction while other letters are slanted in the opposite.
Like italic to the left and right and no italic all in one word or sentence.

Meh!

I didin't saw you drop from FHD vs. 4k monitors into how Fonts work topic (?), so here are my thoughts :
I don't quite get how you can see "slanted letters because of low resolution on your "bad" monitor" (bigger pixels are still squares/rectangles and they aren't slanted in any way - so, it can't be monitor's fault you see a slanted text).

The qouted image is actually made by a monitor screen (and not what you shown in first post). Is it that Ugly ?
I call this reasonable. Sure, 4k get's less visible pixels, but that's why we like 4k.

You can count individual pixels on that image though.
By my rough math text itself is around 118x20 pixels big, or 30mm wide and around 5mm in height on actual 24" screen (it's tiny from where I see it).
@Vya Domus I CANNOT see individual pixels on my screen with naked eye from where I watch it (it's at least a foot away from my eyes), and because of that, I don't see any problem with my screen showing me this "pixelated" image.
I do feel sorry for you with perfect eyesight, that can see pixel grid on FullHD screen from two meters away

PS.

^This is a cut from a 8MP picture of my screen (it was taken in place where I usually have my eyes).
Nothing was change, except distance from screen while taking the picture.
Looks better than the first one, right ?

Main problem with it is the mossaic that is formed when pixels on screen are interpolating with pixels on actual camera sensor.
Our eyes don't have pixels, so we are good on mossaic part
To get this point across :
A 8MP camera picture doesn't show you individual pixels that image is actually made out of.
And again, the example above is REALLY small piece of a picture taken with a digital camera.

Text is perfectly readable (to me) and does not have any issues you pointed out is first post.

 

[ARF]

I didin't saw you drop from FHD vs. 4k monitors into how Fonts work topic (?), so here are my thoughts :
I don't quite get how you can see "slanted letters because of low resolution on your "bad" monitor" (bigger pixels are still squares/rectangles and they aren't slanted in any way - so, it can't be monitor's fault you see a slanted text).

The qouted image is actually made by a monitor screen (and not what you shown in first post). Is it that Ugly ?
I call this reasonable. Sure, 4k get's less visible pixels, but that's why we like 4k.

You can count individual pixels on that image though.
By my rough math text itself is around 118x20 pixels big, or 30mm wide and around 5mm in height on actual 24" screen (it's tiny from where I see it).
@Vya Domus I CANNOT see individual pixels on my screen with naked eye from where I watch it (it's at least a foot away from my eyes), and because of that, I don't see any problem with my screen showing me this "pixelated" image.
I do feel sorry for you with perfect eyesight, that can see pixel grid on FullHD screen from two meters away

PS.
View attachment 162892
^This is a cut from a 8MP picture of my screen (it was taken in place where I usually have my eyes).
Nothing was change, except distance from screen while taking the picture.
Looks better than the first one, right ?

Main problem with it is the mossaic that is formed when pixels on screen are interpolating with pixels on actual camera sensor.
Our eyes don't have pixels, so we are good on mossaic part
To get this point across :
A 8MP camera picture doesn't show you individual pixels that image is actually made out of.
And again, the example above is REALLY small piece of a picture taken with a digital camera.

Text is perfectly readable (to me) and does not have any issues you pointed out is first post.

Nope, still has that black background in between the "M" letters, "O" letters.
Why isn't it the normal blue colour there?

 

[londiste]

Nope, still has that black background in between the "M" letters, "O" letters.
Why isn't it the normal blue colour there?

Drop shadow.

Just the first result to Google search:

How to Remove Shadow Under Icon Text on Windows 10 Desktop | Password Recovery

Here's how to remove shadow under icon text on Windows 10 desktop, making your desktop icons' text labels easier to read against your background.

www.top-password.com

 

[Vayra86]

Nope, still has that black background in between the "M" letters, "O" letters.
Why isn't it the normal blue colour there?

Like I also pointed out to you, Windows does all sorts of funny stuff with fonts. The drop shadow is just one of the examples, but even sizing is affected.

The line between your and my observation of something and the tech at work underneath is there for a reason: any video of whatever kind / image of whatever kind that is computer generation consists of big boxes of tricks. The only right input that doesn't fool you in some way, is native, perfect pixel mapped and neutrally calibrated. That is why for example professional monitors still exist, they achieve a higher accuracy in those exact things. Pixel mapping not so much (though subpixel layout for sure), but color space and neutral calibration most certainly.

For giggles, try this;
Hit start button, and type 'truet' and your can access font settings and pick from all the tiny adaptations windows has in font styling.

 

[londiste]

Text smoothing and antialiasing is almost always these days done with subpixel rendering. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subpixel_rendering

There are different schools of thought for font rendering, Windows vs Mac is probably the best/easiest example. Mac renders fonts as they should be, basically WYSIWYG largely due to Mac's printing roots. ClearType in Windows has a focus on on-screen readability, the tradeoff is font rendering accuracy. Neither is necessarily better as a whole, they are simply different (obviously, Mac way is better for printing and Windows way for on-screen text).

For giggles, try this;
Hit start button, and type 'truet' and your can access font settings and pick from all the tiny adaptations windows has in font styling.

Search for ClearType, you should find 'Adjust ClearType Text', a userfriendly tool to configure aspects of Cleartype.

 

[ARF]

Very helpful discussion

Look at more comparison images:





Source: Google search images.

 

[Nuckles56]

I've had both 1080p and 4k 32" displays and the difference is amazing, I could never go back to 1080p for large displays. 1080p is fine for 15" laptops and alike, where the difference isn't nearly as obvious.

 

[JustAnEngineer]

QHD (2560x1440) is the sweet spot for gaming.

 

[Caring1]

Very helpful discussion

Look at more comparison images:

The image on the right is much sharper for me, does that mean 1080p HDR is better than 4K or are the screens under the wrong heading?

 

[Chomiq]

The image on the right is much sharper for me, does that mean 1080p HDR is better than 4K or are the screens under the wrong heading?

More likely benq adding sharpening in hdr mode.

 

[kayjay010101]

Very helpful discussion

Look at more comparison images:




Source: Google search images.

Top image is comparing sharpness at a wildly zoomed in level. Not very realistic unless you sit an inch from your screen and make your 24" screen take up your FOV like a 100" screen. In which case, 4K would be very beneficial over 1080p. But for normal people at normal monitor sizes sitting at normal viewing distance, it's a luxury more than a necessity. 4K is very nice, but it only starts being actually useful or worth the money once you get into monitors above 27", like 32", 34", or above into TV-territory. 4K on something like a 24" is just wasted money for the vast majority of people.

For the second image, they're comparing two different monitors with wildly different colors. Comparing apples to apples, 4K vs 1080p, it shouldn't affect colors at all. Only sharpness. This is comparing apples to oranges. So the comparison is moot.

And either way they're both at the same size so obviously 4K is going to look sharper. I don't see what point that you're trying to make with that second image. 4K is sharper than 1080p? Well, duh. But apart from sharpness, the image should look identical. The reason why the two monitors look different is not because of resolution, but because of the color that the individual panels produce. We might be looking at IPS vs TN, or calibrated vs non-calibrated, or a million other factors that actually change the overall look of the image. There are plenty of 1080p panels that look worse than 4K ones, but not because they're 1080p, but because they're usually cheaper and therefore use cheaper panels. Likewise, there are some entry-level 4K monitors that look horrid compared to high-end 1080p panels.

Overall image quality is so, so, so much more than just sharpness. It's a factor amongst tens of other, just as important factors. Color reproduction, refresh rate, input latency, sharpness, black levels, contrast, HDR/dynamic range, panel size, brightness, glossy/matte panel, display tech (IPS, TN, VA, OLED, etc.), etc. all make up how good and enjoyable a monitor is to use.

 

[EarthDog]

Top image is comparing sharpness at a wildly zoomed in level. Not very realistic unless you sit an inch from your screen and make your 24" screen take up your FOV like a 100" screen. In which case, 4K would be very beneficial over 1080p. But for normal people at normal monitor sizes sitting at normal viewing distance, it's a luxury more than a necessity. 4K is very nice, but it only starts being actually useful or worth the money once you get into monitors above 27", like 32", 34", or above into TV-territory. 4K on something like a 24" is just wasted money for the vast majority of people.

For the second image, they're comparing two different monitors with wildly different colors. Comparing apples to apples, 4K vs 1080p, it shouldn't affect colors at all. Only sharpness. This is comparing apples to oranges. So the comparison is moot.

And either way they're both at the same size so obviously 4K is going to look sharper. I don't see what point that you're trying to make with that second image. 4K is sharper than 1080p? Well, duh. But apart from sharpness, the image should look identical. The reason why the two monitors look different is not because of resolution, but because of the color that the individual panels produce. We might be looking at IPS vs TN, or calibrated vs non-calibrated, or a million other factors that actually change the overall look of the image. There are plenty of 1080p panels that look worse than 4K ones, but not because they're 1080p, but because they're usually cheaper and therefore use cheaper panels. Likewise, there are some entry-level 4K monitors that look horrid compared to high-end 1080p panels.

Overall image quality is so, so, so much more than just sharpness. It's a factor amongst tens of other, just as important factors. Color reproduction, refresh rate, input latency, sharpness, black levels, contrast, HDR/dynamic range, panel size, brightness, glossy/matte panel, display tech (IPS, TN, VA, OLED, etc.), etc. all make up how good and enjoyable a monitor is to use.

Good. It wasnt only me wondering why he put those images up.

Could be several reasons why the 1080 looks better. That side by side to compare is ridiculous. Lol

 

[ARF]

The image on the right is much sharper for me, does that mean 1080p HDR is better than 4K or are the screens under the wrong heading?

Good. It wasnt only me wondering why he put those images up.

Could be several reasons why the 1080 looks better. That side by side to compare is ridiculous. Lol

It's very possible that one side is Radeon image, and the other is GeForce but who knows. If you find the images, check if there are any details about them..

Top image is comparing sharpness at a wildly zoomed in level. Not very realistic unless you sit an inch from your screen and make your 24" screen take up your FOV like a 100" screen. In which case, 4K would be very beneficial over 1080p. But for normal people at normal monitor sizes sitting at normal viewing distance, it's a luxury more than a necessity. 4K is very nice, but it only starts being actually useful or worth the money once you get into monitors above 27", like 32", 34", or above into TV-territory. 4K on something like a 24" is just wasted money for the vast majority of people.

This is not correct. 1080p image always contains less image information and is inferior in quality. No matter the distance.
Distance doesn't add detail or compensate for lack of detail.
More pixels on the image add detail and clarity.

For the second image, they're comparing two different monitors with wildly different colors. Comparing apples to apples, 4K vs 1080p, it shouldn't affect colors at all. Only sharpness. This is comparing apples to oranges. So the comparison is moot.

This is again wrong.
4K monitors are usually with 10-bit panels, while 1080p panels are 6 or 8 bits.
And the colours range is wider - 100% sRGB vs 75% sRGB, just as an example.

 

[EarthDog]

It's very possible that one side is Radeon image, and the other is GeForce but who knows. If you find the images, check if there are any details about them..

Respectfully, I'm not looking for them. Trying to judge IQ off of pictures like that is quiet frankly, useless. This thread really feels like the blind helping the blind here trying to compare with that image. Yikes.

This is not correct. 1080p image always contains less image information and is inferior in quality. No matter the distance.
Distance doesn't add detail or compensate for lack of detail.
More pixels on the image add detail and clarity.

There is the thing with your eyes being able to see the difference is what I believe he is getting after. You are techincally correct... however if your eyes can't see it... But this is all about pixel pitch/dpi, screen size and how far you are sitting away from it.

As far as monitors go, it depend on the monitor as to what panel (bits) it is using and color gamut. You can find plenty of 1080p/2560x1440 panels that are 10 bit and run more colors.

10 bit monitor | Newegg.com

Search Newegg.com for 10 bit monitor. Get fast shipping and top-rated customer service.

www.newegg.com

But yeah, that image and trying to compare anything off of it is, an exercise in futility.

 

[ARF]

This thread really feels like the blind helping the blind here trying to compare with that image. Yikes.

Say thanks to God that I am not a moderator because if I am, you would have been banned very long time ago.

Now, learn the benefits and advantages of 4K.
Article from year 2014.

• 4K pictures have more detail. ...
• Better image depth. ...
• Better colour handling. ...
• A more cinematic, immersive experience. ...
• 4K fits with the growing desire to own bigger TVs. ...
• 4K is the future – it's not just a fad. ...
• 4K TVs aren't as expensive as you might think. ...
• 4K makes 3D better.

4K TVs: 9 Reasons You Should Buy One -- And 9 More Why You Shouldn't

A balanced investigation into the pros and cons of 4K TVs.

www.forbes.com

 

[EarthDog]

Say thanks to God that I am not a moderator because if I am, you would have been banned very long time ago.

lol, no. Say thanks to God that you have knowledgeable people here trying to help you as best they can...including me.

I'm sorry, ARF, but this thread feels all over the place to me. You post an image of two screens and expect some kind of worthwhile comparison and it just isn't there. Now a link on 4K TV's (not monitors - the article is 6 years old). Some of the high level concepts are comparable (allows bigger TVs, more detail, etc) certainly, but if that was intended to support the panels/color, etc...it falls woefully short. I'm simply saying there are plenty of 1080p/2560x1440 monitors with 10-bit panels that cover a wider gamut. It just depends on the panel used in the monitor. Perhaps more 4K use higher bit panels, I don't know...but we don't even know what models those are to even try and compare.

Again, apologies if I have offended you by being blunt and honest. But you aren't going to get squat from that image trying to compare the two monitors for sooooooooooo many reasons (of which a user touched on some already).

 

[ARF]

lol, no. Say thanks to God that you have knowledgeable people here trying to help you as best they can...including me.

I'm sorry, ARF, but this thread feels all over the place to me. You post an image of two screens and expect some kind of worthwhile comparison and it just isn't there. Now a link on 4K TV's (not monitors - the article is 6 years old). Some of the high level concepts are comparable (allows bigger TVs, more detail, etc) certainly, but if that was intended to support the panels/color, etc...it falls woefully short. I'm simply saying there are plenty of 1080p/2560x1440 monitors with 10-bit panels that cover a wider gamut. It just depends on the panel used in the monitor. Perhaps more 4K use higher bit panels, I don't know...but we don't even know what models those are to even try and compare.

Again, apologies if I have offended you by being blunt and honest. But you aren't going to get squat from that image trying to compare the two monitors for sooooooooooo many reasons (of which a user touched on some already).

There aren't as many 10-bit 1080p panels (or they are prohibitively expensive) compared to how many 10-bit Ultra HD panels are available.
The standard itself is such that even the lowest end Ultra HD panels are already 10-bit.
While the highest-end Full HD panels are 10-bit.

In fact, the pixel grid changes the image because of the black spaces between the pixels. You still see them.

View attachment 162892

 

[EarthDog]

There aren't as many 10-bit 1080p panels (or they are prohibitively expensive) compared to how many 10-bit Ultra HD panels are available.
The standard itself is such that even the lowest end Ultra HD panels are already 10-bit.
While the highest-end Full HD panels are 10-bit.

In fact, the pixel grid changes the image because of the black spaces between the pixels. You still see them.

Will you post a reference supporting that assertion (bold)? I'd like to read it.

...but that still doesn't make that image and using it to compare between the two monitors worth anything. Do you understand why we're making that point?

 

[agent_x007]

In fact, the pixel grid changes the image because of the black spaces between the pixels. You still see them.

Pixel grid can't be seen on that quoted image.
Here's a pixel grid from Your earlier post :

Since pixels are those blocks with blue/green/red lights, the empty space between pixels is a lot smaller than the size of single subpixel).
In short : Black spaces between pixels on image You quoted are made out of... pixels.
They are simply part of ClearType font I use, and are NOT the result of using low res screen.