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M4 MacBook Pros use a quantum dot (QD) film rather than a red KSF phosphor film

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151 points zdw | 8 comments | 16 Nov 24 00:21 UTC | HN request time: 0.818s | source | bottom
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newZWhoDis ◴[16 Nov 24 01:38 UTC] No.42153389[source]▶
I don’t care how much they improve the CPUs, not upgrading before OLED
replies(2): >>42153640 #>>42153844 #
1. imbnwa ◴[16 Nov 24 03:19 UTC] No.42153844[source]▶
Doesn’t OLED pixel layout not line up with modern text rendering engines? At least that’s what I believe I’ve read from reports on banding around text on Windows in particular that makes long-running text work a problem.
replies(4): >>42153864 #>>42153886 #>>42154477 #>>42154603 #
2. wmf ◴[16 Nov 24 03:22 UTC] No.42153864[source]▶
That depends which OLED panel you're talking about; they're not all the same.
replies(1): >>42154411 #
3. ipsum2 ◴[16 Nov 24 03:26 UTC] No.42153886[source]▶
People read text on the OLED screen of the iPad Pro all the time.
replies(1): >>42154408 #
4. imbnwa ◴[16 Nov 24 04:57 UTC] No.42154408[source]▶
Yeah think its a ClearType issue[0] specifically then

[0]https://github.com/microsoft/PowerToys/issues/25595

replies(1): >>42154456 #
5. imbnwa ◴[16 Nov 24 04:57 UTC] No.42154411[source]▶
See reply to sibling
6. jpgvm ◴[16 Nov 24 05:08 UTC] No.42154456{3}[source]▶
Freetype also doesn't do the right thing on RGBW at least. Reading code in the repo suggests it's possible to reconfigure it to work properly with the Harmony algorithm but I haven't worked out how yet. If anyone knows how to sponsor efforts to fix this I would totally contribute to that.

A separate problem is that I don't think there is a standard way for monitors to communicate the subpixel layout in such a way the font rendering engine will have access to it. That seems like a pretty big oversight when introducing these in the first place.

7. PittleyDunkin ◴[16 Nov 24 05:12 UTC] No.42154477[source]▶
I can't imagine subpixel rendering is at all worth it on modern DPIs
8. cosmic_cheese ◴[16 Nov 24 05:42 UTC] No.42154603[source]▶
Shouldn’t be an issue under macOS for the most part, which has used grayscale antialiasing for several years since subpixel AA isn’t of much benefit with HiDPI displays and complicates text rendering considerably.

If there are any problems, it’ll probably be with cross platform software that doesn't use native text rendering and assumes RGB subpixel arrangements instead of obeying the system.