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You sure about that? Desktop resolution is 72 ppi


Whose desktop? 72 ppi would be a 1080p screen at 30". Or 1366x768 at 22". That's pretty low ppi even for your average Joe.

They also said their desktop. Though I don't know what resolution/size it would be to beat 266 ppi. I'm guessing a 4k laptop screen, as a 4k 24" monitor is only 183ppi.


72dpi was normal/standard... about two decades ago.

About the closest thing we have to a "normal" desktop dpi nowadays is probably 24 inches @ 1920x1080, which is ~92dpi.


> About the closest thing we have to a "normal" desktop dpi nowadays is probably 24 inches @ 1920x1080, which is ~92dpi.

Funnily enough, 96dpi is actually the reference that Windows uses. 200% scaling factor is therefore 192dpi, and 250% is 240dpi.

Explains why Windows defaults to 250% scaling on 15" 4K monitors, like laptops. Or 125% on 15" 1080p monitors!


I was curious about the reason for the 96dpi number and found this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dots_per_inch#Computer_monitor...

There's interesting history behind these numbers.


> I'm guessing a 4k laptop screen

Yeah I use one of those 15.6" portable monitors. It's because I have a medical condition that requires me to lay in bed for ~all day ~every day, but I can no longer use actual laptops due to how fragile they are. But I like the laptop form factor as "something that can be used in bed". So here I am.

The monitor itself costed around $70 for 4K. It's only sRGB, but it's honestly the most accurate sRGB display I own aside from my phone. Even beats my laptop, because the laptop is 8-bit Adobe RGB.


This is from a professional design company:

>The optimal resolution for images on screen is 72 DPI. Increasing the DPI won’t make the image look any better, it’ll just make the file larger, which will probably slow down the website when it loads or the file when it opens.

https://largeprinting.com/resources/image-resolution-and-dpi...


As your link points out DPI and PPI aren't really the same thing. DPI has to do with the resolution of the edited/saved image. Usually, it's determined by your editing software. PPI is the physical or effective resolution of your display. You almost definitely want a better than 72ppi display for text work because otherwise fonts will look absurdly pixelated like in the early days of "desktop publishing." I don't think it's even possible anymore to buy a true computer monitor with less than 100ppi, although if you're using an old 768p 49-inch "HDTV" as a PC display it's going to give you something like 32ppi.

https://www.sven.de/dpi/


A high PPI is great for text work, 220 is close to print quality, if it weren’t for the backlight it would look like paper.

One reason I WFH is that it’s the only way I can use a decent monitor at work (outside of the laptop one).


Absolutely, the main reason I want 4K so bad is for crisp text and vector rendering. I actually do have a non-backlit tablet with around 220 DPI, it's the reMarkable 2[0] and the text still looks pretty fuzzy due to that pixel density (it's nowhere near print quality). Print quality is usually around 300–600 DPI at the low end.

[0]: https://remarkable.com


> 220 is close to print quality

Would a decent laser printer be in that ballpark?


They seem to be a print company rather than design, which explains why they don't understand DPI for screens.

Above all, what DPI looks good enough for humans to notice depends on how close the screen is to the user's eyes, which is why phones tend to have higher DPIs than computer monitors which tens to have higher DPIs than TVs.

But even a computer screen at 72 DPI is pretty shit these days.


> Desktop resolution is 72 ppi

For a mid-range screen in the early 90s, right?


> Desktop resolution is 72 ppi

You have to assume _both_ their screen size and resolution to come up with ppi, so not sure where you're getting 72 from.

Speaking for my personal devices, my laptop is 201 ppi and my desktop is a little over half that at 109 (27" 1440p).


Sure? And I have a 4K monitor at 15.6", so around 280ppi. It doesn't matter what "desktop resolution" is.




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