rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) (11/15/90)
gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: > Why don't we see monitors that are 2048*1532, at 150 dpi? Would the > radiation from the high-frequency modulators fry your brains? There are some monitors with 150 dpi resolution. Princeton has had one for a year or more; Cornerstone (which makes the controller for that Princeton monitor) has had a large-screen 120 dpi for a while and I think now has a large-screen 150 dpi. They're not cheap...and part of the reason is the frequencies at which they have to operate. (It's unwieldy to connect the monitor to the machine with a waveguide.:-) There are three factors which make high-res monitors tough: - Video memory requirements and bandwidth requirements go as the square of the increase in resolution. - You can't get away with the interlace cheat, because you just can't make the sweep circuitry stable enough to keep the two fields spaced accurately. - You need a good refresh rate--the sort of scrutiny that a high- res monitor gets will make any flicker unacceptable. It's got to be > 60 Hz; it's better at around 70. By the time you factor all these together (and allow for retrace times, which have to be generous), a 1600x1280 display is up around 200 MHz, and the 2048x1532 in ">" is pushing 300 MHz. It can be done (and has been) but it's not cheap enough to approach the knee in the price:quantity curve. Also, note that the quadratic effect of increased resolution can get you on the CPU side...you have to move a lot of bits. (Today, though, the limit is likely to show up in the video-memory subsystem first--it's so busy shoveling bits to the screen that the CPU ends up waiting.) > Is there a problem with the physics of monitor phosphors? Not really...assuming you're talking about monochrome. Forget color for the time being...it's not going to do any good to be at 150 dpi (which is roughly 6 dots/mm) with a .25 mm dot pitch tube! That, unfortunately, points to another problem in pricing these beasts: "Everyone" wants color so that they can have their cute window borders and clocks with multi-color hands, and other display-on-bad-drugs useless effects (but that's another flame for another time:-)... As a result, people are buying cruddy-looking color displays, driving the prices down, and ignoring the good-looking mono displays, which keeps the mono quantities down and prices up. NeXT is a prime example here--they have one of the best-looking (most readable and honestly *useful*) B&W displays I've seen, but they've been pushed into color by the feature-mad marketplace. -- Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 Cellular phones: more deadly than marijuana.
dave@tygra.ddmi.com (David Conrad) (11/15/90)
rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes: )gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: ) )> Why don't we see monitors that are 2048*1532, at 150 dpi? ) )There are some monitors with 150 dpi resolution.... ) )> Is there a problem with the physics of monitor phosphors? ) )Not really...assuming you're talking about monochrome. Forget color for )the time being...it's not going to do any good to be at 150 dpi (which is )roughly 6 dots/mm) with a .25 mm dot pitch tube! ... )-- )Dick Dunn rcd@ico.isc.com -or- ico!rcd Boulder, CO (303)449-2870 I've heard a report that a Japanese manufacturer (I think it was Sony) is working on a 2048x2048 color monitor. Can anyone confirm this rumour? I think I read it in the New Technology section of PC Tech magazine. -- David R. Conrad dave@tygra.ddmi.com -- = CAT-TALK Conferencing Network, Prototype Computer Conferencing System = - 1-800-825-3069, 300/1200/2400/9600 baud, 8/N/1. New users use 'new' - = as a login id. <<Redistribution to GEnie PROHIBITED!!!>>> = E-MAIL Address: dave@ThunderCat.COM
jonah@dgp.toronto.edu (Jeff Lee) (11/15/90)
rcd@ico.isc.com (Dick Dunn) writes: >gillies@m.cs.uiuc.edu writes: >> Why don't we see monitors that are 2048*1532, at 150 dpi? Would the >> radiation from the high-frequency modulators fry your brains? >There are some monitors with 150 dpi resolution. Princeton has had one for >a year or more; Cornerstone (which makes the controller for that Princeton >monitor) has had a large-screen 120 dpi for a while and I think now has a >large-screen 150 dpi. They're not cheap...and part of the reason is the >frequencies at which they have to operate. (It's unwieldy to connect the >monitor to the machine with a waveguide.:-) MegaScan makes some B/W monitors that are 4096x3300 at 300 dpi (a 1.5Gbit video rate). They also have displays with built in bitblit and 100Mbit/s fiber-optics interfaces. Supposedly have a 12bit grayscale monitor at 200dpi. I don't dare ask the price.
adoyle@bbn.com (Allan Doyle) (11/16/90)
In article <508@tygra.ddmi.com> dave@tygra.UUCP (David Conrad) writes: > >I've heard a report that a Japanese manufacturer (I think it was Sony) >is working on a 2048x2048 color monitor. Can anyone confirm this rumour? >I think I read it in the New Technology section of PC Tech magazine. >-- >David R. Conrad >dave@tygra.ddmi.com >-- >= CAT-TALK Conferencing Network, Prototype Computer Conferencing System = >- 1-800-825-3069, 300/1200/2400/9600 baud, 8/N/1. New users use 'new' - >= as a login id. <<Redistribution to GEnie PROHIBITED!!!>>> = >E-MAIL Address: dave@ThunderCat.COM Yes, Sony has a 2k by 2k monitor. It's 25 inches across (not diagonal) and monstrously large. Last time we checked, they wanted $35k-40k for it. Hitatchi is working on a 2k by 1532 monitor, I'm not sure when it will be a real product. Then there are the 1600 x 1280 monitors, Hitachi, Idek, and Monitronix are the manufacturers I've seen. Prices for these range in the $3k to $5k range. This seems to be drifting away from comp.arch into comp.graphics territory... Allan Doyle adoyle@bbn.com BBN Systems and Technologies Corporation (617) 873-3398 70 Fawcett Street, Cambridge, MA 02138
b645zai@utarlg.utarl.edu (Jay Finger) (11/17/90)
In article <508@tygra.ddmi.com>, dave@tygra.ddmi.com (David Conrad) writes... >I've heard a report that a Japanese manufacturer (I think it was Sony) >is working on a 2048x2048 color monitor. Can anyone confirm this rumour? >I think I read it in the New Technology section of PC Tech magazine. They had at least one operational unit at SigGraph '90 in Dallas in August. Just as sharp as a normal Trinitron, but the tube was about 22" square, and really was 2048 x 2048. Just think how much of your Lotus spreadsheets you could see at one time :-) ---- Jay Finger Computer Science and Engineering, University of Texas at Arlington b645zai@utarlg.utarl.edu finger@csun5.utarl.edu