What environment are you talking about? I run KDE Plasma on X11 and fractional scaling is ok.
More importantly, text quality on Linux is identical at 175% to 200%.
Have you ever compared 27" 5K to 27" 4K side-by-side?
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Are there any monitors for Windows that has about 218 ppi like the 5k iMac?
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What environment are you talking about? I run KDE Plasma on X11 and fractional scaling is ok.
More importantly, text quality on Linux is identical at 175% to 200%.
Have you ever compared 27" 5K to 27" 4K side-by-side?
I tried numerous distros and desktop environments, they all sucked. Also performance when using fractional scaling is abysmal. I read a lot about the problems and I'm not sure if Linux has a way out of this mess right now.
I switched from a MacBook to a ThinkPad last year with the plan to use Linux. Well, that didn't work out. Now I'm stuck with Windows 10 (which I hate now after using it daily for a year) and WSL 2 (which is the only glimmer of hope in all that).
And yes, I used a 27" 4K beside a 5K iMac. It's noticeable. It's not a deal breaker, but I would absolutely prefer the higher DPI for work.
My experiences with running KDE X11 (Manjaro) on a 2020 Ideapad with integrated graphics is decent. My solution is set fractional scaling to 200%, and then "Force font DPI" to whatever you feel comfortable with. I really have no complaints with performance or visual problems after doing that.
The fixes for "retina" screens have been relatively recent (past six months), so perhaps you were trying a less bleeding-edge distribution than Manjaro. Plasma 5.21 with kernel 5.12 is really very nice to use for me, and you will get a lot of Thinkpad support built in.
The fixes for "retina" screens have been relatively recent (past six months), so perhaps you were trying a less bleeding-edge distribution than Manjaro. Plasma 5.21 with kernel 5.12 is really very nice to use for me, and you will get a lot of Thinkpad support built in.
200% isn't fractional scaling though 
As I said, I tried multiple distros and most desktop environments... 2 weeks ago was the last time a gave it a try. I'm done with it, it doesn't work. I need a working system, not something I have to hack around with. I'm actually quite sad, I love Pop_OS and Gnome, it's such a clean and nice system. But it doesn't matter anymore, MacOS I'm coming home when a proper MacBook releases.
As I said, I tried multiple distros and most desktop environments... 2 weeks ago was the last time a gave it a try. I'm done with it, it doesn't work. I need a working system, not something I have to hack around with. I'm actually quite sad, I love Pop_OS and Gnome, it's such a clean and nice system. But it doesn't matter anymore, MacOS I'm coming home when a proper MacBook releases.