Display scaling in macOS, 4k and full hd

[sh00t1ngf1sh]

MacBook Pro 15in 2017 connected to two 32 inch Samsung monitors:

4k monitor at 3840x2160 native
full monitor at 1920x1080 native

Please refer screenshot

My question is, with display scaling I would have thought it should only scale the GUI, not images or video like in Windows.

In the 4K monitor, instead of resolutions it gives the icon text scaling options
Each option when hovering over displays the looks like e.g. 1080p or 2k
It seems only at 1080p/1920x1080 do the images or video display at 1:1 whilst the GUI is enlarged.
At 2k/2560x1440 the images are twice or three times bigger

So my question is, why does macOS scaling scale the whole screen instead of just the GUI. The point of scaling from my perspective should be to allow text to be more readable whilst giving you nearly the same amount of workable area - like in windows?

 

[user_xyz]

Bump for Answers.

 

[allan.nyholm]

There's no solution to this issue as the two OS's does things differently - choose one over the other for the preferred experience with display scaling.

 

[sh00t1ngf1sh]

Apparently the scaling capability also has something to do with the monitor itself AND whether the HDMI cable or port on the monitor is capable of thunderbolt 3.

That said, impossible to work in 4k on a 32" monitor let alone 27". Though I imagine the mac osx scaling at 27" probably gives images at 1:1 and does the GUI at 1:2 or 1:4 if anyone can verify?

 

[Significant1]

In the 4K monitor, instead of resolutions it gives the icon text scaling options
Each option when hovering over displays the looks like e.g. 1080p or 2k
It seems only at 1080p/1920x1080 do the images or video display at 1:1 whilst the GUI is enlarged.
At 2k/2560x1440 the images are twice or three times bigger

I have never owned an retina Mac, so have no experience, but try holding down the alt-key while switching to Scaled. On non-retina it will give your more resolutions, but don't know if it will do anything on retina.

So my question is, why does macOS scaling scale the whole screen instead of just the GUI. The point of scaling from my perspective should be to allow text to be more readable whilst giving you nearly the same amount of workable area - like in windows?

Because it gives all kind of problems with text being to large to fit. I have some old experience as win32 programmer and it was really designed for 96dpi anything else would either cut text or if you tried to design for bigger, you would have lot of empty space in your design.

The gist of what apple does to make bigger text and images look sharp, is to render the selected resolution to a multiplum which gives a bigger resolution than the physical resolution and then scale it down. Eg. your screen has 3840 x 2160 and you choose a scaled resolution of 2560 x 1440 so the graphics card calculates screens in the resolution 5120 x 2880 and scales them down to 3840 x 2160. This makes great demands on the graphics card's performance and memory, but makes it easier to design apps and support older apps without much special consideration, while still getting advantage of high resolutions displays. Search the internet for more specific explanation if you want (is likely described in Apple's developer documentation).

 

[sh00t1ngf1sh]

Yes holding down the opt key enables the final resolutions.

The macOSX scaling is much smoother in appearances in that respect but also as you mentioned it does take a performance hit.

I'm just so surprised people have not caught onto the image scaling proportions...guess most people have full hd and 4k is still mainly for architects, engineers and vloggers.

For the record I find the full HD 31.5" much more comfortable to use and focus on work than the huge amount of information to visually process on a 4k screen.