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Maximus434

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 11, 2006
109
0
Hi,

As I'm still deciding whether to get a glossy or matte screen with my 15" Macbook Pro, I really need to see the two up close to compare.

Unfortunately there are no Apple stores here at all, and none of the resellers have a glossy display, so I'm asking anyone here with a glossy MBP please take a picture and post it here so those of us still deciding can have a look.

Also anyone with a matte screen it would be great if you could do the same.
 
it's hard to tell with pictures, i've never used both, but here's a picture of my MBP with a Matte screen and my brother's Dell XPS w/ glossy screen.

As you can see from the pics, the glossy does have glare, but it's not really THAT bad, however its still there. I find it almost impossible to get glare on my my screen.
 

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I have a glossy MB, and a client has a matte MBP (Which I have been doing a large amount of work on).

Glossy looks great, the reflections are minimal unless used in an area with a large amount of natural sunlight.

Matte screens do not look as bright, or colourful as the glossy screens, BUT they display colours correctly.

I have found that it is difficult to work in photoshop with the glossy screen as colours do not seem the same as on normal monitors, so you should really think about it's purpose.

If you want to give presentations, play games or do general word processing & web browsing - go glossy.

If you want to do photo editing, printing, web design or other design work, go for matte.

That is my opinion anyway ;)
 
i went to compusa yesterday to check it out. they BOTH will have glare, make no mistake. the glossy screen just reflects it more. its really personal preference though. im still undecided myself.
 
matttrick said:
i went to compusa yesterday to check it out. they BOTH will have glare, make no mistake. the glossy screen just reflects it more. its really personal preference though. im still undecided myself.
true they both gare some at the stores, but i dont think anyone's house has as much light as CompUSA does.
 
Thanks for the pics Xander. I'm hoping someone will chime in a pic of a glosssy MBP to compare more squarely.

Booth screens have their plus points so in the end it doesn't really matter what screen anyone goes for (apart from ship time!), I'm just trying to get a better picture (no pun intended).
 
Maximus434 said:
Unfortunately there are no Apple stores here at all, and none of the resellers have a glossy display...
Really? I was at costco the other day and all of their notebooks had glossy screens (no matte in sight).

Glossy is really the way to go.
 
EricNau said:
Really? I was at costco the other day and all of their notebooks had glossy screens (no matte in sight).

Glossy is really the way to go.
So you should go glossy because all the other notebooks at Costco had them? That's terrible logic!

-Matt
 
EricNau said:
Really? I was at costco the other day and all of their notebooks had glossy screens (no matte in sight).

Glossy is really the way to go.

Not everyone on the internet is from America.
 
MattDell said:
So you should go glossy because all the other notebooks at Costco had them? That's terrible logic!
No, you should buy glossy because I say so! :p

...But really, I wasn't trying to imply that you should buy a glossy screen because they are more popular; it was just my opinion that glossy really is nicer.
 
Another advantage of the Matte finish is that there arent as many fingerprints. And if your like me, matte's the way to go, I HATE it when someone touches my screen with greasy fingers.
 
Maximus434 said:
Not everyone on the internet is from America.
Huh? You asked for opinions, ... he gave you his. The fact it came from a visit to an American store shouldn't mean anything.

I prefer glossy. Before I got my MacBook I had a matte 15" PowerBook, so that's what I'm comparing. The reason I like glossy is that the colors look more vivid to me, the screen (when powered on) totally hides smudges, and outside in my backyard during the day, I can see the glossy screen whereas the matte totally washes out.

I've never had a glare problem with glossy that tilting the screen the slightest didn't fix.

Xander562 said:
Another advantage of the Matte finish is that there arent as many fingerprints. And if your like me, matte's the way to go, I HATE it when someone touches my screen with greasy fingers.
Hmmm, I find the exact opposite. When my MacBook is off, the screen shows fingerprints and smudges, but the minute you turn it on, they totally disappear. My PowerBook screen, once smudged, stayed smudged until I iKleared it, whether the screen was on or off.
 
EricNau said:
Really? I was at costco the other day and all of their notebooks had glossy screens (no matte in sight).

Glossy is really the way to go.

Yeah it seems to me that every retailer I go to (BestBuy, Circuit City, etc.) has 95% glossy.

Why is this?

Is this the way things are moving or do they do this to make them look better, so the salesman can tell customers these are better screens.

Personally I do not like the glossy screen. I am going to buy a MBP over MB for that reason alone (almost). I hope that this is not the trend in laptops.
 
ChickenSwartz said:
Yeah it seems to me that every retailer I go to (BestBuy, Circuit City, etc.) has 95% glossy.
In the harsh lighting of a retail store and for somebody who's just glancing at two side by side computers, the glossy is going to look drastically better, just because it's so bright. Simple sales tactic.

Under closer inspection, if you're picky, glossy screens tend to do funky stuff with colors for whatever reason, so I'm not particularly fond of them. Not to mention glare is a bigger problem than brightness for me--I generally end up with my MBP's brightness turned down, but glare really sucks.

This isn't a 1:1 comparison since the MBs have cheaper panels than the MPB, but I had my matte 17" MBP side by side with a new MB a while ago, and while the MB's glossy screen did indeed look all kinds of bright and crisp, the colors looked totally funky in comparison to mine, and even my wife (who is far from picky) commented on how much better the MBP screen looked.
 
Xander562 said:
Another advantage of the Matte finish is that there arent as many fingerprints. And if your like me, matte's the way to go, I HATE it when someone touches my screen with greasy fingers.

Simple solution....don't let people touch the screen.

The glare on the glossy screen isn't that bad. I use mine frequently in fairly high light environments, including outdoors and under large flourescent lights...It's never gotten to the point where I had regretted getting the glossy screen over the matte.
 
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