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Romahaaa

macrumors member
Original poster
Feb 24, 2021
36
1
Hey Macbook owners.

Most of you knows about Macbook weak performance using resolution scaling for external monitors. Currently I am on Macbook Pro 2015 15" top spec, and after I purchased LG 4K monitor, I met that issue face to face as well.
From what I understood checking the web that MBP behaves well only on integer scaling, otherwise there will be huge performance issues especially working on hard graphical tasks.
Elements on 1080p are too huge and 2160i are tiny. For now I just using 1080i because of no other options. To say I am disappointed means to say nothing..

I am checking the option buy new M1 MacbookPro, and I would like to know did M1 chip somehow soled that problem? Or it's OSx related problem only?

I found some discussions here, but there is no consensus at all. Please, describe your experience here using 4K monitors with resolution in range of 1080p and 3840p mentioning your monitor model.

Thanks in advance, and really hope that problem solved using M1 chips
 

pshufd

macrumors G4
Oct 24, 2013
10,136
14,565
New Hampshire
I have 2014 and 2015 MacBook Pro 15s that I've used with external monitors (Dell 27 4k, Dell 25 QHD). I use the QHD with native resolution and use the 4k with native resolution or sometimes the next smallest one depending on how my vision feels. Yesterday I was working at native 4k but I have the option of dragging a program to the QHD monitor. I think that QHD, either 25 inches or 27 inches is pretty good but I like the ability to display a lot of information on a screen which is why I have 4k.

One other approach is to use program scaling with native - that is the individual program displays elements larger instead of the screen resolution.

I don't see a difference between the Intel MacBook Pros and the Mac mini m1.

This problem is somewhat worse on Windows. I have 2 27 Dell 4k monitors on Windows and prefer how macOS looks compared to Windows 10. I think that the best solution is to get a monitor size where native resolution works best for your vision.
 
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