if someone could put an S-IPS panel in a laptop, that would be a fairly no-compromise (and expensive) solution.
Expensive, yes. No-compromise, no.
S-IPS panel consumes a lot of power, far more than TN panel. It is also larger in physical dimensions. So if MBP had S-IPS panel it would not be inch thick and have 4-hour battery life.
But most of us want that inch-thick laptop and would be grateful if the battery life was closer to 8 hours than 2ish.
So I have learnt to accept the fact that I can only have external S-IPS.
:I have my Thinkpad connected to a pretty average (ie: not fancy) Dell external monitor, and the Dell is SOOO much nicer to look at. At least all the colors don't look washed out and its pretty bright.
That's because the Thinkpad is not using the panel to its fullest, because the panel draws so much power even Thinkpad cannot afford. Because laptops need to use less power, the display also runs "half throttle", which means the quality panel will not be as bright as a standalone desktop unit.
I have not ever met a design professional who would do all his/her work on a laptop panel. Every single one of them have external display! Some have better and some have worse, but everyone has a desktop standalone display.
And I do know why.
Remember that _all_ LCD screens have to make the compromise: You can have 8 bit display, or you can have fast update times, but you can't have both.
Maybe today, but we can always demand better displays. For starters, how would you like a lowly 10bit or 12bit display (if you don't dare to ask for a 16bit one) that doesn't suffer from ghosting? HD refresh rate of 60 frames per second means the perfect screen would have to refresh the screen every 16ms but as we all want some safety margin let's demand that the screen should be at least 8ms if not 4ms one.
It can be done, but not today. But because it cannot be done today, there's no reason to expect it to be possible tomorrow. Keep the faith
