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15" Retina MacBook Pro Preferred Resolution (Scale)

  • 1024 x 640

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1280 x 800

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1440 x 900

    Votes: 16 39.0%
  • 1680 x 1050

    Votes: 16 39.0%
  • 1920 x 1200

    Votes: 9 22.0%

  • Total voters
    41

iPaintCode

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jun 24, 2012
142
38
Metro Detroit
Calling all professionals who use a 15" Retina MacBook Pro. Talking to others on the small scale I've found many didn't even know the Retina displays scaled great when using higher resolutions. I've been curious for a long time what other working professionals prefer to set their resolution/scaling at?

I lean heavily towards 1440 x 900 due to not having 20/20 vision, but once in a while when I need that little extra screen real estate I will tango 1680 x 1050 but the O.C.D. side always goes back to 1440 x 900. Pre-Retina I would BTO a matte screen and IIRC they defaulted to 1680 x 1050?

Without further ado, I would love to read what others prefer and why when you go sans external display!
 

Raptura

Suspended
Sep 6, 2008
332
88
Toronto, Canada / London, UK
Since I got my Retina MacBook Pro in 2012, I've always used it in 1920 x 1200 as I need as much real estate to work with as possible. Constantly having Photoshop, Illustrator, Safari and word documents open for my work makes it difficult with anything less than that.
 

maflynn

macrumors Haswell
May 3, 2009
73,682
43,740
I never changed my, and to be honest, I'm not sure what that resolution is. I just took the default retina and it looks great :)
 
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Loge

macrumors 68030
Jun 24, 2004
2,836
1,312
England
1920 x 1200 extra screen real estate; it keeps the interface elements from taking up too much space, and in most applications the content in the work area can be scaled as required for comfortable viewing.
 

MinEderPlayz

macrumors 6502a
Aug 3, 2013
726
50
Hamburg, Germany
I go for 1680x1050. Not so small that I have to get too close to the screen, but also not such a waste of space as the default 1440x900. I use Photoshop, Lightroom, After Effects and various office softwares on my device.
 

xraydoc

Contributor
Oct 9, 2005
11,001
5,470
192.168.1.1
I do what the OP does. Usually use it at 1440x900, but will temporarily switch to the 2016's "default" of 1680x1050 when I need extra space. The text in the 1440 mode is just so beautiful.

I've had the 15" for less than two weeks, but so far I've only switched to 1920x1200 for a moment just for fun. Text is too small for me to use on any kind of regular basis like that, but I can think of at least one app where it might come in handy (Osirix MD is the one that comes to mind).
 

wmk

macrumors newbie
May 14, 2014
22
11
Usually 1440x900, as anything above makes everything too small to me, increasing to the default 1680x1050 when necessary, i.e. while working with multiple windows that need to stay on the same desktop, etc.

For comparison, on 17" Asus laptop I have 1920x1080 set all the time.
 

TechZeke

macrumors 68020
Jul 29, 2012
2,464
2,310
Dallas, TX
Currently using 1680x1050, I although I periodically switch back to 1440x900 if go for longer periods of time without having to do any heavy work.

Every looks so beautiful on the default 1440x900.
 

xraydoc

Contributor
Oct 9, 2005
11,001
5,470
192.168.1.1
Wait the 2016 has a higher default? How come?
Yep. On both the 15" and 13" models. The new 15" default is 1680x1050 and the new 13" default is 1440x900 (versus 1440x900 and 1280x800 respectively).

Can't say exactly why Apple chose to make this change, but I guess they thought that the increased GPU performance could handle the scaled resolutions without performance hit (the Displays control panel no longer gives that warning that it used to on other machines) and that they could get a perceived increase in screen resolution without switching to a higher resolution panel.

In fact, the default mode is now simply called "default" and not "best for retina" any longer.
 
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bevsb2

Contributor
Nov 23, 2012
4,938
14,968
I use 1440x900. That resolution was what I was used to on my 2012 rMBP and the text size is much more comfortable for reading while still producing sharp images.
 

davis_fang

macrumors newbie
Oct 27, 2016
18
9
I do enjoy having the space and versatility of having 1200 pixels of vertical space, but very occasionally I switch to 900 for those extra crisp typefaces.
 

Karnicopia

macrumors 6502
Mar 27, 2015
482
506
I had it on the default for a long time but read one of these threads and tried out the 1440 x 900 and really like that resolution for readability. I'm getting a bit older I guess and really appreciate readability over the real estate.
 
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