I don't like curved displays

I got a curved 5k2k lg display for games, and every time I switch to work monitor (5k regular flat lg), it feels like I'm looking at an old CRT that's bulging out at me. Such a strange sensation. I do like the curved display a lot however.

I had this experience back when the glass on CRTs was curved and monitors started shipping with knobs to adjust the curvature of the image. I had used a curved-glass CRT (curved the opposite way of today's curved monitors) for so long that nothing looked quite right after that until LCDs came into the picture (pun intended).

Did it ever happen to you, that you are not dealing with humans and therefore you noted this assumption?

Once upon a time there were these places called “retail stores” where you could go look at actual products and even try them out before buying them.

Alas.

I'm not sure where you're based, but don't you have consumer protections that allow you to return goods you regret buying? I know that even in places with good return regulations, there are exceptions, but where I live, I could buy a monitor from Amazon to try it out, and if I don't like it, just return it within the 30 days and buy another one. I assumed it was like this in most of the western world? Maybe I'm a bit naive.

I know a bunch of people who do this for cloth shopping (which isn't a great idea considering everything else except themselves, obviously), where they don't know exactly what size will fit them, so they buy the same dress in 2-3 sizes, try them out at home then return the ones that didn't fit.

Over the years I've gifted a few nice keyboards to people and their immediate response has often been "why didn't I get a proper mechanical keyboard sooner!"

They had only used cheap plastic or laptop keyboards until then and never saw a keyboard as a tool to invest in for their profession (which often required plenty of typing).

> a mushy $12 pack-in included with their Dell at work

For what they are, the standard Dell keyboards are quite nice.

It's a cost thing, ultrawide has always been expensive relative to how much extra area you get, and pushing the resolution up compounds that. 5120x2160 (extended 4K) panels do exist but they cost a fortune.

I just recently picked up a 32 inch curved 1440p screen and it's awful, for that size I should have realized I needed a 4k. Text is horribly pixelated and when looking dead on it feels like the aspect ratio is closer to 4:3 or something. Coming from an ultra wide 1440p I'm really disappointed.

> 1440px is just so little space.

1440px tall on a common 13 tall ultrawide is 107 PPI.

In my mind > 100 PPI is pretty much perfect for most tasks. Or are you talking about physical size?

For a 34 incher, 1440px is perfect, and so is a 34 incher. A higher resolution renders text too small to read, and a larger monitor has one moving their head around instead of just their eyes.

Of course, they are not ideal for the graphical work that the author implies, but they can't be beat for productivity work imho.

My holy grail of computer monitors is an 8k 55" curved screen. Not a shorty, but a full 55" or 65" 16:9 (or similar) screen with 7680 x 4320 resolution, but curved.

I currently have three 4k 32" screens in portrait arranged in a sort of curved configuration. I love it, except for the bezels. It's something like this: https://i.sstatic.net/YocaE.jpg

I was almost ready to purchase a flat 8k 55" TV for my workstation, but decided to try a flat 4k 55" TV I already had, and the flatness just ruined it for me. I need a slight curve when using such a large surface area only a few feet from my eyes. I guess I'll have to stick with my three 4k monitors for now.

Easy solution: Reorient the monitor in portrait mode. /s

> I don't like straight displays, things at the corners are a different size than things in the middle, because they are further from my head.

Are you sitting really close or have a really enormous monitor? Measuring how I'm sitting right now, my nose is exactly 61cm from the center-center of my monitor, and ~72cm between my nose and any of the corners, and it's a 32" monitor.

I'm usually sensitive to things not being 100% straight/level/aligned, and if I create five identically sized windows and put them in the middle and one in each corner, I see no difference between them.

> On curved displays, objects on different areas of the screen are the same size

This is only true if your eyes are in the focus point (center of the circle) and you never move your head or chair.

Yeah, projecting onto a plane instead of a... spherical dome? means that things at the border of your screen are more visible than the things at its middle which definitely not how eyes usually work.

It's especially glaring when the far plane serves as the place where the view-distance limiting fog is rendered: if there is some thing barely visible before you, turn 45% to the side, and you'll see that thing very clearly at the side of your view.

Yep, that's what I noticed when I got a 34" ultrawide. After swapping for a 38" curved screen, the experience is better.

This got me thinking, are there any games that have a graphics setting for monitor curvature? Because they should, IIRC the standard is rectilinear rendering, where the perspective comes out correct only if the monitor is flat. But if people can get used to glasses that severely distort the image, I guess this isn't a big deal.

Also, my obligatory rant, ultrawide monitors do not exist, only ultrashort, and 16:10 shouldn't have become a "premium/business/designer/prosumer" option, it should just be the standard. Nobody gets a VR headset and crops off the bottom and top thirds of the image and claims it's more immersive that way.

I had no opinion until I was assigned one at work. My opinion is the opposite of yours. I find it very annoying (for reasons entirely unrelated to what the article is talking about), and wish that I could swap it out. I may smuggle my own monitor in to do that.

Different strokes for different folks!

I think LCDs have been around long enough that we no longer notice all the problems with them. If you have a large monitor on your desk, chances are very good that there is nowhere you can place your head where some part of the display doesn't look noticeably darker than another part. You can TRY to compensate for that by cranking the brightness up, but then you set yourself up for eye strain.

I'm lead to believe that OLED displays don't have these issues (and have much better color fidelity as well) but they have a limited lifespan.

For me, I've found that some curved displays are better than others. My home monitor is curved, on a seemingly very large radius, and I love it!

However some that I've used that are more curved make everything look distorted.

I've been thinking of getting one. What is your use-case and why do you like it? Mine would be mostly work, but at least some gaming each week.

My regret is I didn't buy a 4K one at 32" but it's still good

Some of my buddies have that 8K Samsung one, that one is nuts to see in person