OT - Monitors (warning - math ahead!)

[Ed Kolis]

Thought you’d get a kick out of this, guys... but did you know that widescreen monitors have 11% less screen space than regular monitors of the same size? And they charge you more for the widescreen!

See, they measure monitors on the diagonal, which means that the closer you are to a square, the more space you get. 4:3 (a regular monitor) is much closer to square than 16:9 (a “widescreen”).

How much less? Well, the Pythagorean theorem says that X^2 + Y^2 = Z^2, where X and Y are the width and height of the monitor and Z is the diagonal. So since the diagonals are the same, Xr^2 + Yr^2 = Xw^2 + Yw^2, where Xr and Yr are the dimensions of the regular screen and Xw and Yw are the dimensions of the wide screen. Putting in the ratios, we have (4 * R) ^ 2 + (3 * R) ^ 2 = (16 * W) ^ 2 + (9 * W) ^ 2, where R and W are proportionality constants. Multiplying and condensing, 25 * R^2 = 337 * W^2. Remember that the part on the left is the diagonal of the regular screen, while the part on the right is the diagonal of the widescreen. We can solve for W, getting W = 5 * R / sqrt(337).

Now X * Y is the area, of course. So, the area of the regular screen Ar = (4 * R) * (3 * R) = 12 * R^2, while the area of the widescreen Aw = (16 * W) * (9 * W) = 144 * W ^ 2. But W = 5 * R / sqrt(337), so that comes out to Aw = 144 * (5^2 * R^2 / 337), or 3600 * R^2 / 337. The ratio of areas is, thus (drumroll please): (3600 * R^2 / 337) / (12 * R^2) = 300 / 337, or about 89%! The widescreen is wider, but it overcompensates by being shorter, leading to an 11% reduction in surface area!

[geoschmo]

The popping sound you just heard was Geo's head exploding.

[Captain Kwok]

You should calculate the difference in viewing area of a widescreen DVD on a 4:3 screen versus a widescreen panel.

[GuyOfDoom]

I think a large portion of the cost difference is packing a higher resolution into a smaller area. That and LCD's take up much much less space than a CRT.

[Ed Kolis]

Geoschmo: YOUR HEAD A SPLODE... PLAY AGAIN? [Y/N]

Kwok: If I actually watched DVD's I might actually care to do that; seeing as I use my computer as a computer I don't feel like it

GuyOfDoom: On the resolution thing you might have a point, but I was comparing LCD's to LCD's - the widescreens last I looked tend to be slightly (maybe 10%) more expensive, barring any discounts...

[Kamog]

I prefer the regular 4:3 monitors to the widescreen version.

I'm not sure if games would adjust to a wide screen. What happens if a game isn't designed to work with widescreen, do you get unused sections on the left and right sides of the screen? If so, that area is wasted and you end up with effectively a smaller screen.

[Fyron]

Most games these days support widescreen resolutions. In the absence of such, the video card can either stretch them to fit 16:9, or cut off the sides to make the display 4:3.

[GuyOfDoom]

Hrm... widescreen LCD's... shows how much I'm out of the techno loop

[Will]

Who cares about it technically being a few pixels less when you have a glorious dual head 5120x1600 pixel screen real-estate?

Also, I prefer the widescreens because it more closely matches human field of vision. We don't see the world in a 4:3 ratio box, but 16:9 is a much closer fit.

[Suicide Junkie]

Something to consider: how often do you need more width, rather than more height?

What is the net value?