Acer Shows Off 2880x1620 Panel
by Jarred Walton on January 14, 2013 10:58 AM ESTWe visited with Acer at this CES, and they didn't specifically have anything that we were told we could discuss, but after seeing another publication with pictures of Acer's pre-release 2880x1620 IPS display laptop it appears that's fair game. So, let me tell you what we know.
The panel as noted is 2880x1620, with a diagonal of around 15.6" (give or take 0.1" I'd guess). This is basically the non-Apple version of the QWXGA+ display, only in 16:9 attire rather than 16:10. The display is clearly IPS or some other wide viewing angle design, and when we walked into Acer's suite to look at the laptops and tablets, from an oblique angle it stood out as far and away the best display of the bunch. I also took some time to show the same image (wallpaper) on the 2880 panel alongside adjacent 1366x768 and 1080p panels (both TN), and the difference in color was astounding.
My best guess for when we'll see this LCD show up in an Acer laptop (and potentially in laptops from other vendors) is around late Q2 2013, when the Haswell launch occurs. That should give the OEMs plenty of time to figure out how they're going to deal with an ultra-high-DPI panel in Windows, and that's where Apple's control over both the hardware and the OS is going to be difficult to beat. Hopefully when the display shows up, manufacturers will also remember to spend the extra time and money to pre-calibrate for accurate colors, and it sounds like that's at least in the cards.
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mayankleoboy1 - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
Pre-caliberation is something that a lot of companies ignore. Dunno why, as it would give them much better out-of-the-box experience.Khato - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
It's hard to justify that when you see how many people are completely oblivious to displays with a horrendous blue shift. Sure if you go back and forth between the calibrated and non-calibrated settings they'll be able to tell the difference, but otherwise...JarredWalton - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
Anand told an entertaining anecdote about letting a friend borrow his iPad recently. When the friend fired up Netflix, he stated, "I've never seen that color red before!" Now, when he looks at any device, he loads up Netflix and says, "That's not red." Note that this friend is not an Apple user, but he has now been converted to pre-calibration.Incidentally, I've heard the BoM cost of pre-calibration is somewhere around $5, which is really high when you're looking at things from the penny-pinching perspective that the race to the bottom has created. On the other hand, if you're spending $20 more for 2880x1620 (or possibly even more than that), $5 extra is nothing.
Word to the wise (OEMs): If you send us a great display that's not pre-calibrated, we're going to ding you in the reviews. I did as much with the Acer Aspire S7, I'll do it in the Dell XPS 12 Duo, and I'll continue to do it until companies get with the times.
Tuna-Fish - Monday, April 15, 2013 - link
Proper pre-calibration *reduces* sales. People equate bluish shades with "new" and "shiny", and when they look at displays on the showroom, they provably almost always consider the bluest one to be the best. That's why all displays are so horribly miscalibrated, it's sort of an arms race to make your colors look shittier.The same is true in audio -- when the average person is asked to evaluate audio quality, and in some cases even music quality, 90% of what they score by is simply volume.
JDG1980 - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
Does anyone know if this will be available as a stand-alone monitor, or will it be available in laptops only?sheh - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
The PCWorld article suggests desktop monitors are planned as well:http://www.pcworld.com/article/2024391/acer-takes-...
DanNeely - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
OTOH from PCW: "Acer noted that it was looking to bring non-touch ultra-high-resolution LCD monitors to the market later in 2013. "If you're marketing that sort of highend model display why wouldn't you include the touch layer checkbox too? Any mid/high end monitor these days has a USB hub so you've already got the connectivity. Also AFAIK this is high enough resolution that you'd need to use DP which has a 720mbit AUX channel, would carrying the USB2 connection over that be possible?
Calabros - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
Thats why photographers pay more and get AppleDeath666Angel - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
What kind of professional photographer does not calibrate his display? And they should really get wider gamut than what Apple is offering.Fleeb - Monday, January 14, 2013 - link
The calibrated NEC monitor reviewed in this site is way better than Apple's displays. Look it up.