Gadgetory

resolution is often the only spec quoted when referring to the fineness of a digital image but there's actually much more to it than that a 5-inch 1280 by 720 image will look sharp and crisp on your phone but if you projected a 720p image in a movie theater it would look horrible so that my friends is where pixel density comes in a measure of the resolution that also accounts for the size of the screen PPI has become the most common way to denote pixel density although pixels per centimeter or PPC can also be used to calculate PPI simply measure one inch diagonally on the screen then draw a line diagonally through them and find out how many pixels it intersects with so I heard higher pixel density is always better is that right well sort of the geek in me wants to say yes bring it on more but in reality it requires advanced display technology and more processing power so it's not always practical from a cost and manufacturing perspective to keep driving up pixel density with older devices there was tons of room for improvement diagonal lines looked like this and circles even had an ugly staircase effect but this is improved in recent years and we've even begun to see displays where the eye cannot even pick out the individual pixels on the display once that point is reached there's not much benefit to continuing to add cost and complexity to manufacturing because most people won't notice anyway Apple's branding for this good enough density concept is Retina but to determine if a display is retina there's one last thing to consider how far away are you going to be from the display is this retina com has a handy little tool for this and according to their calculator a 55 inch 1080p TV will have the same perceived pixel density from 7 feet away as this 4.7 inch 1080p phone does from 7 inches away but there's more to a great display than how many pixels it has of course contrast color accuracy and pixel response times impact the viewing experience tremendously and different display types can even affect other things like the battery life of your vais improving power efficiency panel technologies also play a large role for example while both the Samsung Galaxy s4 and the HTC One have 1080p displays the s4 uses a pentile matrix a moe LED display that has fewer dots on it overall while the one uses a more standard LCD display with RGB sub pixels click the link in the video description to learn more about this speaking of links in the video description our sponsor for this episode is audible.com head over to audible.com slash tech quickie to sign up and get a free audiobook now I read the first one a few years ago but I was browsing customer favorites today and saw that there's a prequel to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Jane Austen and Steve Hockensmith you might wonder how a book released in 2010 could have been co-authored by Jane Austen to which I would reply duh Zombies anyway guys audible.com slash tech wiki for your free audio book today there's tons of selection if you want something fun and light to listen to like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies or for something more serious as well don't forget to subscribe to tech quickie for more fast as possible like this like this video and leave a comment for us if you have any feedback