Who ever said that glossy screens sucked because of their reflection, clearly never had to watch Manchester United vs Arsenal on a TV located behind them…
Once you try a glossy screen you’ll instantly notice that something is different, if it’s not the reflection from a light or something, it’s the increased contrast due to the glossy part.
In my new Mac setup (will post about it soon), I’m sitting with my back against the telly, so I can’t really keep an eye on the match while I’m working. Then I noticed, by just moving my laptop a few centimeters, it would reflect the TV perfectly.
On this picture, the match looks blurry, when in fact it’s not. I just took the picture with automatic camera settings, so it adapted shutter speed to get good lighting instead of paying attention to getting a sharp image of the reflection. Had I increased the shutter speed to get a sharp picture of the reflection, the image itself would have been dark, I could then have fixed the darkness by using the flash but then the flash would have ruined the reflection… got all that? 🙂
No matter what, the experience was much better than what it looks like on the picture, I actually managed to watch most of 2nd half like that – only turning my back around when something important was going on.
While many TV watchers would hate watching TV, or a match, in the reflection of their laptop like that, I don’t really mind. Living where I do, I don’t get to see any football (soccer) matches from my home country on the TV. For that purpose, I have a Slingbox. I connect to the Slingbox using SlingPlayer and it streams the TV signal to me over the Internet. The quality is not the best, so I have gotten used to watching matches on less than a full-size laptop screen – simply because it’s better than nothing….
So next time you have to decide between glossy or matte laptop screen, make sure you also consider the placement of your telly…
I don’t have a lap top… I’m using a 24″ wide screen Macintosh which is great for working from home, however, I would love to purchase a Mac Lap top for when I’m abroad, because it’s really a pain in the ass to bring such big and heavy macintosh everywhere I go… To be honest, I never bring my Mac when I go on vacation etc… I rather use local computers…
.-= Benjamin Cip´s last blog ..OIOpublisher review =-.
I wouldn’t want to drag around on a 24″ Mac myself, either 🙂 I assume it’s the iMac 24″ you got?
I really like the matte’ screens better than the glossy MAC screens, every time I consider going to the 17″ because of the extended battery life I take a step back because of the glossy screen. Well that and I prefer a 15″.
Oh, you’re one of those…. the matte people 😀 Nah I don’t blame you, the glossy can be crappy if not used under the right circumstances. I don’t think I’d want a 17″ laptop, simply too big to move around with, 15″ fits me perfect, I have an external monitor the places I need to work with it a lot anyway.