[ltp] SXGA+ versus XGA resolution, any suggestions?

[linux-thinkpad@linux-thinkpad.org]

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On Sat, 13 Aug 2005, JP Renaud wrote:

> On Friday 12 August 2005 21:43, prosolutions@gmx.net wrote:
>> I'm deciding on getting a Thinkpad and have a question about the
>> difference between SXGA+ (1400x1050) versus XGA (1024x768) resolution.
>> Most people think more is better but I have read reports of annoyances
>> also when the resolution is so high that, for example, many images on
>> web pages are ridiculously small.  
>
> I have a R51 SXGA+ (1829-9MG) and I love the screen. As I said in an earlier
> post I sometimes wish I had bought a 1600x1200 T42 but the price difference
> was too high for my employer...
>
> I have no problem with pictures on web pages and text is easy to resize if
> necessary with CTRL-+ in Konqueror.
>
> In Konsole and kvim, I do like rather small fonts and I use the Bitstream Vera
> Sans Monospace font at size 10. I have had a collegue or two saying that my
> fonts were too small but they usually work from a desktop, much further from
> the screen than I usually am.
>
> It is usually screen brightness/contrast which strain my eyes, the Thinkpad
> screen is rather good in this respect.

I don't know if more reports help, but I feel the same way about my
T40's display - again SXGA+ (1400x1050) on a 14.1 inch display.  I
couldn't live with 1024x768 in any form, personally, and always use
four workspaces even at SXGA+ - but that's me.  I too use Monospace
10 in a terminal, but appreciate some eyes couldn't cope with this -
but the IBM LCDs are remarkable bright and clear compared to previous
laptops.

The only area I found problems with was Firefox, and I used to fix
this by setting a minimum font in Preferences - it's a bad solution
as it scales different pages differentially, and found my real
solution with the extension TextZoom:

http://www.cosmicat.com/

which sets a permanent Zoom in Firefox - 120% is fine for me.  This
of course should be a core feature of Firefox... but isn't.

As to Konsole bloat... I use gnome-terminal, talk about bloat!
I haven't done accurate memory use comparisons, as the last comment
on that interesting Konsole blog entry someone posted points out, it's
actually quite complex to do with certain accuracy, but I bet it's big.
The real problem's CPU use - try using a transparent background and
scrolling a lot of text - CPU hits to roof!  Transparent backgrounds
are the real killer, but I can't get used to xterm/urxvt etc.
Even more ironic that I'm running an Xfce desktop - just because
of the clean look.  But I really need an xterm that can kick off
multiple tabs at startup time (gnome-terminal --tab ... --tab ...) -
can konsole or any others do this?  Wasn't obvious to me.

Besides when you have 1GB of RAM or more, and usually have 60 tabs open
in Firefox (Session Saver is a curse!) and *still* don't touch swap,
then I don't feel the difference in memory usage is so important...
If you've got it, use it.  Those little chips are dying for some
action, and it's mean to deprive them.

Incidentally, for Fedora users, I was wondering why I wasn't seeing
so many CPU governors as others on the list:

# cat /sys/devices/system/cpu/cpu0/cpufreq/scaling_available_governors
userspace performance

I've always used the default setup, which is userspace and the
cpuspeed daemon to control CPU speed (got fed up tweaking cpufred).
Yesterday I realise that the other governors are compiled on Fedora
as modules, so I turned off cpuspeed and tried ondemand, which
doesn't require a daemon to control it:

# modprobe cpufreq_ondemand

- wow, quite a difference.  Much more responsive to changing CPU speed
on demand, and really boosts page loading responsiveness in Firefox,
for instance.  Might be worth a try for Fedora users and others
who use cpuspeed and userspace - I'd be interested if you notice
the difference too.  The xf86info plugin in gkrellm shows the CPU
jumping around so much quicker.  I realise now I could have turned
the interval cpuspeed works at to something quicker... but why bother
when ondemand is now in the kernel?

Bret, what difference does setting DisplaySize make in xorg.conf?
I've never used it, and never noticed a problem: interested what it
does for you?

Honey
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