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How does apple "scale" the retina MacBook Pro? Does it actually switch the resolutions or does it just enlarge/shrink the ui elements?

I am asking this because it seems as though the "best resolution" is not the max. Also, they phrase it as "seems like 1280x800, or seems like 1920x1200"enter image description here

agz
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1 Answers1

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When you choose a "resolution" in this preference panel, you actually modify the size of every component on the screen, but you don't actually switch from a resolution to another one.

A standard 15" MacBook Pro screen resolution is 1440*900. On a MacBook Pro Retina 15", it is 2880*1800.

If you select "Best (Retina)", the screen resolution will be stuck at the native resolution (i.e. 2880*1800) but every component will be as big as if it was a 1440*900 screen resolution : basically, every component/image displayed will be neater since for a single pixel on a standard MacBook Pro, there are 4 on a MBPR.

The same happens when you chose another scale :

  • Larger Text : everything is bigger, and looks like if resolution was 1024*640.
  • More Space : everything is smaller, and looks like if resolution was 1920*1200

However, as described on this article, there are means to choose other resolutions.

ssssteffff
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