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Mobile Screen Resolutions

Posted by Sam Hobson on June 30, 2009 – 3:57 pm  Share
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I remember back in 1997 when 640×480 was the standard screen resolution for a computer screen.  Now days, you have huge HD screens that can pull a resolution up to 2560px wide.  In just over 10 years it grew that fast.

I’m beginning to see a little bit of that growth in mobile devices as well.  My last cell phone only had a 172×144 res screen.  Most of the time though I saw 320×240.  Recently I’ve seen VGA (640×480) and WVGA (854×480) screen resolutions.  And I’ve even seen some bigger on devices which I cannot remember.

My point is that mobile resolutions are starting to grow some, and I wonder if they will grow as much as PC resolutions did.  I can only imagine holding a small device with a 1280×1024 res screen.  I honestly think making any higher resolutions is ridiculous.

Anyone else have any opinions on this?

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Sam Hobson is an Afro-Latino computer nerd. He enjoys all kinds of technology and innovations, and is an intermediate programmer. Currently, he's a junior in High School, and when he's not doing something computer nerdy, you'll find him at the basketball courts or the poker tables.


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  • Recently I’ve seen VGA (800×600) and WVGA (854×480) screen resolutions.

    I believe VGA is 640 x 480 and there are plenty of PDAs and phones with VGA screens. 800 x 600 is SVGA, but I don't believe I've seen a phone or PDA with that resolution. I've seen PDAs like the Sony Xperia described as WVGA at 800 x 480, but How Many Dots Has It Got? says WVGA is either 852 x 480 or 858 x 484.

    I think 800 x 480 makes more sense as WVGA, though. That same chart defines WQVGA as 400 x 240 (like the Samsung Omnia), so WVGA should double both dimensions to 800 x 480.

    Like you, though, I'm not convinced you gain much by cramming more pixels in the same-size screen. Yes, fonts and images are sharper if you keep the display the same size, but, unless you have eagle eyes, you can't get four times the information on the screen readably going from 320 x 240 to 640 x 480. You can probably get some extra information by using slightly smaller fonts and having the extra sharpness compensate for the reduced size, but I'd be surprised if you can get even 25% more in each direction.

    Increasing the screen size and resolution makes more sense.

    And when are we going to see PDAs with 24-bit color? Most Windows Mobile devices seem stuck at 16-bit color. Of course, increasing the color depth 50% means screens will likely require 50% longer to draw, too. That's where faster processors come in, but then your battery life descreases. Designing portable devices is a series of big compromises. :D

    Steve
  • Sam Hobson
    Sorry about the flawed info. The chart I was going off of must have had a problem with it. I fixed it.
  • Brozono
    VGA is 640x480
    WVGA is 800x600
    FWVGA is 854x480
  • WVGA is "Wide VGA", so the vertical resolution has to be 480 pixels. 800 x 600 is SVGA (as stated below and in the chart I linked).

    As for FWVGA, I've never heard of that. What does the F stand for?

    Steve
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