Question 24 inches monitor FHD or QHD for home office and scaling dilemma

[RyanBR]

Hello,

I'd like to. buy monitor for my wife.

• she has limited space on desk
• monitor will be probably around 45-60cm from her eyes
• she uses glasses, say she like more "matte" monitors,
• she works a lot, have problem to see read small text on labels (while I can, so that is her eye problems )
• we live in Brazil where in stores they have only 24 inches or 27 inches in FHD. I was even in capital of our state I couldn't find QHD on 24 or 27''
• 24 inches seems optimal size, but 27 should fit on desk
• it will be used on ASUS Zenbook UM425QA-R75BLHDCP1 R7-5800H 16GB 1TB 14P FHD AMD RADEON Vega7 WIN11PRO
• available ports
  - 1x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A
  - 2x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C support display / power delivery
  - 1x HDMI 2.1 FRL
• should have flicker free/blue light filter etc. work on macbook pro m1 pro (temporarly as I need it first for 1-2 weeks for my work before I will do more research what monitor I can buy on higher end here in Brazil for me, I use betterDisplay so I guess I will manage to work with most of monitors), then on Win 11 pro
  
  When we tested FHD 24'' the 100% scaling icon sizes/UI were to small for her. She would use either 125% or 150%.
  
  In that context I wonder what scaling should be used if I would order QHD online 24'' inches (If I find one here..)? 125% -> 160% on QHD? to match the same size of elements? On Win 11 pro it seems custom scaling can be set. Does normal apps works ? browser/office/etc. ? Anyone can show some screenshots if has two monitors 24'' with FHD and QHD?
  
  Perhaps 27 inches should be also consider? if 27'' than I guess QHD only as 4k can be to much for office work and laptop size/grpahic card? She doesn't have and doesn't want to have AC in office (but it's hot... so I don't want to put extra work for the laptop) Budget: up to 380 USD? but prices in Brazil can be higher so it may be equal to 280-300 USD? I can put more if it will make difference in her case/usage.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Windows scaling works for most applications; I've yet to find an app made before 2010 that doesn't work with it.

Scaling also lowers the "usable" resolution. That is, on a 24" monitor, 1080p with 125% scaling does not look the same as 1440p with 125% scaling. 125% on a resolution of 1440p will drop the "usable" resolution to 2048x1152, which is close enough to 1080p, so it'll just look like 1080p at 100%. However, 1440p at 125% will look much sharper than 1080p at 100%.

If you want to figure out what size, resolution, and scaling you need, figure out the size first, then lower the resolution at the desktop until you find something your wife likes. Then do some math to figure out the scaling you need based on the monitor's native resolution.

 

[RyanBR]

Thank you Hotaru.hino for your input.

My wife will need 125% at 1080p so with 1440p I guess the scalling should be 150-160%? to match the UI size. Will the text be still as sharp or even sharper than at 125% at 1080?

As you said I had to make some calculations. Chat GPT claims:

"For QHD to match the increased size of the FHD at 125%, you need to scale up from 100%. From the calculated effective resolution and considering typical GUI scaling settings, 160% scaling on QHD would indeed make more sense to visually match or approximate the size of icons and text at 125% scaling on FHD."

However before it had quite a trouble to provide such an answer so I wanted to double check it on forum, not to mention some real users feedback who perhaps did similar choice before, have some vision issues and could provide some feedback, recommendations, specific models.

 

[hotaru.hino]

Thank you Hotaru.hino for your input.

My wife will need 125% at 1080p so with 1440p I guess the scalling should be 150-160%? to match the UI size. Will the text be still as sharp or even sharper than at 125% at 1080?

As you said I had to make some calculations. Chat GPT claims:

"For QHD to match the increased size of the FHD at 125%, you need to scale up from 100%. From the calculated effective resolution and considering typical GUI scaling settings, 160% scaling on QHD would indeed make more sense to visually match or approximate the size of icons and text at 125% scaling on FHD."

However before it had quite a trouble to provide such an answer so I wanted to double check it on forum, not to mention some real users feedback who perhaps did similar choice before, have some vision issues and could provide some feedback, recommendations, specific models.

125% scaling at 1080p will be roughly 1536*864. To get the same from 1440p, you'd need about 166.67%. So the 160% mark isn't too off.