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Comment by fmakunbound | Hacker News Reader

A few Windows HiDPI problems I've experienced with an external 4k display: all the task bar status icons are blurred nearly unrecognizably after a while, Qt-based applications seem to be twice as large (text scale, and widgets) than win32 based ones (sure it's a Qt thing, no Windows), Steam can't figure out where the pointer is after a while (seems to track the pointer as 1/4 of where it is in x/y coordinates), and win32 applications often appear blurred and require some compatibility setting via the .exe file's properties thing which I don't understand because it seems to make no difference.

Honestly, Pop_OS! on the same setup is much smoother. Probably something to do with the HiDPI Daemon it has running.

The only flawless operating system on this 4k external setup has been macOS. Can't think of any problems and that's my daily system.

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Are you on Windows 10's 2020 release? That doesn't resonate with my experience at all – macOS has been vastly more frustrating to deal with on 4K displays in my experience, constant reflowing and forgetting window states, takes forever to recognize the displays when plugging in or resuming from sleep, etc... I even have all of the pointer and icon problems you describe with the top bar. Sometimes, with a 4K display plugged in, it takes 10+ seconds to figure out how to use it. Meanwhile, none of that on my Windows machine!

> 2020 release?

Probably. It's Windows 10 build 2004 or something.

The mac I have is mid-2014 w/ Mojave (also Catalina), and I'm using the hdmi out. It seems to remember the display, moves the applications I had on it last time to it, with all the other details like wallpaper scaling settings. It takes maybe 1/2 second to display.

To be fair that Mac was one of the greatest ever made, haha – I blame most of my issues with all of this on stability issues with the 2019 MBP I'm forced to use for work.

I've never experienced the issues you describe with status icons or steam having pointer issues except perhaps when changing the DPI settings without logging out and back in. When was the last time you tried it?

With regard to Win32 apps appearing blurry, I think that's a fair compromise considering Windows heavy focus on backwards compatibility.

Same here. I honestly thought they were talking about Linux, not Windows. Windows 4K/HiDPI support is just great with many different compatibility options.

The primary display at login time determines the windows system dpi, so will have apps scaled correctly and if they are dpi aware they will appear sharp. If apps appear wrongly scaled on the primary display at login, they implemented dpi awareness in the wrong way. So, if you make sure the external 4k is primary before you login to windows, you should have a better experience.

On other screens with different dpi basically the only apps that look right are the ones using the latest dpi aware api’s.

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