Yeah I'm quite annoyed too by the lack of progress and even regression of laptop screen quality. Reflective screens, poor viewing angles, poor colours and contrast (artificially enhanced by glossy finish), poor resolutions. Hell, my 11.6'' netbook (NC10) had a better screen than my UL30A (granted, it's a cheap laptop).

I really wish manufacturers would stop using bottom of the barrel technology and bring decent quality screens for the lower end market. It seems that you have to go 'business' to get a decent screen.

Sony and Apple makes the effort at least, but really disappointed by other manufacturers and mobility notebooks in general, like the new Samsung Range (RF, QX, SF, Q430), Acers (3820TG), which are suppose to be 'desirable' laptops, except they have really mediocre screens.

The Radiance screen option isn't even available in the UK on the Envy 14. Why would they even consider selling with their inferior resolution and quality and call them 'macbook beaters'. It's got to have a decent screen for a start (... and the OS L. f***in' O.L.).

My Sony VAIO, with a 14" widescreen, is 1600x900. I love the thing!

It was the move to widescreen that really killed laptop monitors. We've added a bunch of extra pixels on the sides and sacrificed the height. I work in 1440X900 and I can get by with it but a little more would be handy. Screen resolution is one of the top 3 deciding choices for me on a laptop.

I got a Dell Studio 15 and had the option (and took it) to have a 1920x1080 display on the 15" screen.

Additionally, you can shrink the taskbar in Windows 7 to use smaller icons. I think it gets to about 60-70% of the normal size.

The new Macbook Air 13" has a 1440x900 resolution -- pretty much the best resolution one can expect in a sub-14" form factor. May not be what you're after, given the otherwise outdated specs, but the price isn't half bad considering the battery life and that a rather fast SSD comes standard. You can Bootcamp windows or your favorite Linux, but you pay some penalty in battery life typically as neither OS does as well with power management as OSX (in no small part to Apple knowing the hardware inside and out).

I'm definitely with you though. I manage well enough in Visual studio on 1280x800, but eclipse and its multiple-windows are a pain. I would love to have more real-estate on my screen -- and anything larger than about 14" inches I don't consider to be portable enough to justify as a laptop.

Quote:

It was the move to widescreen that really killed laptop monitors

widescreen killed all monitors
I have 2 at the moment
20" 16:12 1600x1200
24" 16:10 1920x1200

now its hard to get one thats not 16:9
eg 90% of 24" and smaller monitors have smaller resolutions than by old 24".
usually tech advances more memory capacity, bigger HD, faster CPU's etc
but we have monitors bucking the trend + going backwards!