Yes, and that reason is mainly marketing. "Widescreen" was found to be a successful marketing tool with the general public and was applied to TVs, monitors, video games etc. Many people, including yourself, seem to believe that simply because a movie fills the screen at 16:9 or 16:10, that must mean 16:9 or 16:10 is bigger and better. In fact, it's proportionally smaller than the "old" standard of 4:3, even when compared at the same diagonal width. This allows manufacturers to save some $$ on the displays, while customers happily believe "widescreen" is better. If you watch a lot of movies, you'll find that 16:9 isn't even really a historical standard for cinema. There are many, many, many different proportions used. From your own charts...yellow is the size advantage for 4:3, and red the size advantage for 16:10 "widescreen" at the same diagonal measurement. The chart above takes the bars from the first chart and combines them. 4:3 wins easily even at the same diagonal measurement.
personally I can't believe apple is still on 4:3, just... unbelievable from a gaming perspective. The horizontal axis is simply more important than the vertical aspect IN GAMES. I mean, your eyes are ovular not round. Now when we get to other uses ie casual games and apps, 4:3 or 3:2 is still very viable. Just not for hardcore games.
Why? Modern "hardcore" games generally have the gamer moving through three dimensional space, which makes the aspect ratio of the screen literally a "cut out" through which you view the game space, similar to looking at a room through a keyhole. Since 4:3 is proportionally larger than 16:9, you actually get a proportionally larger view through the "keyhole" at the game space with 4:3 than you do with 16:9. Like I said, the whole "widescreen" thing has more to do with marketing than with function.
well because horizontal just means a whole lot more than vertical. Batman proves time and time again that many ppl go through life without simply looking up <g> looking up is not necessary, having peripheral vision is. It also may be easier to see with your 'ovular' eyes... no scientific evidance but it makes sense to this simpleton.
There is no difference in peripheral vision if you lock the game to 16:9 on a 4:3. It's just slightly smaller and letter boxed. However, I don't think developers are limited to 16:9 if they ported a game that used three dimensional space to a 4:3 platform. I would imagine you can just increase the vertical area that is rendered so that it matches 4:3. The red area is the difference between 16:9 on a 16:10 10.1" iPad and 16:9 on a 4:3 10.1" iPad. Now look at this screenshot from an upcoming iOS game based on Mass Effect...can you honestly look at that and say it doesn't work in terms of field of view?
Why is it a proportional advantage to have more height but a disadvantage to have more width? I understand that these devices are wider than they are high, but the portability of the device is not bound by the longest measurement. Eg. making a phone 1" wider may mean it will not slide in and out of your pocket easily, making it 1.5" taller may have no effect on how easily it slides in and out of your pocket. In this case we're adding much more to the width to make the deice 4:3 than we are to the length to make it 16:10. You compared a fictitious (unstated) screen size to an actual one. A real 16:10 competitor to an iPad would have a screen of the same diagonal measurement. This is and industry standard, what you put forth is not. Your example was misleading by showing the 16:10 screen to be smaller in every way. This is not the case in the market. Going from a 19" (viewable) CRT to a 19" 16:10 monitor loses you some height but gains width. This is the standard for how aspects are compared, deal with it.
I agree that 16:9 on desktops/laptops is mainly marketing, cashing in on the buzzwords like 1080p while at the same time cutting costs by producing screens with less area. 16:10 however, was designed specifically for desktops and laptops and is the best compromise for modern computing. Yes, the screen has less area, but like I keep beating out of that dead horse, it's where the area is, not how much of it you have which makes a display ideal for more tasks. Like pdraggy said, our vision isn't round, it's more akin to an oval. See the golden ratio, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_ratio It is very clear that this ratio is pleasing to the eye because it naturally fits within out vision perfectly. It can take up much more of our central vision than any other ratio of shape, with others either wasting parts of our vision, or having one axis go into peripheral. So what is the golden ratio? 1.61803399, hmmm, that's awfully close to 16:10, and not very close to 4:3. Indeed, with 1:2.53 being the next most common standard. The wider you go the more you will see on a 16:10 screen compared to a 4:3 of the same diagonal measurement. So unless you are arguing for movies to be 4:3 as well, this argument will only work against you. I already agreed that 4:3 gives you more area, I'm talking about how useful the area is for modern computing tasks. If you want more area, again, I suggest you lobby for 1:1 screens. P.S. Jpegs are so 1990.
Why would you want to do that? You'd be missing out on the cinematic immersion that only widescreen can give you. So yes, you lose area when viewing any widescreen media content. Honestly, no it doesn't work. You have large portions of your central vision wasted on either side, removing much of the immersion. You also lose any peripheral vision that 16:9 gives and is important for action/cinematic gaming, again giving you less immersion. You could look at the screen closer taking up all of your central vision, but then the top and bottom of the screen would spill into your peripheral, and that's not immersive, just disorientating. Clearly for cinematic gaming the most immersive experience is to take up as much of your central vision as possible (16:10 does this near perfectly), and then to add more on to your L+R peripheral (16:9 does this). If you have problems filling your central vision (top and bottom wasted), then you need to move closer to the screen. For puzzle, 2D platform/sidescroller, RTS etc, I would say that 16:10 is the ideal choice.
I'll tell you one thing this thread did do, is convince me to either get Windows or Android (or Linux) on my next tablet purchase. I'd use it almost only on multimedia and gaming and I can't stand to do that on 4:3 or 3:2 lol. I just can't believe apple is still in the dark ages on this! They may have those retina screen thingers and higher resolutions but... sooner or later android will hit the sweet spot, iOS will always have that wasted black box. I totally didn't know apple didn't use widescreen before. Damn, I don't know how I missed that. Plus Iphone and iPad use DIFFERENT ARs?? WTF Steve Jobs? What an asshole making you buy two versions of every program to get full screen!
Truthfully, you won't notice a big difference with that aspect ratio with a screen size this small. Although I would prefer 16:10 of android tablets. BTW, you don't buy 2 versions of the same app. I would assume the apps scale with the screen resolution just like android apps. I use an HP Touchpad for android with 1024x768 (exactly like the ipad resolution), no official android device has this resolution, and this is how it works.
When the iPad first launched there were more specific iPad only versions of apps. All other iPhone/pod apps were either run at their native res or pixel doubled. There was the introduction of universal apps for all iOS platforms shortly after the iPad launch, which as far as I am aware, has become pretty much the standard for any app available for all iOS devices these days. Universal apps still look different on iPad than they do on iPhone (so they make use of the extra space), but are packaged as one convenient app - exactly how it should be. So yeah, that's not an issue anymore. I do believe that iPhone and iPad apps are still split in the iTunes store (I don't use iTunes so cant confirm), which could be the source of your confusion. This is merely a superficial separation though, you are more often than not looking at/buying/downloading the exact same apps.
I have to admit Apple have made it very easy to move from one iPhone to another. Last night we got iCloud going properly and backed up what we needed. This morning the 4S arrived, Mrs Grim went on the O2 website, got her number moved to the new SIM and then turned on the phone. As soon as she had finished setting it up it had already pulled all her apps and contacts etc from the cloud. Got to give Apple credit for this guys, sorry I know some of you hate them but they have done that very well. My wife (yes a girl!) managed to do it all by herself, for that alone I applaud Apple.
Misleading? I said that Apple chose 4:3 because it was proportionally larger than 16:10, and was a more flexible format for a wider range of media and uses. Nothing that you've said or posted has disproved that. Look at your own chart again: even when limited to equal diagonals, 4:3 easily proves my argument regarding screen space vs. 16:10. It's obvious from that chart that 16:10 does NOT provide more screen area overall. Does it allow a slightly larger 16:9 reproduction? Yes, but that advantage doesn't really apply to video games, where the developer can simply increase the vertical render. So 16:10 has an advantage for locked 16:9 content like film/TV from the last 10 years or so, but not so much for games. You've already acknowledged that 16:10 doesn't work better for books/magazines/office uses that are much closer to 4:3 in terms of proportion, and of course most point-and-shoot photos are 4:3. I think you're simply making this up as you go along. See below...
Yes, my chart is a correct comparison, your original one was misleading because you compared different screen sizes. How many times do I have to say it? 4:3 gives you more screen area yes, 16:10 gives you screen area that is best suited to all uses without compromising drastically on one one in favour of another. Overall it is most ideal because it makes the best use of your central vision, thus being the most efficient and ergonomic. To me more screen area is meaningless if it leaves much of your vision wasted, or if viewed closer, puts parts of the screen in your peripheral, in turn making general use less comfortable. As for games, your simple solution of increasing the vertical render is a compromise, as I already discussed. It leaves more of your L+R vision unused, and as such immersion is lowered. The other solution to render at native 16:9 gives you a smaller screen. At a higher resolution you can just sit closer, when other 16:10 or 16:9 devices use similar resolutions, then a dpi reduction will be the drawback for 4:3 displays in that case. Congratulations on stretching and cropping a 4:3 image to 16:10, that is truly a real life representation right there! An actual render of the game at 16:10 would show more on the sides, giving you a wider field of view, thus adding to the immersion. Further more, as I keep saying but you believe to be made up, more of your central vision is taken up by the game. If rendered at 16:9, a further horizontal portion of the screen is used for L+R peripheral, again, further increasing immersion. 4:3 at native aspect simply cannot achieve this level of immersion for cinematic video games. If you actually want to dispute this, then please put forward your actual thoughts to the contrary. Most people who have at least some experience with 4:3 and widescreen gaming will surely understand what I am saying to be true.
So after I posted about the 1024x768 res on the touchpad being the only android device using that aspect ratio, LG announces the Optimus Vu 5" device with 1024x768 to challenge the Samsung Galaxy Note with 1280x800 res. 4:3 is horrible for a phone. It looks like a box that you put up to your ear. I think LG took that data out of context. That aspect ratio is acceptable for a tablet, but not a phone.
My original chart compared proportions displayed at the same width. There's nothing misleading about that when the point I was making is "4:3 is proportionally larger than 16:9". The comparison between the screen diagonals didn't refute that point. This argument is nonsense. 4:3 was the standard aspect ratio of the film industry prior to TV, and TV chose 4:3 because of the popularity of the format for film. Once TV started to eat into cinema ticket sales, then the film industry switched to really wide aspect ratios like Cinemascope and VistaVision etc. to differentiate itself. Books, magazines, and standard office paper sizes are closer to 4:3 than 16:10, and the standard photo format for the general public is 4:3. And, of course, the entire history of video games prior to the last 10 years was based almost entirely on 4:3. Did the Nintendo DS flop by using 4:3? Claiming that it's not a workable format for your vision is nothing more than a fabrication. It's proven to work just fine, time and time again. The success of the iPad itself is just one more example. I guarantee you that it's not going to look any better to find a game that has the small areas to the left/right rendered vs. a 4:3 render with the larger top/bottom areas included. Again, this is just the marketing. People have been fooled into thinking that 16:9 is bigger and better, when in fact it's smaller.
Like I asked before, why must the overall device proportions locked? Why is it okay to add to the device height but not width? You're imposing an artificial limitation by saying the device must not be wider than the current iPad. All historical standards must be correct from the get go then. No need to revise or re-think anything, whatever is first decided upon must be the best option and shall be kept for the rest of eternity regardless of technological and cultural changes! "That's just the way it's always been!", clearly an inspirational way of thinking - especially in the technology field. How about a little bit of research into the Academy Ratio (4:3) for film? http://www.pictureshowman.com/articles_technology_ratio.cfm Notice the mention of the golden ratio and the golden rectangle, widely accepted as the most pleasing aspect for rectangles. Why? Like I've said, it fits perfectly within our central vision thus limiting distraction by surrounding objects, or causing discomfort by being outside our central field of vision. To me using all of our central vision is the most ideal solution for modern computing displays. For film and other cinematic experiences, using a portion of L+R peripheral adds to the immersion by offering a slightly overwhelming experience, where the viewer is somewhat lost in the image as if they are really there. As for why the 4:3 ratio was initially used in film; it clearly is not because it's the best overall aspect for the job, it was simply the most feasible and logical to one person who had a part in pioneering film. It was then shoe horned into becoming the standard for the industry by way monopolistic practices. Very similar to how you view the rise of 16:9. But of course to you, 4:3 was here first, so every initial standard must be the best one for the job. Yes 16:9 is smaller, but better suited for a cinematic experience. For such uses the trade off is worth it. On a mobile computing devices uses for a myriad of tasks? IMHO it is not worth it, and other, 'half way' aspects are more suited as they make the best use of your available vision while still maintaining decent overall screen area. The introduction of 16:10 monitors on both the PC and Mac was nothing but a benefit. While the standard sizes for 4:3 monitors at the time was 17", 19" and 21", 16:10 monitors were initially most common in 22", 23" and 24". Why? Because they knew people didn't want to sacrifice height for width. I completely agree with your premise of not wanting to sacrifice overall area, especially on a mobile device, which is why I think 16:9 is a poor standard for this space. However, I reiterate that 'half way' aspects are by far the better choice over 4:3 because they offer a compromise that suits all uses without dramatically hindering one, take up more of your central vision providing ideal efficiency, and allow for smarter use of the given space (other interactive on screen items not encroaching on valuable, central screen real estate). As for your claim that it's not going to look better for a game rendered in widescreen vs. 4:3. Tell that to the millions of people who have gamed in both and would never want to go back to 4:3. With the correct FOV, the same vertical view is rendered on all display aspects (this method of FOV calculation is the most common for games), but displays with a wider aspect render more of the scene on the horizontal aspect. You see more of the action because your view point is far closer to what it would be in real life, just as virtual reality goggles attempt to surround the users peripheral.
The current width of the iPad isn't an artificial limitation. That's what they chose for the device. And as I pointed out, ANY device width could use a 4:3 proportion or a 16:10 proportion for the screen. 4:3 will always provide more screen space if you base it on width. 4:3 will always provide more screen space if you base it on the screen diagonal. You've been attempting to claim that 4:3 doesn't visually function properly compared to 16:10. I'm pointing out that 4:3 has a very long and very successful history of working as a visual format. It's worked for film, TV, video games, photos etc., etc., AND it's closer to office paper standards and general book/magazine proportions than 16:10. That's why Apple chose 4:3. You can't really argue that it's not a successful or popular visual format, it provides more screen space, and it's closer proportionally to a wider range of media than 16:10. I don't have any argument with the golden section. But the fact remains that most of the media and documents that users would be viewing on the iPad is not based on the golden section. And I would point out that the Golden Section kind of blows up your complaint about using an "old" proportion instead of a "new" one. People who gamed in the 80s and 90s aren't gaming on the iPad? Anyway, look at the comparison below. I found a panoramic image by a guy that does video game set design and cropped it to both formats. It doesn't look to me like there are any glaring problems with immersion or visual effectiveness in either case. But, like I've said before, people have been trained by marketing to think "widescreen" is automatically better.