Thinkpads Forum

I was just playing around on T60 with SXGA flexview.

I noticed that in the Display control panel that the color setting was 16 BIT (medium).

I would like to get some opinions on whether or not I change it to 32 BIT?

With such a nice LCD and a machine/Graphics chipset that can certainly handle it, you most definitely want 32bit color depth.

Oh absolutely...32-bit. Max everything out. The resolution should also be set to the maximum, which is either 1400x1050 (SXGA+) or 1600x1200 (UXGA).

16 bits color is split as 5 bits Red, 6 bits Green and 5 bits Blue. With 5 bits, you will get 32 shades of Red and Blue and 64 shades of Green. This is done this way because the human eye is more sensitive to Green. 16 bits will give you a total of 32x32x64=65K colors.

Because the eye can tell brightness differences between 32 shades, you can see the so called banding in spots. An example is the bright spot in the upper left of the WindowsXP startup screen. If you have 16bit setting, the banding is very noticeable in that bright spot. LCDs are not perfectly spaced in brightness steps. Sometime they have a larger step between some brightnesses and small step between other brightnesses.

32 bits color is split as 10bits Red, 12bits Green and 10bits Blue. 10bits gives 1024 shades and generally the eye cannot tell this banding effect.

sjthinkpader wrote:16 bits color is split as 5 bits Red, 6 bits Green and 5 bits Blue. With 5 bits, you will get 32 shades of Red and Blue and 64 shades of Green. This is done this way because the human eye is more sensitive to Green. 16 bits will give you a total of 32x32x64=65K colors.

Because the eye can tell brightness differences between 32 shades, you can see the so called banding in spots. An example is the bright spot in the upper left of the WindowsXP startup screen. If you have 16bit setting, the banding is very noticeable in that bright spot. LCDs are not perfectly spaced in brightness steps. Sometime they have a larger step between some brightnesses and small step between other brightnesses.

32 bits color is split as 10bits Red, 12bits Green and 10bits Blue. 10bits gives 1024 shades and generally the eye cannot tell this banding effect.

This is great info. I certainly for one didn't know it. Thanks for sharing.

For OP's question, 32-bit is certainly the way to go. I have been using my T60p with a simultaneous displays with a 1900x1200 monitor and it works flawlessly - just a disclaimer I don't play graphics intensive games on it.

32 bit color usually means 24 bit RGB (8 bit for each color) plus 8 bit that are wasted (to align to 4 byte boundary) or maybe used as alpha channel http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_depth. There are systems with 3x10bit color depth, but I don't think anywhere in consumer hardware.

The LCDs generally can display either 3x6=18 bit or 3x8=24 bit of distinct RGB colors. Of course they never tell you on the spec sheet. I'm pretty sure every TN panel is 18bit, maybe with dithering or other tricks to reduce banding. Anybody knows for sure what the T60 IPS panel can display?

use 32 bit ... you'll notice lesser "banding". You have a nice IPS screen, use it as it should be used!