[bhauer]

I don't agree that the stagnation in resolution evolution was an artifact of the CRT to LCD conversion. I put the blame on the convergence of the living room and desktop display markets and the disturbing marketing effectiveness of the "HD" moniker [1].

Resolution didn't simply stagnate; it regressed. In approximately 2000, Dell sold laptops with 1600x1200 LCD displays. Once "HD" appeared, display manufacturers lost interest in resolutions higher than 1920x1080. For several years to a decade, the most common top resolution was 1920x1080 and many mid and low-spec laptops were sold with shockingly poor 1024x768 and 1366x768 resolutions. (The 2560x1600 30-inch monitors appeared on the market as a prosumer option in ~2004 but these were tainted by their own blight--a fixed price of $1,100 that never wavered--and didn't see any compelling competition until the Korean and Chinese manufacturers disrupted the incumbents.)

[1] http://tiamat.tsotech.com/hd-sucks

[kps]

I blame porn, and more generally, the desire for flashy colours in the consumer market. Circa 1990 we had 1600×1200 monochrome CRTs at work, and nothing I've used since has equaled them for text. Considering displays as effectively limited by signal bandwidth, colour forces a √3 drop in linear resolution.

[coldtea]

>Circa 1990 we had 1600×1200 monochrome CRTs at work, and nothing I've used since has equaled them for text.

Really? I've used monochrome hi-res CRTs in the early nineties (made by SUN for its workstations nonetheless) and they were shite -- (not to mention the text rendering of the software at the time was shite too).

I actually think you're just seeing those things through rose-colored glasses. Try a modern 5K retina iMac or 4K dell monitor.