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From: toddpw@tybalt.caltech.edu (Todd P. Whitesel)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware
Subject: Re: (Non) Square Pixels?
Message-ID: <1990Feb15.035401.19041@spectre.ccsf.caltech.edu>
Date: 15 Feb 90 03:54:01 GMT
References: <4687@lmrc.uucp> <3119@cello.UUCP> <4736@lmrc.uucp> <710@shodha.dec.com> <11140@nigel.udel.EDU>
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new@udel.edu (Darren New) writes:

>In article <710@shodha.dec.com> ridder@elvira.enet.dec.com (Hans Ridder) writes:
>>Yes, the Mac does have square pixels.  This was one of the few Mac
>>features I wished for when the Amiga first came out.

>No, the Mac does not have square pixels.  At least not the early ones.
>Mac programs are written to behave AS IF the pixels are square, because
>the PRINTER pixels are square. But a circle on the monitor is not round.
>(Maybe the MacII has round circles, but the Mac SE or Plus does not.)

oh really? how did you draw the circle?

>For evidence, look at the paramters to the printer device on a Mac.
>One of them is a flag whether you want to use square printer Pixels
>or whether you want to adjust the printer to print what you see on
>the screen.

Don't know about your printer, but mine would turn a mathematical circle into
an ellipse. (NEC PC-8023A)

>The basic difference is that the Mac considers hardcopy more important
>than video and the Amiga does not.          -- Darren

Nope, the Mac considers WYSIWYG more important than anything else. If the
printer doesn't make life easy by printing 72 dpi square then they at least
give you an option to (attempt to) correct for it.

Every Mac has always had square pixels, and every monitor (from Apple at
least) has had 72 pixels per inch on the monitor. The price has been non
standard video, expensive monitors, and Genlock From Hell.

Todd Whitesel
toddpw @ tybalt.caltech.edu