Fractional scaling on 5k2k 40" ultrawide monitor

[aysbg]

Hi guys, I have been tempted to try out Omarchy. I have tried Omakub last year on dedicated older Thinkpad that I had back then and experience was really bad. The problem is that almost all DEs, except KDE to an extent, are really bad with fractional scaling and in particular fractional scaling of fonts. I think that the issue is even more present on ultrawide monitors like mine, an LG 40" 5k2k monitor. I have run Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian in the past, Gnome, KDE and Hyprland. Being a developer myself, I do not mind tweaking or configuring stuff (once, I do NOT want to deal with that constantly) but I've been on Mac for the better part of previous 20yrs so I got spoiled with the font rendering ever since introduction of Retina screens.

Does anyone has such monitor and is running Omarchy? If yes, please let me know what scaling are you using, how the font rendering looks like, hows the behaviour of the Apps, is there screen tears, stutters when moving from virt. desktop to desktop etc.

Much appreciated!

[XY55bqg6iAw8ttP]

Hi guys, I have been tempted to try out Omarchy. I have tried Omakub last year on dedicated older Thinkpad that I had back then and experience was really bad. The problem is that almost all DEs, except KDE to an extent, are really bad with fractional scaling and in particular fractional scaling of fonts. I think that the issue is even more present on ultrawide monitors like mine, an LG 40" 5k2k monitor. I have run Ubuntu, Fedora and Debian in the past, Gnome, KDE and Hyprland. Being a developer myself, I do not mind tweaking or configuring stuff (once, I do NOT want to deal with that constantly) but I've been on Mac for the better part of previous 20yrs so I got spoiled with the font rendering ever since introduction of Retina screens.

Does anyone has such monitor and is running Omarchy? If yes, please let me know what scaling are you using, how the font rendering looks like, hows the behaviour of the Apps, is there screen tears, stutters when moving from virt. desktop to desktop etc.

Much appreciated!

I have this set and it works perfectly with my 40":

monitor = desc:Dell Inc. DELL U4025QW, 5120x2160@120, 0x0, 2, bitdepth, 10, cm, hdr, sdrbrightness, 1.15, sdrsaturation, 1.00, vrr, 1

[aysbg]

Thanks for replying, can you help me understand what fractional scaling value is that? 1.15 as in 115%? What I've noticed is that the ideal resolution for my eyes (from the MacOS perspective) is 3840x1620, which would be 133% scaling.

[XY55bqg6iAw8ttP]

The 1.15 in that line isn't scaling, but the SDR brightness multiplier for when in HDR mode.

Fractional scaling in Hyprland uses the monitor directive’s scale parameter. If you don’t set one explicitly, it defaults to 1.0 (100%). A scale of 1.33 would be 133%, which is roughly the “looks like 3840×1620” setting you’re used to from macOS’s retina voodoo.

So, if I wanted a 133% scaling, I'd need to switch that line to:

monitor = desc:Dell Inc. DELL U4025QW, 5120x2160@120, 0x0, 1.33, bitdepth, 10, cm, hdr, sdrbrightness, 1.15, sdrsaturation, 1.00, vrr, 1

If you run hyprctl monitors, you'll see all the info you can manually dial into:

hyprctl monitors
Monitor DP-1 (ID 0):
	[email protected] at 0x0
	description: Dell Inc. DELL U4025QW BKNXG34
	make: Dell Inc.
	model: DELL U4025QW
	physical size (mm): 930x390
	serial: *********
	active workspace: 2 (2)
	special workspace: 0 ()
	reserved: 0 26 0 0
	scale: 2.00
	transform: 0
	focused: yes
	dpmsStatus: 1
	vrr: true
	solitary: 0
	solitaryBlockedBy: windowed mode,missing candidate
	activelyTearing: false
	tearingBlockedBy: next frame is not torn,user settings,missing candidate
	directScanoutTo: 0
	directScanoutBlockedBy: user settings,missing candidate
	disabled: false
	currentFormat: XBGR2101010
	mirrorOf: none
	availableModes: [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

[aysbg]

Thank you so much man! This was a great explanation for an arch noob.

[aysbg]

So you are using 200% scaling basically, from what I can see. Have you tried scaling it down to at least 150%?

[XY55bqg6iAw8ttP]

So you are using 200% scaling basically, from what I can see. Have you tried scaling it down to at least 150%?

Yeah, 2 is what feels "right" for me. A 1.5 (150%) would be an invalid scale. Hyprland would nag because it's not a "clean divisor". I believe it would suggest the nearest possible scale instead. In this case, probably 1.6.

[aysbg]

So you are using 200% scaling basically, from what I can see. Have you tried scaling it down to at least 150%?

Yeah, 2 is what feels "right" for me. A 1.5 (150%) would be an invalid scale. Hyprland would nag because it's not a "clean divisor". I believe it would suggest the nearest possible scale instead. In this case, probably 1.6.

That would be too large for me, I'd have to make font smaller (which is what I used to do with gnome, couple of years ago when I also tried to switch from Mac, set resolution to either 200% and make text smaller or set at 100% and make everything larger). Maybe the option is to sell this 5k2k monitor and get 2x 27" 5k monitors and run them at 200% so that would be ideal...