Products · Broad category
Monitors
Raised as a usability problem by 129 people on Hacker News over 19 years (2008–2026), in 113 threads.
This is a broad category rather than one product, so its issues aren't ranked on the home page.
No issue was raised by at least 3 people in 3 threads this year.
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- 6Cursor lags badly at 30 HzUnreviewed
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Every issue, all time, most people first
Arranging windows into an ideal layout across screens is a constant struggleUnreviewed
20082026- Juggling many apps and windows on one screen makes work unpleasant, forcing constant minimizing and switching2024-07-02
- Tiling and finding windows across several monitors interrupts flow and wastes time2024-02-09
- Switching between many windows on one screen is fiddly and loses context2023-10-06
Text becomes unreadably small on sub-43-inch 4K monitors without scalingUnreviewed
20082026- Text becomes unreadable at small font sizes on non-HiDPI screens2024-03-07
- Native 4K on a Mac leaves text hard to read and too little usable screen space2023-12-29
- Monitors lack proper HiDPI support, so macOS and Linux scaling looks poor2022-03-08
Brightness must be constantly adjusted using awkward touch buttonsUnreviewed
20082026- Constant manual brightness adjustment with shitty monitor touch buttons is annoying2025-07-05
- Brightness must be constantly readjusted with cumbersome physical buttons or touch controls2022-12-11
- Changing monitor brightness requires a clunky joystick and many presses through menus2022-06-15
4K TVs add 130-230ms display lag, making interaction unpleasantUnreviewed
20082026- Monitor refuses to play 4K content with a 'not a TV' safety block2025-10-10
- Substantial input lag makes Photoshop impossible to use on a TV monitor2023-12-29
- Touch-to-drawing lag is much worse with external input or browser whiteboards2023-09-28
Cursor lags badly at 30 HzUnreviewed
20082026- Lag and stuttering when typing and scrolling on a 30Hz 4K screen2021-06-08
- Jerky cursor and scrolling make the display painful to use at 30 Hz2019-07-04
- Cursor feels sluggish, like molasses, due to TV input lag2018-05-11
Moving cursor across screens needs a long mouse trip or app switchUnreviewed
20082026- Moving the cursor across screens requires a long mouse trip or an app switch to get focus2023-03-03
- Shortcuts for moving between screens are non-intuitive, and mouse cursor jumps unnaturally when resolutions differ2019-04-07
- Screen updates so slowly that pointer position is hard to judge when dragging windows2014-12-14
Apps ignoring DPI scaling are unusable at high resolutionUnreviewed
20082026- Constantly have to fix UI scaling bugs and zoom in and out2026-04-04
- Native resolution makes everything tiny, and scaling UI 1.5x causes many problems2026-03-31
- Apps that ignore DPI scaling settings are unusable at high resolution2017-03-24
Ultrawide screen can't fit browsers and terminal beside the IDEUnreviewed
20082026- Ultrawide screen too cramped; toolbars and menus eat space, can't view two A4 PDFs side by side2023-12-30
- Widescreen shape wastes horizontal space and gives too few lines for code2018-04-19
- Ultrawide screen can't fit browsers and terminal beside the IDE, and wide layouts strain the neck2016-07-03
Windows move to second monitor and resize when monitor is switched awayUnreviewed
20082026- Windows moves all windows to second monitor and resizes them when the monitor is switched away2023-01-06
- Desktop windows must be refixed each time switching between laptop screen and monitor2021-12-02
- Docking and undocking monitors and rearranging windows is frustrating2021-07-30
Unreviewed issues were grouped by machine: Claude Haiku labelled each comment as a usability complaint, named what it's about and summed up the problem in a line, and a small model grouped similar problems. Nobody has checked them by hand. Expect mistakes.
The newest 50 complaints
- Screen goes dark when refresh rate is set wrong, requiring figuring out and remembering the setting2026-04-19
- Constantly have to fix UI scaling bugs and zoom in and out2026-04-04
- Native resolution makes everything tiny, and scaling UI 1.5x causes many problems2026-03-31
- Glossy screen becomes unreadable black reflection in sunlight outdoors2026-01-19
- Input lag makes typing feel delayed, throwing off typing cadence in the terminal2025-11-05
- Monitor refuses to play 4K content with a 'not a TV' safety block2025-10-10
- Constant manual brightness adjustment with shitty monitor touch buttons is annoying2025-07-05
- Half of the displays tested don't show 640x480 HDMI signal2025-05-29
- Input source switching buttons are badly placed and sometimes open full settings instead of the source menu2024-10-19
- Monitor stays distorted and unusable for about half an hour after computer wakes2024-09-26
- Juggling many apps and windows on one screen makes work unpleasant, forcing constant minimizing and switching2024-07-02
- Father finds keyboard brightness shortcuts too hard to use, so he avoids the newer computer and monitor2024-06-03
- Cannot dim low enough at minimum brightness, so it blinds in a dark room2024-04-28
- Text becomes unreadable at small font sizes on non-HiDPI screens2024-03-07
- Tiling and finding windows across several monitors interrupts flow and wastes time2024-02-09
- Screen dims itself when static text stays unchanged, making code unreadable every few minutes2024-02-02
- Ultrawide screen too cramped; toolbars and menus eat space, can't view two A4 PDFs side by side2023-12-30
- Native 4K on a Mac leaves text hard to read and too little usable screen space2023-12-29
- Hard to find a position where the whole screen is comfortable to see without moving head2023-12-29
- Hard to find the right position so the screen is reachable without moving the head2023-12-29
- Substantial input lag makes Photoshop impossible to use on a TV monitor2023-12-29
- Switching between many windows on one screen is fiddly and loses context2023-10-06
- Touch-to-drawing lag is much worse with external input or browser whiteboards2023-09-28
- Nag prompt blocks access to settings until the eco mode is disabled2023-09-04
- Monitor menu button is non-standard and gets fumbled like a misplaced wiper knob2023-07-26
- Wide keyboards stretch beyond reach for small hands, forcing palm lifting while typing2023-07-17
- Forgets where applications were placed when using two monitors2023-03-04
- Moving the cursor across screens requires a long mouse trip or an app switch to get focus2023-03-03
- Can't switch monitor inputs without manually using the on-screen display buttons2023-02-25
- 1366x768 resolution is too cramped and uncomfortable to use2023-02-24
- Too little vertical space for browsing and documents, with browser and site chrome eating the rest2023-02-02
- Windows moves all windows to second monitor and resizes them when the monitor is switched away2023-01-06
- Must manually switch input on each monitor and swap USB dongles between machines2023-01-06
- Switching inputs or resolution takes seconds instead of milliseconds, which the commenter finds unreasonably slow2022-12-19
- Quick-switch input list differs from the normal list, confusing users; monitor takes 10-30 seconds to wake2022-12-19
- Joystick menu navigation is hard to use and the control is awkwardly placed on the back2022-12-19
- To turn it off after the PC sleeps, user must wake it, wait through all inputs, then navigate menu2022-12-19
- Brightness must be constantly readjusted with cumbersome physical buttons or touch controls2022-12-11
- Searching hoarded image files is hard; names are number strings and must be remembered2022-12-09
- Volume levels are too coarse, with first few steps already too loud2022-10-28
- Hard to give the third screen much attention2022-09-02
- Two monitors get randomly reassigned after wake, forcing awkward head tilting to navigate the mouse2022-08-28
- Monitor buttons are hard to press and options are buried under menus2022-07-26
- Switching inputs takes three button presses with noticeable lag, plus separate mouse and keyboard switches2022-06-16
- Changing monitor brightness requires a clunky joystick and many presses through menus2022-06-15
- Monitor hardware buttons and on-screen display menu are obnoxious and slower to use2022-06-11
- Monitor interface is not designed for TV use cases and has no TV remote2022-05-07
- On-screen menus make adjusting brightness and contrast a pain compared to physical knobs2022-04-26
- Changing brightness on the monitor is harder than enabling a gaming crosshair2022-03-16
- Monitors lack proper HiDPI support, so macOS and Linux scaling looks poor2022-03-08