Windows Scaling - Does this Defeat the Purpose of a 4K Monitor?

Hi, I recently upgraded my monitor to 4K and noticed that Windows Scaling shows the value of 150% as Recommended. Leaving it at 100% is super crisp, clean, but small - the upgraded resolution is obvious.

But I find that 150% almost looks like a 1080p resolution... and am curious if setting it to that defeats the purpose of having a 4K monitor. Meaning, am I dropping the monitor's resolution by using any scaling above 100%? And why would Windows suggest 150% if doing so downgrades the quality of the HiDPI? Just doesn't look super high res to me anymore at 150%... is it just me?

I have my scaling set at 175% and the 4k desktop wallpaper looks very sharp as do 4k videos. Most 4k TVs are significantly more than 50-75% larger than my 27" 4k monitor, so 3840x2160 graphics are spread out much more on them.

Scaling is for things like text and menus. It doesn't affect images.

bobkn said:

Scaling is for things like text and menus. It doesn't affect images.

yes thats exactly what I noticed the difference in... text in Windows, text in apps, the clarity of GUIs....
i guess it seems like the more one scales up, the more the crispiness is lost...or is it just an illusion because it's getting larger on the screen?

The resolution of your monitor is physical pixels, or rather 3 sub pixels, RGB. Native resolution.Nothing changes that.

The Windows scaling is so that small thin text which maybe 1 pixel wide is larger & maybe 2 pixels wide which makes for easier readability.

That is one of readability not resolution.

orlando1974 said:

...am curious if setting it to that defeats the purpose of having a 4K monitor.

The answer will depend on how Windows scales the display, and how programs deal with the info Windows supplies about the effective screen size. But unless Windows interpolates the up-scaled pixels (which it might, I don't know), you are bound to lose crispness. Steps of 1 pixel in the original become 1.5 pixels in the scaled display. I have noticed that some apps (by which I mean applications, not the dreadful UWA things) cope better with the 150% I uses on a small-screen (15") laptop: explorer manages a crisp view, Wiztree looks blurry. There is some MS discussion baout this here:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...0-960b99aa347d
but I didn't really learn anything useful - I haven't read it all.