If you’re having trouble with light bouncing off of your laptop screen and hitting you directly in the eyeballs, you have three choices for how to deal with the problem…
- 1-   Get a seeing-eye dog.
- 2-   Sit somewhere else.
- 3-   Get an anti glare screen.
If you already have a laptop, it might be too late for option three. However, if you haven’t yet purchased your laptop, or if you’re looking to upgrade to a new one sometime soon, and you plan on taking it outdoors or using it in a well lit room, you might want to look into getting an anti glare screen-equipped laptop.
The screen has to be specially treated at the time of manufacturer, so it can be difficult, and expensive, to have one installed at a later date, or to have your current screen treated to become an anti-glare screen.
If you’re already equipped with a normal screen that does not prevent glare, you still have an option of using an anti-glare filter. These can be bought for pretty cheap, most of the time, and tend to work considerably well.
As an added bonus, most anti-glare filters double as privacy filters. This means that only the person sitting directly in front of the laptop can see what’s up on the screen. Sitting to the side or standing to peek over your shoulder, looky loos will only be able to see a pitch black screen.
If you need a quick fix, right now, and can’t really get to the nearest electronics store to grab a glare filter, well, sit somewhere else! Okay but seriously, you can usually reduce glare to some extent by turning the brightness on your screen all the way up, or positioning the screen vertically. Vertically upright screens can be difficult to see when they’re sitting on your lap, but they do reflect less light than if they were pointing up towards the overhead light at an angle.
If you want to just get rid of glare altogether, an anti-glare screen really is your best bet. A lot of manufacturers don’t actually print “anti-glare screen” on the box, for some reason. Next time you go laptop shopping, it may be wise to run a quick demo on the laptops you’re looking into buying. Open it up, turn it on, and point it at the overhead lights at different angles. If it gives a big bright glare, indoors, it’ll give an even bigger, brighter glare if you plan on sitting on a park bench or using your laptop in a vehicle.
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I don’t really see the point of buying a privacy filter just for the anti-glare function. I picked up a ViewGuard Anti-Glare Matte Screen Protector for $15 and buyviewguard.com and it does the same job better and for much cheaper.
I’m trying to find a 13″-15″ laptop that is built with an anti-glare type screen but, other than the Dell Vostro series, all units I’ve see by any manufacturer is the newer glossy lite bright style.
Any suggestions?