I'm about to adjust all drawables for an Android app for XXHDPI devices (like sony xperia Z and samsung s4). After thorough reading on Google's documentation, blogs, and SO, I'm confused as to the graphics I'm about to produce.
My concerns are the following:
Google states that I shouldn't worry about this density as it scales up XHDPI graphics - In the same manner, (before XXHDPI devices) why the production of XHDPI graphics was a necessity and it didn't scale up HDPI graphics?
Sony reminds developers not to exclude XXHDPI screens without clarifying if this concerns making adjustments to graphics - Do I have to redesign all graphic elements for XXHDPI?
Based on (2), Sony Xperia Z Ultra has 342dpi density but it is categorized as an XXHDPI device. - If I produce the graphics for an XXHDPI, which is twice the size of an HDPI density, the graphics will scale down by almost 1/3 to match Sony's density and this is undesirable. Why doesn't Xperia Z use the XHDPI drawables? What if I have a pattern and I can't afford any scaling since I'll lose the detail of the pixel-perfect pattern?
Are XXHDPI resources REALLY necessary?
I hope somebody can answer all the questions above.
EDIT
Below are the results of slightly scaling a graphic to adjust to various densities
- xhdpi image (1:1) no scaling
- xhdpi scaled up by 10%
- xhdpi scaled down by 10%
The detail loss is obvious at 2nd and 3rd image.
A dp is equal to one physical pixel on a screen with a density of 160.
The sp unit is the same size as dp, by default, but it resizes based on the user's preferred text size.
In 4x screen (~640 DPI) it takes four times as many pixels (352 x 144 PX) to fill the area of 88 x 36 density-independent-pixels.
XXHDPI resources are essential for stuff like icons on modern devices. Google will change their story and start to recommend them when they release their own XXHDPI Nexus device.
Think about it this way: xxhdpi devices are pretty much the STANDARD Android devices. Little chance Samsung & HTC are going to roll everything back to XHDPI just because Google can't keep up.
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