Visually represented:
This is a comparison of 3 manual engravings of a 1/2" wide, 100% black square (just the first few passes are shown). The black areas are motion without laser power. The grayscale areas represent % of laser power from 0-100% white. Blue indicates no travel.
They are at 100, 500 and 1000 GF Zooms™, from top to bottom respectively. (The top is at 125 LPI, and the two below it are at 340 LPI. That’s why the spacing between rows is different.)
At 100, there is very little accel/decel distance. At 500 it is close to a 1/4". At 1000, it is around 3/4".
(Note the brick layering effect. This is an artifact of the way GF modulates laser power. I’m drafting a summary of my findings on that, which is where these images come from.)
EDIT: Forgot to mention: The image is scaled at 1 pixel per step on each axis.