iPhone 3G S has yellowish tint

GOOD NEWS! I received my new iPhone 3GS today (replacing the one I've sent back to them) and its OK, not at all Yellow!

Compared side by side with the Yellowy 3GS that's gone back, and the old 3G its MUCH easier on the eye, no tobacco stained off white.

Still don't think the blacks are as good as the 3G, but at least the white is more palettable.

In fact it made the 3G look a touch redy/bluey/purpley...

Sadly it hasn't come out too well on the rubbish digital camera I have at work 😟

Left = old iPhone 3G, middle = new iPhone 3GS (no yellow), Right = old iPhone 3GS with yellow tint
http://www.davidmbell.com/iphone/iphones1.jpg

http://www.davidmbell.com/iphone/iphones2.jpg

David

Message was edited by: davidmbell

ieonjunas wrote:
Call me paranoid, or whatever but I truly believe these "geniuses" are truly lying when they say they have never heard of the problem. I would not be surprised at an internal memo directing employees to disavow any problem with the screens and only replace if absolutely necessary, but to stonewall the customer if at all possible.

I feel exactly the same (as far as the Genius reps go, I'm not sure about the retail guys). IMO, yes the Genius guys are lying, but doing so because they're required to by middle management. Tell the truth and immediately lose your job, or do as you're told and let the customers figure out from this thread how to work the rotten Apple system. I'd hate to be a Genius stuck in this situation between their job and doing the right thing...

Antonio... Exactly. I worked in sales for two years with a company merely because the pay was decent... And for any customer service they required the customer to jump through many hoops, and only then would they fix a problem. Being in thv middle, unable to take care of our customers, and knowing they would eventually get a resolution only if they pushe hard enough for it was very frustrating and completely killed any potential customer loyalty... Sounds famiar to me. I did not expect this kind of policy(as I'm convinced it is) from a company like apple.... Now ya know!

As much as I've enjoyed my previous iPhone(I adopted at the 3g level to allow time to work out any problems that first year LMAO) I hope Microsoft drops a zune HD phone with a tetra video processor and surprises us all... and forces apple into a competition where customers are taken care of as a company selling point... But seriously there are enough apple customers, and consumers in general, who take what they get and settle that they really don't need customers like us unfortunately. Completely besides the ethics of doing good business....

Forgot to mention, new one is week 29 and Factory 88.

If this helps...?

Now have whistling during video recording (fixed by putting on silent) that I'm not sure I had before, but think I can live with that is sure its a 3.1 fix.

Also got a rattly silent switch when on silent, but last one did that too.

Why can't they get this right when they charge SO much for it!

David

no problem frodo...its not as extensive as the other site... i keep them all bookmarked on my phone so i can "attempt" to demonstrate to the "geniuses" at the apple store... hopefully i can post tomorrow that i have a phone i am happy with... does anyone have issues with their map and compass app? my compass doesnt seem to be real exact...the street always tends to angle to the left 10-15 degrees

Frodo B wrote:
I just checked my contrast. On my 2G I can see all of the blocks. On my 3GS I can only see the bottom two rows of blocks. Does anyone have a 3GS screen better then this?

I can only see the bottom 2 rows as well (max brightness on, auto-brightness off, dark room & zoomed in). My wife's is the same. I consider our two 3G S's to have "near perfect" screens too. I wonder if the Apple Store display phones display any better...

OK....Guys.....please don't be angry with me for what I'm about to say. Now I do realize that SOME OF YOU may have horribly whacked out screens and you have a right to have them corrected. But earlier today I visited the website mentioned for screen testing, COMPUTER LCD screens. Yes, yes. The iPhone IS a computer with an LCD screen but at heart it's just another cell phone. Oh God. I said it. "It's just another cell phone".

Anyway, here I am earlier today at www.lagom.nl running tests on my iPhone that were apparently originally intended for larger LCD screens and I came to the realization that I must be crazy. OK, my screen is warm tone and I have good contrast. I like it. Is your screen warm tone? Is it an even tone over the whole screen?........ It's even toned???? FINE! LEAVE IT ALONE! White is white if you're looking at one phone.

OK, some of you evidently have serious problems with half your screen being urine yellow (really?) or one half having at least a noticeable color temp difference from top to bottom. OK legit gripes. I hope you get it resolved to your liking.

But here I am earlier today running black level tests, gamma calibration, pixel inversion tests and the like on A CELL PHONE!! I must be nuts!!!!

Really guys. Please don't be angry. But I think that SOME OF YOU are being a bit anal about this. Myself included.

Yeah, there's been 85,000 some odd views on this thread. That's views, not replies. There are only about 800 replies and most are from the same group of people which really makes that number smaller. Out of the millions, that's pretty small potatoes.

BUT THAT STILL DOESN'T EXCUSE APPLE FOR TREATING US LIKE IDIOTS!

Again, sorry guys. Don't be TOO rough on me. Keep smilin'!

A- FREAKING-men.

I've been following this thread purely for the humor value. I can't believe the amount of stress and time people are pouring into this topic.

Are some of the screens "too" yellow? Probably. Like... maybe... 1% or less of the entire production run. Remember, the new screens are SUPPOSED to be "warmer" and individual judgement of what's "too yellow" and what isn't is just that... judgement. Individual tolerance or intolerance does not indicate a massive failure on Apple's part, it only indicates that a few people are particularly uptight about what the "tone" of their phone screen is... for what reason I can't possibly imagine. So the screen is a little more yellow than it used to be, honestly... so what? Why is this such a big deal? It works just fine, personally I like it better. Does that mean I have defective eyes or something?

Are some of the screens defective? Of course! How could some not be? They make millions of these things, some will be defective. Take it back and get a new one.

Is there variation phone to phone and production run to production run? Of course! How could there not be? The volume at which these screens are produced by necessity means the screens come from several sources, so there's variation.

But the unbelievable level of torment people are going through, running gamma tests, polarization comparisons, exchanging their phones 2, 3, 4 times... all over something so ultimately unimportant... it is to laugh. I can't think of even ONE situation where a slightly "warmer" screen tone would have ANY meaningful effect of any kind other than to maybe be slightly annoying if you don't care for it. The level of response here compared to the real-world significance of the problem... amazing.

It's a PHONE, people, a PHONE. It's not a multi-dimensional transportational device with a sentient AI that can regulate your chromosomal degeneration. It's a PHONE. There's only one single test you need to do: Look at your iphone in a normal use situation and for less than 2 seconds think about whether or not you like it. If you answer "yes" move on with your day. If you answer "no" take it back to where you got it and ask for a new one. Everything else is just excessive mental flagellation.

Markie-Poo I'm not angry with you at all regarding your post. Everyone here has the right to their own opinion. You are correct, it is only a cell phone.

My only problem is why is the screen on my 2G far better then the screen on my new 3GS? The screen quality should be improving on the new models not getting worse. Even the camera on my 2G is better then my 3GS with the exception of close-up shots.

Frodo! Thx! But please understand there is a level of sarcasm and levity intended. I know from experience that there is a nicebunch of people around here.

Micah D! Thanks for standing up! I think a good portion of the folks here should just try to enjoy their iPhone instead of worrying about color temperature.

Now the battery issue......that's different since Apple published specs and a lot of folks aren't getting any where near them!

Markie-Poo yes the 3GS is a great phone and I do love it. I won't let this one problem ruin my iPhone experience.

As far as my battery performance goes I am very pleased. I have bluetooth, wifi, locate me all swithced on. Push set for 15min AND I listen to the iPod using my bluetooth headphones for eight hours a day at work. Added to that I go on the Internet and check my email. By the end of the (work) day my battery is down to around 25 percent. I think that is pretty good.

I just got a 3GS factory 88 week 29 which has a yellow tint.

BUT. I must say that is it not a bad screen. It is actually both better and worse!!!

Worse because a phone needs to have a high contrast display for easy navigating - and this screen has less contrast than my old 3G.

Better because when looking at pictures it has much more detail in both dark and light areas. Pictures look a lot more like they do on my MB-Pro which is calbrated with a Gretag Macbeth Eye 1.
It is also somewhat easier on the eyes when reading for a long time.

Hi,
Up until yesterday I didn't know anything about the Yellow Tint. After read this thread, my senses were heightened! So I just got an iPhone 3GS (Factory 86 - Week 30 2009). And I am pretty pleased with the unit!

UNTIL I compared it to my iPhone 3G (Factory 84 - Week 34 2008), and you can see that the 3GS has a yellow tint! There is less contrast! But the difference, is when you look at the viewing angle from above, you can DEFINITELY see a yellow hue all over the screen (which was not on the 3GS).

I'm not sure if Apple changed suppliers to reduce costs (to make the phone more affordable). I can understand that, there was a screen difference between the iPhone and the iPhone 3G (the 2G LCD panel seemed to be closer to the out glass).

This might be a temporary thing, until Apple changes the screens to LED or OLED. Or Apple might be slowly getting rid of the Yellow Tinted panels and silently introducing the better ones (kind of what we saw with the MacBook Unibody Late 2008, and Early 2009).

I am a little upset about my purchase, I still have the 3GS in the box, going to go check the other 3GS to see if the Yellow Hue is visible at an "above viewing angle".

To me I think the 3G has a blue tint where as the 3GS has a more natural color. I compared both phones to my 8-bit lcd monitor set on a sRGB profile and the 3gs was closer to the color temperature of the monitor than the 3g.