I just bought my iMac at the end of August of this year and it's a got a screen burn-in problem. I noticed when watching a movie in full screen that there was a black line across the top of the screen (I'm guessing from the menu bar?). Can this be fixed? Will the warranty/apple care cover it? What can be done to prevent this in the future if I can get it fixed?
Spoke to Apple today regarding a very similar situation with the screen. I have change the screen every 2 months since August 2009, because of screen burn in or some other issue with the screen.
Just spoke to them today, they are saying it is an environmental issue where the machine is being used and as such they are not willing to replace the screen, given the history of my machine’s screen replacement.
This is what they replied, “the dark patches may be environmental but its impossible that this customer is the only one to get panels with this defect consistently.”
This is Apple saying this is not their problem anymore and they are not going to honour the warranty.
just want to add my name to the list of people seeing this on a 24in imac..in my case, i am doing heavy use, mostly in photoshop and aperture, and I too see this problem in as little as 1-2 hours...
needless to say, its a hassle..i have my screensaver set to all white and it starts after 5 minutes of idling, yet i still see screen burn in...
apple should admit the design flaw and either issue a software patch that allows you to control the fan speed or replace these units..
Ugh, Ive just set up an appt. at the local Apple Store for this issue--I'm a bit disheartened to have found this thread describing the exact same problem. I've recently installed Windows Vista via Boot Camp, and was surprised to notice that indeed, merely 1-2 hours of use is enough to cause screen persistence of the Vista background/icons (and of course, the usual elements in my main OSX screen are visible as well). It does happen more during heavier usage, sometimes alleviates after turning the machine off for a few hours, and I only noticed it as the machine has aged slightly (2 years ownership). I don't run a screensaver because I have Energy Saver set to sleep the display after 10 minutes of non-use.
The frustrating thing is, like many people I own plenty of LCD displays (both laptop and desktop), all of which are much older than the imac and stay on for much longer than the Mac. In fact, I have a Dell 24" monitor next to it that is almost twice as old, sees more use, has a longer sleep delay, and as never exhibited this problem.
I have the same problem. I have been using the Mac a lot in the past few weeks to design a website for univeristy but it has worked harder before. I too have a screen saver that kicks in after a few minutes. I have noticed that after switching it off over night the lines and shadows had gone, but they returned within a few minutes. I have taken the advice of moving the dock and will move it's position no and again, but I agree this is not something everyone would know about. I am running the JScreenFix as we speak but no success so far. i will try the white jpg as a background option over night. This is really poor though.
Hi, same issue here, only for me it happens most when I am using Adobe GoLive. The programme only needs to be open for 10 minutes before the tool palette burns into the top corner of the screen. I can even read words left from the site palette in my very neutral desktop picture.
I have called Applecare this afternoon and, after quoting this discussion, managed to have the case escalated up to a senior technician. He has confirmed the pixel sticking scenario and recommends changing the background picture often and going onto screen saver as often as possible in down times, both of which I do.
So - no definitive resolution but hope this helps someone else.
I just got my iMac back from the Apple Store, they replaced the LCD. This did NOT fix the problem, and in fact it's even worse (more noticeable) now.
Like others, what I'm experiencing is NOT long-term burn in. I've had this screen for less than a day (less than 6 hours on-time since getting it back) and I can see burn-in images from my web browser, from scrolling text in XCode, and in my IM window.
This leaves me with two possible causes:
1) GPU/VRAM/logic board failure. Replacing the screen didn't fix the issue, perhaps the problem lies elsewhere.
2) Heat-soaked LCD: Perhaps the LCD is being affected by the heat of the components directly behind it (the problem is most prevalent on the left-bottom of the screen, on both the old and the new LCD). This explains the localized area effect, and why other LCD-equipped devices, which don't front entire computer systems, do not experience this effect.
Neither necessarily explains why the effect is only becoming visible after about two years of ownership (unless the chassis is starting to get warmer because the fans/vents are getting slowly clogged by dust).
Regardless, one thing is clear: this problem is NOT long-term screen persistence, and is NOT an issue caused by leaving the same screen elements on too long, or not running a screen saver/energy saver.
CPU is about 45 degrees, GPU (Nvidia 8800GS) 65 degrees, airport card 60 degrees. The most CPU-intensive app I've run is Flash video (Youtube) within Chrome, for maybe 5 minutes total.
If you look closely at the first image, you can see the "build and run" hammer from XCode's console, and from the second image, you can almost read the names of people from my Skype contact list.
Would be good to hear how you do next. When I called, although the technician in Ireland was very helpful, the outcome of the conversation was "if it fixes itself after a restart, what does it matter?" To me, as a designer, what matters is that it disturbs my field of vision to have this weird halo of type over the top of something I am working on.
I don't recall the TOS on this forum, but if you post up an email address I'll send to you. Sorry for the roundabout, it's just not wholly relevant to the issue discussed here and I don't want to muddy the waters (suffice it to say to those with the issue that very likely an LCD replacement will NOT solve the issue).
