Greyish Smudge marks behind the glass screen.

To your expectations...

1) Not going to happen, because this is a, statistically speaking, a fairly uncommon failure. It does not appear to be a "design flaw" to me, because if it were, it would happen to many, many, many more people.

2) How do you know this hasn't been done? Because the few people you have spoken to haven't seen it? You ever tried to pass information to the numbers of people we are talking about around the world? It didn't happen when I was in the Army, it will never be 100%

3) If there is a problem with a unit, Apple will repair it under warranty. Their typical process is that if a unit needs repair a number of times, varies from what I hear from 3 or 4 up to as many as 6 or more...

4) They provide a warranty and will repair it if there is a defect.

And finally, they are not ignoring the problem, there have been posts here indicating it has been addressed by executives and/or their reps. The only posts I have noticed being deleted are ones that violate the Terms of Use. How do you know that some of the problems are NOT related to local environment? Have you ever seen a computer that has been in the house of a smoker? Frustrate buyers? That one is on you...you let yourself become frustrated.

I am done, Apple will continue to pull posts that are in violation of the ToU, you want your posts to stay...don't post in violation of the ToU.

@RDJ2011 Thanks for the link. I had never heard that guy's story. It's very disturbing.

Everyone who comes here, please subscribe to the thread and make sure you get email alerts. That way you can read anything that Apple decides to censor on here.

@J.K. ROFLing I'm happy your iMac is in great working condition, but it doesn't mean it's going to stay that way. I've had mine since late 2009, and this grey smudge issue just started happening. You might also have a yellow screen tinge that you're not aware of. You should check macrumors and do a screen test. I've found most people don't actually recogonize the yellow tinge until someone points it out to them on a grey screen.

Totaly agree with Motofabio. He has listed exactly what I expect Apple to do. I have spent thousands and thousands of pounds on Apple equipment over the years and have found them to be extremly reliable and well designed and built. I am therefore dissappointed in the problems I am having with my 27" iMac screen. I never took out Applecare as in my experience I have never needed it so that is not a solution for me as my iMac was out of warranty before it started showing these screen problems. Many of my friends have iMacs and they ALL now have these screen problems, so I don't think the problem is as rare as J.K ROFLing imagines. It is a desgin issue as my iMac 24" dosn't have any problmes at all and is in excatly the same envirnoment (and two years older) so does need resolving and I think Apple should do the right thing by their customers.

I had a first generation iPod Nano which was working fine yet Apple replaced it with a brand new Nano. I thought this was truly excellent service. Though I assume as there may have been a fire hazard that this may well have been the reasoning behind it. However many months after it I am still coming accross people who never even knew about the replacement program. I never came accross threads with over 700 posts complaing about battery issues in their Nano's in the first place. So I reckon 700 posts is a fair indication that there is a significant problems with iMac screens. I am certain there are many more iMac owners with the same symptoms who will not be aware of this thread. It took me a while to come accross it when I was trying to figure out the problems with my screen.

Hope the next iMac range is better desgined as I realy need to upgrade my system and still like my Apple products. Reckon I'll be taking Applecare out next time.

I just deleted a huge reply, as I am now done with this thread as well; you can continue to make all the excuses you want for them.

I don't have all the right answers; ignoring a relatively small group of users is the way to conduct business when money is the ONLY motivation. I don't think this is the response Steve Jobs envisioned when he said "Go for perfect."

motofabio is absolutely speaking the truth. I think money is becoming the sole motivation at Apple.

@J.K. ROFLing I feel sorry that one day your iMac will suffer the same fate. And I'll say it again, this is NOT an issue that can be solved by a simple screen replacment. It is a hardware defect, and it cannot be fixed unless the entire machine is re-designed. I've seen several people on here, including me, who have kept their Macs in completely pristine conditions. So saying this is purely enviornmental is just plain ignorance.

I'm convinced the only way Apple will recall these machines is if they start bursting into flames. But otherwise, I expect they will just ignore this entire block of iMac users, especially since they are possibly readying a new redsigned iMac for release sometime this year.

Have a new Mac pro book. All is excellent. Also thinking about an imac, after reading the posts, maybe not. I live 250 miles each way from a Apple store or genius bar. I need to fed ex the system, then wait, email or phone or something. Will put off buying the imac for a while. I live in the NW Rocky mts., computers wait for summer to dry the gravel and dirt roads. And worse, the dust is terrible here with summer pollen.

My September 2010 iMac is in for LCD panel replacement for this issue.

I don't know if this is helpful, but I was told it was a known issue and would be fixed beyond warranty free of charge - I do have Apple Care though.

If you are speaking to someone who doesn't understand what you are talking about, tell them to look up "LCD panel contamination." The specific issue starts in the upper left hand corner and expands from there.

Thanks! I will try this as my Apple Care is about to expire and the two separate stores I've gone to and the Apple Care representative have said no such thing and more or less "wished me luck" beyond the expiration of Apple Care (which is in December of this year) and I'm currently on my 4th LCD panel replacement...

MYTH BUSTED.

Great and interesting news.

My iClouds became so intolerable that I tried all Youtube recommended DIY exercises. First result is that disconnecting LCD panel from the mainboard I broke the connector. The second one except whirls of dust on the alluminum back cover I figured out that there is nothing I can do.

So I took it to local repair shop. AMAZINGLY guy there said that for $80 he will fix it (he was more sceptic about the connector). He said that it is dust. I expressed my doubts. Long story short.

Two days later I got perfectly clean iMac back. He asked me not to tell anyone about Apple policy. Apple insists that LCD is 'dead or alive"part and forbids to try to fix it, only replacement. He said that smudges are thin dust which gets in between LEDs and screen because of lack of insulation. He disassembles back side of the panel, cleans it and Scotch it very tightly for future concers. Otherwise he offered to wait a month, because under Apple's instructions LG doesn't sell replacement LCD panels without getting back faulty ones. So for $600 plus shipping (which is not cheap) I can get a new screen.

So - it is not burn out. Air filters will help. It has nothing to do with smoking, it is about thin dust which is everywhere. Apple acts "strangely".

By the way how do you post photos here. Tried but failed. With good advice will post all jpg's.

Very interesting! Would love to see photos.

My suggestion would be not to upload them direct to this forum, but instead choose a free image hosting service such as http://minus.com/ or http://imgur.com/ or http://imageshack.us/ and then link to the photos in this thread.

Thanks in advance!

Antonio, that's nice to hear. I would gladly spend $80 to clean and seal the panel. Can you share what local shop you took it to so that others can benefit from this guy's knowledge? I've read many posts about cleaning it, but never has anyone mentioned sealing it after cleaning to prevent more contamination. It totally makes sense!

That makes a lot of sense, this always kind of looked like dust to me, hence the initial frantic attemps with various cleaning solutions and wiping the screen like a nut which I (and it appears several others) went through prior to taking the computer to the store. I also think it's interesting that my 2007 24 inch I-Mac, which does not have the glass extending to the edge of the screen, but rather provides a solid and one piece metal frame never had these problems, i.e., sealing seems like it might be the "magic bullet", I can't believe noone brought this up until now.. thanks! (of course I guess the way Apple is acting doesn't help)

Dust makes sense as a cause, you might want to take a look at the environment the computer is being used in. Not saying it will take care of everyones problem, but will a number of them. But sealing the screen is NOT the answer. If it is not sealed, it is open for a reason, that is not an oversight on the manufacturers part (Apple, Samsung, or whoever made the display). If you seal the display, you are sealing ambient air between the panels, that air contains moisture and moisture is not going to be good, the display heats up and cools down, condensation is caused...do the math. Then there is an issue of pressure differences between the sealed panes and the outside air... Sealing it is not a good idea anyway you put it.

I don't have the issue that you guys are taking about, call me lucky or blind because you think I do have it and just don't see it, what ever. But I did talk to a Genius at one of the Austin Apple Stores and he told me that all the stores should know how to handle it and if not, they need to do some research. But he also said that virtually all of the bad cases he has seen have been due to environmental issues, most in homes of smokers or higher dust areas.

I thought you were done with posting on this thread, especially as you don't even have the problem we are complaining about.

However , you may well be absolutely correct about your thoughts about sealing the screen so I assume that you were were wanting to share those with us that might have thought of going down that road. So thanks for that.

However I do not regard what an Apple Genuis (an employee of Apple) might have said to you about the problem been due to environmental issues, most in homes of smokers or higher dust areas as been reliable. I still maintain its a design fault. The main reason I say that is because it dosn't take a genius, even an Apple one, to see that my 2007 iMac 24" which sits right beside my 2009 iMac 27" dosn't have any screen prolems at all. They are both on 24/7 and sit 4 inches from each other. The 2007 24" sat for 2 years in EXACTLY the same place as my less than 2 year old 27" which developed problems not long out of warranty. I don't smoke and rarely have to even dust.

In fairness to Apple I have not taken my computer back as it was out of warranty when I spoke to somebeody in the store around about the time I first noticed it I was told it would be a chargeable repair. However after seeing that it is quite common (okay I am just assuming its quite common because I know many people who have the problem, neither of us has actual facts about the number of screens affected so neither can make accurate claims) I am going to return with my iMac to a new Apple store, which is easier to access, and see what they say now that they should be aware of the problem I bought my iMac by credit card so may well approach them if I don't get any joy with Apple. Will post back how I get on.

I so agree with you as I am having the same problem and also now having black screen and can't even use my imac 27" tonight as it stays black now. I too switched from PC and was very pleased with my mac for a while, I bought it in 2010. Not now however and I am beginning to feel ripped off. The smudge is covering half my screen now...grrr..No more macs for me! I am glad I have found all this info out because I was going to purchase a mac laptop. Back to PC's as they are less of a headache for sure.