Is highly uneven screen brightness normal?

This is my second iMac Pro since my initial purchase in late December (swapped out the first for the second). Both have exhibited, right out of the box, a highly uneven brightness between different areas of the screen, so much so that it's noticeable, and very annoying, during normal usage. See the picture below.


Aside from a cheap-o Acer LCD continuously exposed to the heat of an incandescent lamp right behind it on my desk—and it started out looking fine before the heat exposure—I have never seen an LCD with such irregularity in the backlight brightness. True enough, a "perfect" LCD unto itself costs as much as an iMac Pro, but most LCDs are not noticeably bad like this under normal usage, when you're not actively looking for imperfections. But with these iMac Pros, I literally cannot help but notice the imperfection it's so bad.


Is this just how all the iMac Pros are? Or it is a "screen lottery" situation, where you just have to keep swapping until you get an acceptable unit?


iMac Pro

Posted on Jan 7, 2019 4:05 PM

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10 replies

Jan 10, 2019 1:55 PM in response to dialabrain

Later I'll post some comparison shots with other screens I own or have access to, but this degree of unevenness is most definitely not normal for LCDs in general. There is always going to be some irregularity, just not this much.


If this is normal for Apple displays, then it would indicate a manufacturing issue such that in assembling the computer, the chassis and LCD panel are affixed in a manner placing inordinate mechanical stress on the panel.



Jan 10, 2019 1:26 PM in response to tedjdsk

Okay. I figured out a test. I opened a blank white document in Affinity Photo on three of my Macs. An iMac Pro, a 5K iMac, and a 2015 MacBook. I zoomed in so the white filled the screen. All three had some unevenness so I have to think it is normal. Unless I see a $$$ monitor that is pure white, I guess I have no reason to think it is not normal.

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Is highly uneven screen brightness normal?

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