MacBook Pro Retina display burn-in?

For my trip to the Apple Store in Munich tomorrow I made photos that demonstrate the problem clearly. (I don’t particularily want to wait around ten minutes.)

Here is a photo of my screen displaying a website.

And here is the image persistence issue clearly illustrated, only ten minutes later.

This is not some dark grey background, this is a colorful desktop background. Still, it’s visible. (Some image persistence is apparent even earlier, after less than five minutes. It’s just harder to photograph.)

Here is the album with the two photos. Feel free to use them however you want.

johns1 wrote: . . . who uses default gray as a background anyway . . .

Don't knock it. It's an ideal choice for protecting eyes over many decades of using bright screens and minimizing distractions on a desktop, while still making the desktop seem like a surface instead of a black sky.

michael.ka wrote:

For my trip to the Apple Store in Munich tomorrow I made photos that demonstrate the problem clearly. (I don’t particularily want to wait around ten minutes.)

Here is a photo of my screen displaying a website.

And here is the image persistence issue clearly illustrated, only ten minutes later.

This is not some dark grey background, this is a colorful desktop background. Still, it’s visible. (Some image persistence is apparent even earlier, after less than five minutes. It’s just harder to photograph.)

Here is the album with the two photos. Feel free to use them however you want.

That demonstrates the problem quite well. Still, you may run into problems just showing them pictures because:

1) You have no way to prove how long you left the images on the screen. They'll assume it was hours with the screen saver turned off rather than just 5 - 15 minutes like as happened to many of us.

2) You have no way to prove how long the after-image remained on the screen. They'll assume it was just a second or so, not 5-15 minutes like many of us have seen.

3) Even then, they may still respond with a "well, image retention happens, it's not a defect". That's basically the stance that more and more Apple stores/reps seem to be taking as this becomes a bigger issue.

From my most recent interactions with Apple, it sounds like you may (or may not) get one replacement if you are outside of the 14 day no-questions-asked return window. After that replacement, you'll probably be out of luck getting another replacement, but you may be able to get a refund, allowing you to play the "can I get a good rMBP screen" lottery again.

Regardless, best of luck getting a rMBP with a good screen.

johns1 wrote: ...who uses default gray as a background anyway . . .

Don't knock it. It's ideal for minimizing risks to eyesight over decades of bright screen use and minimizing distractions on the desktop while still seeming like a surface instead of a black sky.

Well, if they don’t believe me we are just going to have to wait together, I guess. I think I will be able to muster up the patience in that particular case :o)

Alitanet italy

On today I received my rMBP number 5 :

-the first one had 6-7 white stuck pixels (BTO : 2,3, 16GB, 256)

-the second one had 2 black dead pixels + IR (LG screen) (entry model)

-the third one had severe IR (LG screen, week 24) (entry model)

-The fourth one had IR + spots on the screen and yellow tint (LG screen, week 29) (entry model)

The number 5 has LG screen (week 33) and has yellow tint and severe IR (it's a BTO : 2,6, 16GB, 256)

I only had two, first was returned because change of build options available for base unit, but display was perfect, second was LG. But neither had yellow tint, stuck or dead pixels. What I find perplexing is how in your next of the woods you can have a score of MBPr's with the above problems?

macimby

Don't knock it. It's ideal for minimizing risks to eyesight over decades of bright screen use and minimizing distractions on the desktop while still seeming like a surface instead of a black sky.

Two reply's? A dark greenish/blue screen serves as a better background, it makes the icon fonts stand out more along with application windows being more differenated. I think if one is using a MBPr you would desire something a bit more colorful then medium grey background. 😉

YESSSS. Got a Samsung (LSN) display on my advanced replacement. Quote from my previous post below.

Terranwolf wrote on Aug 8, 2012:

Yes, it -should- come with ML pre installed. I would be quite suprised if it isn't, as ML install is determined by build date rather than order date.

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I don't believe my mbpr IR will get any worse over time but I might as well replace mine anyway. Got an advanced replacement request in a few hours ago over the phone. Didn't know I had to call Apple Care rather than 1-800-MY-APPLE, but tech support forwarded me to Sales, which realized I didn't have a number yet. So they contacted their apple care division on their own (putting me on hold), and handled everything for me. After that they told me my advanced replacement should be in around august 20th, expedited. Without me asking, they also claimed that "my new one will not have this problem" so I'm crossing my fingers it's Samsung and not some modified LG, lol. Oh, and the entire call duration, from when I dialed 1-800-MY-APPLE, was only 25 mins including wait time.

Dear johns1, I can ensure this situation is not funny for me...

Probably working on publishing I'm more "sensible" to screen defects, but I read many forums on internet, and I discovered I'm not the only one with so many problems with these "holy" rMBPs...

Unfortunately until now I haven't had a Samsung display.

P.S. : the new Adobe CS6 has a dark grey background so the problem is strong if you work with this graphic suite.

Hey everybody I just got a replacement for my fweek 31 LG screend 2.6/16/512 unit. and it's a samsung! I will take pics of them side by side now so u can see the difference (My LG unit was a GOOD LG unit with VERY minimal IR (u would only see a slight discoloration on a grey backround after about 15 minutes or so but any IR is not acceptable IMHO and in the store the samsung was clearly more white)

I am very happy to report I got a samsung screened unit not sure the week build yet but I will post that info with the pics to compare

Alitanet italy

Dear johns1, I can ensure this situation is not funny for me...

Probably working on publishing I'm more "sensible" to screen defects, but I read many forums on internet, and I discovered I'm not the only one with so many problems with these "holy" rMBPs...

Unfortunately until now I haven't had a Samsung display.

I wasn't implying that. I hope you can get things worked out to your satisfaction.

Having read most of this thread, it seems that many of you are receiving an LG, followed by one, two, three, and even four LG replacements. Considering those odds, would it be a fair assessment to say there's a significantly higher percentage of LG's in production than Samsung's? It doesn't seem like ANYONE has gotten multiple Samsung's...most can't even get one.

I called back earlier and they told me the reason they didn't do anything was that just changing the screen wouldn't fix the problem. I tried to tell him that the Samsungs don't seem to be having an issue and he cut me off and told me that all high density displays have this issue. He again told me to change the settings for putting it to sleep and the screen saver. I then told him that doesn't do me any good when I'm working I an image and when I go on to the next one I can still see the previous image. After I told him it only takes about 5 min he said he would talk to the engineers and see what they say. Waiting for him to call back.

I might just call and try to talk to another person.

Just got a message from him and he said that he talked to the engineers and they told him I just need to move the window around every so often to prevent it.

Hello,

Some of these Apple tech support people seem...well...not that bright, or at the very least lacking in common sense.

One doesn't need a technical background to understand that this problem is abnormal and clearly unacceptable.

The fact that some of the Apple tech support reps are suggesting that you need to change your screen-saver or sleep settings indicates that they don't understand the issue and/or they're not really listening to you. I also think there's a level of ego involved with some of these interactions, with some of them taking it personally.

In any case, I can reliably produce my IR problem using the checkerboard in about 5 minutes. In fact, sometime this weekend I'm going to make a really clear unedited video of the entire test process, all in one take, from beginning to end. If I don't get a satisfactory resolution to this problem soon, I'm going to start posting that video around to try and get some more visibility on this so that they will start taking it seriously. Putting this on ZDNet or filing this as an iReport on CNN should do the trick.

:-)

Cheers,

Peter