Q: MacBook Pro Retina display burn-in?

Canuck1970 wrote:

 

johns1 wrote:

 

Canuck1970

Personally, I think a better message would be: "Don't be put off buying a Macbook Pro with Retina display...but wait for bit".

Like you waited, eh? 

 

Yeah...well...lesson learned, let me tell ya. I just don't want anyone else to make the same mistake I did. I will NEVER be an early adopter again. And, with regards to the new iPhone 5 coming out next week, I'm going to watch the forums for at least a month before I buy one.

 

Well, just to counterbalance this, and not to try to take away from Canuck1970's point, because everyone has to make their own choice about what works for them and doesn't ...

I have IR on the rMBP that I purchased in early July.  That issue aside, it's the best laptop I've ever owned or used, and I am extremely happy with it.  I am not regretting having bought it even though it has IR.  The reason for me is that the work that I do doesn't put me into a situation to reproduce IR very often.  The only time that it has ever happened to me during normal use is when I had a VirtualBox instance of Windows 7 running and the flat blue background of the Windows 7 desktop showed IR.  Aside from that one time, I've never seen it unless I was artificially trying to reproduce it with flat background colors that I would never normally use.  The light grey and white background colors of most windows will not show any IR.

Some people have said that the LG is yellow and has poor color; I have not noticed this at all, mine has what look to me like great colors and I don't see any yellowness (maybe putting it next to a Samsung display I might notice it (I have not done so and can't say for sure), but that is not really a fair comparison because I don't think the Samsung is necessarily more correct, just different).  I also have had no dead pixels, no creaking, no chips or dents, really no problem whatsoever except for this image retention.

I can easily live with the image retention; I could most likely own the laptop indefinitely without actually experiencing the image retention in any meaningful way during normal use.  But I want to have it fixed for two reasons:

a) I don't think that Apple should be able to get away with releasing a flawed product and not having to fix it, and

b) More importantly, I would worry about the resale value should it become widely known that the LG displays are 'inferior' due to image retention.  I don't want my laptop to have lower value than it should in the after market because of this.

I firmly believe that there are some people for whom the image retention does present actual and real usability problems during normal use:

1. Graphic designers and photographers and other "image professionals" for whom IR is not just an annoyance, it could mean producing flawed work

2. People who look at X-rays, MRI images, etc on their laptops

3. People who use screen locking that shows image retention (I have never used this feature but apparently the default screen lock color (not sure if this is modifiable via a user preference or not) shows IR which means that any sensitive documents you might have been looking at can be viewed on a locked screen).

I think the sum of all three of these categories is still a minority of users, but that's besides the point; the display should work properly for them as well as it should for everyone else.  And so while the IR issue has not impacted me particularly, I'm still going to push to have it fixed.

So to reiterate, I am very happy with my rMBP, given the same circumstances, I personally would still buy it again, even with IR.  If Apple ends up refusing to do anything about the IR, then I will be unhappy about that and much less likely to buy another Apple product (this is actually my first!), but still expect to get a long and useful life out of my rMBP.

Well,

Just got the replacement back ... and it's another LG. Will have to wait and see, though I am not holding out much hope that it will be immune to the IR issue. Will update if that does happen again.

Cheers

northtwilight

I, too, am deciding to get off this merry-go-round after going through three different rMBP's.  While my original rMBP had a flawless Samsung display, numerous problems with the aluminum body (i.e. creaking, chips, scratches, etc.) led me to retun it.  The subsequent two replacements both had an LG display, both exhibiting distinct image retention.  Sorry, but given the expense of this computer, I'm not going to accept that...

I've elected to go with the refund, and I'm going to wait a few months until these problems are addressed / fixed.  The rMBP's are certainly beautiful machines, and I look forward to purchasing one again once some of these wrinkles have been ironed out. 

can you guys tell when they replace the displey, DO THEY REPLACE THE WHOLE ALUMINUM BODY WITH THE PANEL or they receive only the panel and need to **** up the whole laptop to replace the display ? i hope the get the whole aluminum display thing that is easy to replace

bjiibj wrote:

 

Canuck1970 wrote:

 

johns1 wrote:

 

Canuck1970

Personally, I think a better message would be: "Don't be put off buying a Macbook Pro with Retina display...but wait for bit".

Like you waited, eh? 

 

Yeah...well...lesson learned, let me tell ya. I just don't want anyone else to make the same mistake I did. I will NEVER be an early adopter again. And, with regards to the new iPhone 5 coming out next week, I'm going to watch the forums for at least a month before I buy one.

 

Well, just to counterbalance this, and not to try to take away from Canuck1970's point, because everyone has to make their own choice about what works for them and doesn't ...

 

I have IR on the rMBP that I purchased in early July.  That issue aside, it's the best laptop I've ever owned or used, and I am extremely happy with it.  I am not regretting having bought it even though it has IR.  The reason for me is that the work that I do doesn't put me into a situation to reproduce IR very often.  The only time that it has ever happened to me during normal use is when I had a VirtualBox instance of Windows 7 running and the flat blue background of the Windows 7 desktop showed IR.  Aside from that one time, I've never seen it unless I was artificially trying to reproduce it with flat background colors that I would never normally use.  The light grey and white background colors of most windows will not show any IR.

 

Some people have said that the LG is yellow and has poor color; I have not noticed this at all, mine has what look to me like great colors and I don't see any yellowness (maybe putting it next to a Samsung display I might notice it (I have not done so and can't say for sure), but that is not really a fair comparison because I don't think the Samsung is necessarily more correct, just different).  I also have had no dead pixels, no creaking, no chips or dents, really no problem whatsoever except for this image retention.

 

I can easily live with the image retention; I could most likely own the laptop indefinitely without actually experiencing the image retention in any meaningful way during normal use.  But I want to have it fixed for two reasons:

 

a) I don't think that Apple should be able to get away with releasing a flawed product and not having to fix it, and

 

b) More importantly, I would worry about the resale value should it become widely known that the LG displays are 'inferior' due to image retention.  I don't want my laptop to have lower value than it should in the after market because of this.

 

I firmly believe that there are some people for whom the image retention does present actual and real usability problems during normal use:

 

1. Graphic designers and photographers and other "image professionals" for whom IR is not just an annoyance, it could mean producing flawed work

2. People who look at X-rays, MRI images, etc on their laptops

3. People who use screen locking that shows image retention (I have never used this feature but apparently the default screen lock color (not sure if this is modifiable via a user preference or not) shows IR which means that any sensitive documents you might have been looking at can be viewed on a locked screen).

 

I think the sum of all three of these categories is still a minority of users, but that's besides the point; the display should work properly for them as well as it should for everyone else.  And so while the IR issue has not impacted me particularly, I'm still going to push to have it fixed.

 

So to reiterate, I am very happy with my rMBP, given the same circumstances, I personally would still buy it again, even with IR.  If Apple ends up refusing to do anything about the IR, then I will be unhappy about that and much less likely to buy another Apple product (this is actually my first!), but still expect to get a long and useful life out of my rMBP.

I see your point and, honestly, other then the IR issue, mine is also a really great machine. However, whereas your IR problem seems to be pretty minor (I'm not sure how long you've had it), and mine was also at first, my IR problem got worse and worse until now I can see it under normal everyday use with a variety of backgrounds, even on top of the GUIs of certain applications. So, even if it weren't for this thread, I would have seen it and probably started a thread of my own.

Xpldoe wrote:

 

can you guys tell when they replace the displey, DO THEY REPLACE THE WHOLE ALUMINUM BODY WITH THE PANEL or they receive only the panel and need to **** up the whole laptop to replace the display ? i hope the get the whole aluminum display thing that is easy to replace

As I understand it from the tech I talked to at an authorized Apple repair location, they replace the entire display assembly (i.e. LCD panel, aluminum lid, glass, etc), which is probably a good thing.

alwaysforever wrote:

 

Sorry to butt in this thread again. I'm curious, though...

 

Apple must have known that this was going to happen. Did they think that people wouldn't notice the defect? Or wouldn't mind?

No, I don't think they knew. The first production samples that Apple's engineers received from Foxconn were probably great. Then, when they started to go full bore into mass production, either Apple or LG (more likely the latter) got sloppy. Due to the nature of the IR problem, the Foxconn workers who assembled each rMBP probably didn't notice it at all. They likely just boot them up, run some diagnostics, close them up again and move onto the next machine. I honestly don't fault Apple at all for this happening, but I do fault them for not rectifying the situation sooner. They let it go too long and now we're angry and our loyalty is strained. A dodgy antenna problem on a subsidized iPhone, that can be resolved with a cheap plastic cover, is one thing, but image retention on a $2000 to $4000 Macbook Pro, where the display is the defining feature, is a completely different matter. It should have been dealt with much more aggressively.

Canuck1970 wrote:

I see your point and, honestly, other then the IR issue, mine is also a really great machine. However, whereas your IR problem seems to be pretty minor (I'm not sure how long you've had it), and mine was also at first, my IR problem got worse and worse until now I can see it under normal everyday use with a variety of backgrounds, even on top of the GUIs of certain applications. So, even if it weren't for this thread, I would have seen it and probably started a thread of my own.

Just curious - can you give an example of some of the apps that you see image retention in?  Maybe I should try them and see if I get it there too.  I can definitely perceive image retention in some parts of the default galaxy background, but I don't use that background except to test image retention; my normal background is called "Bjango Trio Hot" (search on Google to find it), and doesn't show any image retention whatsoever.

Aside from that, I tend to run only a few apps regularly: terminal and emacs, which I have black backgrounds for and obviously don't show IR because of that, and mail/safari which use light grey/white backgrounds and don't show it either.  In fact I can't think of any application that I run regularly that uses colors that are susceptible to showing IR.  So if you have some examples, please let me know, and I'll try them out to see if I get IR on them too.  Thanks!

bjiibj wrote:

 

Canuck1970 wrote:

I see your point and, honestly, other then the IR issue, mine is also a really great machine. However, whereas your IR problem seems to be pretty minor (I'm not sure how long you've had it), and mine was also at first, my IR problem got worse and worse until now I can see it under normal everyday use with a variety of backgrounds, even on top of the GUIs of certain applications. So, even if it weren't for this thread, I would have seen it and probably started a thread of my own.

 

Just curious - can you give an example of some of the apps that you see image retention in?  Maybe I should try them and see if I get it there too.  I can definitely perceive image retention in some parts of the default galaxy background, but I don't use that background except to test image retention; my normal background is called "Bjango Trio Hot" (search on Google to find it), and doesn't show any image retention whatsoever.

 

Aside from that, I tend to run only a few apps regularly: terminal and emacs, which I have black backgrounds for and obviously don't show IR because of that, and mail/safari which use light grey/white backgrounds and don't show it either.  In fact I can't think of any application that I run regularly that uses colors that are susceptible to showing IR.  So if you have some examples, please let me know, and I'll try them out to see if I get IR on them too.  Thanks!

Absolutely. Try Mac's "Airport Utility" or any of the applications in the iLife suite of apps (iMovie, iPhoto, etc).  Also, many web pages, including the web pages of my DNS-323 NAS drive and the darker blue portions of flightaware.com's flight tracking web pages.

bjiibj

Well as far as I can tell, you're the only poster whose been around a while with LG displays and has not had IR develop.  We've had a bunch of people also post about no IR on LG but from what I could tell most of them had very new units that wouldn't have developed it yet.

 

To be honest, it makes me want to question whether you are accurately checking for IR (it can be subtle), but you seem like a smart person who would be able to tell if you really had it.  So I guess the only conclusion to be drawn is that there are LG panels that are not affected; but for posters on this forum, that certainly looks to be uncommon.

Because of my engineering background I don't take anyones statement and immediately draw conclusions, and i notice neither do you.  All I can conclude based on what i have read is that there are unusual patterns with this issue based on several users experiences.  With at least 200,000 of these computers produced if this was a gigantic problem there would be a awful lot more discussion then there is.   Your probably right on your followup to canuck1970 that a minority of specific type of users would be a lot more observent of this type of panel fault if present.  Very nicely written BTW.

Canuck1970

As I understand it from the tech I talked to at an authorized Apple repair location, they replace the entire display assembly (i.e. LCD panel, aluminum lid, glass, etc), which is probably a good thing.

That seems to be the trend with ultra thin display assemblies, its impossible for the local touch labor to service these panels in a take apart mode, now they just swap the whole panels now (case and all), and send the problem panel back to a major service center.  

Thanks, Canuck1970. I'm just attempting to gauge what the company feels is acceptable performance in 2012. That's why I've been watching this topic.

johns1 wrote:

 

bjiibj

Well as far as I can tell, you're the only poster whose been around a while with LG displays and has not had IR develop.  We've had a bunch of people also post about no IR on LG but from what I could tell most of them had very new units that wouldn't have developed it yet.

 

To be honest, it makes me want to question whether you are accurately checking for IR (it can be subtle), but you seem like a smart person who would be able to tell if you really had it.  So I guess the only conclusion to be drawn is that there are LG panels that are not affected; but for posters on this forum, that certainly looks to be uncommon.

Because of my engineering background I don't take anyones statement and immediately draw conclusions, and i notice neither do you.  All I can conclude based on what i have read is that there are unusual patterns with this issue based on several users experiences.  With at least 200,000 of these computers produced if this was a gigantic problem there would be a awful lot more discussion then there is.   Your probably right on your followup to canuck1970 that a minority of specific type of users would be a lot more observent of this type of panel fault if present.  Very nicely written BTW.

I think if more people were aware of this IR issue, then more people would look for it, and more people would be complaining. I think the complaints would increase exponentially. It's the principle that bothers people the most. Why should I pay the same price for a rMBP with an LG IPS display that is known to have the IR issue when there are rMBP laptops that contain Samsung PLS displays that are known to not have the IR issue? These are different displays.

alwaysforever wrote:

 

Thanks, Canuck1970. I'm just attempting to gauge what the company feels is acceptable performance in 2012. That's why I've been watching this topic.

When you say "the company", which company do you mean?

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