LED Screen Flicker

Polly,

I don't believe what you're talking about has anything to do with the flicker we're speaking of. I've turned off the ambient light sensor. This flicker is related to backlight dimming. When on any setting other than maximum brightness, there is a flicker, or as I've seen other people post, it's like a 'shimmer' or almost like interference causing the screen to ripple.

Seems to have been a huge issue with the macbook line, and now seems to be happening to the new Macbook Pro line.

Is this something that would be obvious ? Or is it more subtle? As far as I can tell, my new MBP 2.2ghz has no flicker at all.

Like I said, I didn't notice it in the one I just returned but this new one, it's very obvious. With the default OSX background (blue), dim your brightness level down from full brightness and look at the desktop. I can see it very easily on this machine.

I just tired doing that but I really can't see anything abnormal. It looks completely still and stable to me.

Hi Toby and Paul,

I was just wondering of they could be related as I noticed Paul's post about the gray background and the indication that he was not experiencing the same and another poster indicating it worked fine in the Apple Store's bright light. Aside from the construction paper my desktop picture is always dark as it reduced the "shimmer" that I experienced during normal use and the construction paper I use when editing video as this was when it was the worst. Whenever the image on the display went on the from light to dark it would behave erratically covering the sensors "fixed" it.

Are you using a third party utility to disable the sensors or are you just deselecting the "Automatically adjust brightness as ambient light changes" in the display preferences? Or is there a new display preference on the new MBP.

Thank You.

Sweet Polly

Really happy to report that my brand-new 15" MacBook is rock-steady at any illumination level.

Sorry to all that are having troubles.

Cheers,

No, your machine isn't stable. It has the flicker. You just haven't noticed it yet :-P

They all do!

The machines themselves are wonderful, but this flicker issue affects all Santa Rosas from what I've heard (speaking directly to the source).

Don't let it bother you. Hopefully Apple will pull through and issue a fix via firmware!

Or he's incredibly lucky. What if 90% of the machines have the flicker. I mean who knows. Maybe you're all unlucky and it's 10% of machines that have the flicker. 😉 We need a larger sample size.
And if he hasn't noticed the flicker, that's a good sign, I plan on getting a new MBP and hope this issue isn't too bothersome if it's common. :P

Just uncheck the option you mentioned. Why would you need to do anything more than that? When that's unchecked, the sensors won't adjust your backlight. They will still kick on the backlit keyboard, but a quick press of F8 will turn that off too. I still don't understand your need for this construction paper. I must be missing something.

Honestly, it's not that bad - it is annoying but Apple will likely fix this with an update. It's not all that bad. Anytime we get new hardware, new issues arrive along side.

Hi Toby,

When I uncheck this option it shuts off the backlit keyboard altogether and for some reason also has an effect on my display, dimming it when the room I am in gets darker. The paper simply blocks any light (especially from the display) from hitting the sensors so the backlight does not keep going dim when I want it to remain constant.

Sweet Polly

No, your machine isn't stable. It has the flicker.
You just haven't noticed it yet :-P

They all do!

The machines themselves are wonderful, but this
flicker issue affects all Santa Rosas from what I've
heard (speaking directly to the source).

Don't let it bother you. Hopefully Apple will pull
through and issue a fix via firmware!

Well, I won't let it bother me because I don't see anything abnormal with the display at any brightness. I'm usually very very sensitive to any strangeness with displays, but seriously can't see any flicker. IF there is one, it's so subtle that I can't see it and, if I may say so, if I can't see it chances are that 99% of the world can't see it.

The other alternative is that not all are afflicted with this issue. I think this is more plausible actually...

Chiming in here. I picked up a new 15" MBP yesterday. I turned it on and the LCD backlight was out - it came on a minute later and I saw massive flicker. The backlight then became erratic. Two hours later when I returned to the Apple store the backlight no longer functioned at all. They replaced the MBP with another one that has a fine working backlight and no flicker.

my brand new 15" MBP LED is having the same exact issue as described above - straight out of the box.

flicker at all brightness levels except max.

just got off the phone with AppleCare and let them know of the issue, he said he hasn't heard about it yet, but will look into it, and we'll be in touch.

if enough people call, hopefully this will get fixed sooner than later!

Hmm I just got one. I don't really have much flickering at all.
Except, well I notice some flickering for areas on the screen that are dark grey, but that's it, for example the background of the dashboard. No flickering at all otherwise which is very odd.