Brightness Setting Not Kept

[frank_t]

Hi everyone,

I just got me a 2.8Ghz iMac 24inch and it's great in every way but there is a small bug i was wondering if anyone else was experiencing.

When ever i start up or restart my iMac the brightness level is turned up to the max. Which for me (and most in dark rooms) is too much so i keep turning it down to the lowest setting which is fine.

Is there a pref file i can trash or another fix or is this one of those report to apple and wait and see if it gets fixed bugs?

Cheers,

Frank

2.8Ghz iMac (Early 2008)
Mac OS X (10.5.2)
4GB RAM, 750GB HD, 24inch Display

[frank_t]

I guess i'm alone on this?

[danny_w]

My wife's C2D white iMac has the same problem, except in reverse. It keeps lowering the brightness for some reason.

[frank_t]

Could be effecting older gens but mine is a new iMac so is this a wider issue for all iMac users?

This is my first iMac...i've moved over from a PowerMac G4

[mhnajjar]

To my knowledge, there is no light sensor in the iMac and for some reason it does not save your settings so what you have is normal because I am having the same problem on both 24" 2.8 and 3.06 imacs.:o

[freddyaudiophil]

Do a search on the net for the Shades snap-in to system preferences. It gives way better control over the brightness setting and to the best of my knowledge "stays" where you leave it after reboots, etc.

It certainly helped for me...

freddy

[TriadMacMan]

My 2.4GHz 24 inch aluminum iMac holds it's brightness settings (three dots showing) just fine from boot to reboot. This is the first computer I've ever owned that I felt was too bright at max setting. Not that I'm complaining, I'm actually quite happy that it is capable of being too bright. If my MacBook would go brighter I would set it brighter so it's very nice to have some to spare for once. I'd say you definitely have an issue. Have you installed any firmware updates since having the iMac? It seems like it would have be a software issue instead of a hardware problem. I spent a little time on the Apple support discussions site and I can tell you that you're not alone. One person said zapping the PRAM seemed to make his quit changing when he rebooted for a little while but it started doing it again. I didn't find anyone who knew of a permanent solution though. A trip to the genius bar might be in your future???

[frank_t]

Hi everyone, the fix is set the brightness to +1 from the lowest setting and it will keep the setting after reboot.

As for Shades all it does is put a filter over the whole display (you can change the color of that filter in the prefs). The backlight would still be going at %100 behind it which means the life span of it will be shorter and consume more power when your eyes can't use it at that setting anyway.

Thanks everyone anyway.

[7031]

Hi everyone, the fix is set the brightness to +1 from the lowest setting and it will keep the setting after reboot.

As for Shades all it does is put a filter over the whole display (you can change the color of that filter in the prefs). The backlight would still be going at %100 behind it which means the life span of it will be shorter and consume more power when your eyes can't use it at that setting anyway.

Thanks everyone anyway.
Shades works well when say the minimum brightness is still too much though. I keep it just for that reason.

[danny_w]

Shades works well when say the minimum brightness is still too much though. I keep it just for that reason.
Agreed. I keep my iMac at minimum and use Shades to darken it some more.

[hologram]

Or you could calibrate the display under the preferences panel (Displays>color>calibrate) and lower the brightness as much as you want (as well as change the color), then when you get it where you want it, just save it as a custom profile and it will load every time you boot up.

You'll get a lot more control this way than just using the slider.

[dakdzin]

Bought my Mac Pro 2.8GHz Quad-Core few months ago and had similar problem with brightness being cranked up to the max after reboot!
It doesn't happen every time but still creates reasons for concern, is it a bug? has downloading unsecure torrents finally caught up with me?
So yep, same here.