Pastel color distortion on the white MacBook

droidix said:

Just got a new white MacBook yesterday (MB403LL/A) and have noticed, that depending on a slight change in viewing angle, pastel colors can get really distorted, even appearing as other colors, e.g., light green->gray and light orange to pink.

One example would be Google calendar when editing an event. Looking at the screen in a normal position, the background appears gray, but when slumped down in my chair it looks green (the actual color).

Is this a normal problem with MacBooks or could my display be defective?

I took a couple snaps with iPhone that didn't turn out to hot but illustrate the point:

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Unfortunately, that's "normal" with the MB displays, along with quite a few PC laptop screens. When looked at from below, the color tends to shift to "negative."

droidix said:

So this would also cause the color distortion when looking from slightly above?

Click to expand...

Mine washes out when looked at from above, at a slight angle, but when looking "down" the screen, the colors go "negative" as well.

droidix said:

Ok, thanks for your help. So is there any angle you can look at your screen with everything appearing correct? With mine, no matter the angle, either the colors are washed out or the top starts to turn negative.

Click to expand...

After calibrating my screen (9c89) with a profile from around here somewhere, when i look head-on, its pretty good, and if I look a little from the bottom, all the colors saturate more, but detail is lost in the dark areas.

Unfortunately, contrast ratios are not friendly with these screens, as they have a tendency to look washed out no matter what =\ (Mine's a Unibody MB by the way)

I'd suggest either running the built in screen calibration app, or finding an appropriate one on here. To run the app yourself, goto System Preferences-->Displays-->Color-->Calibrate. If you want to find an appropriate one, you'll first want to figure out what type of panel you have, which can be done by going to the same place as to calibrate it yourself, but instead single click on the default profile, then select "Open Profile," and scroll down to the last entry in the lower pane titled "mmod" and then your panel model will be listed in the "Model" field that comes up under that.

Each model has a slightly different color reproduction field, I guess you could say, so you'll most likely want to find a profile for the same panel model that you have.

I have a perfect display calibration on mine, and I have no issue with the screen like I first did. I'm not sure if it will do the same on yours, since all displays are different (hence the need for calibration), but if you want to give it a shot, PM me and I will send it to you