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27", 21.5" iMac Owners, test your screen for yellow tint issue here

Is your display having the problem described?

  • iMac 21.5" both grey bars look identical in color

    Votes: 102 8.9%

  • iMac 21.5" the bottom bar looks more yellow

    Votes: 199 17.4%

  • iMac 27" both grey bars look identical in color

    Votes: 311 27.2%

  • iMac 27" the bottom bar looks more yellow

    Votes: 533 46.6%
  • Total voters
    1,145
@jicka

Did your 2010 models come from CA or China?

And what shipping did you get when you placed the order?
 
I don't know where any of the ones I have had came from. I picked them all up at the salt lake city utah apple store though. If i would have had it shipped I would have probably kept the first yellow one, not worth shipping it back imo
 
jicka said:
Btom will you check these pics for me. all three are zoomed in from about 15 feet away and I took them at the same time

I returned my other one today it went smooth but I didn't have to deal with anyone that knew me so I didn't tell the genius bar guy that I had already returned 2 lol

I think this is the best screen out of the 4 I have had, It has the gray bar pretty bad at the bottom and maybe a little yellow at the bottom right and at the top just to the right of the middle. I might just be seeing yellow cuz I'm trying so hard. Either way it seems way better than my other ones overall, no obvious yellow blotches.

I got stuck with a seagate hdd again hopefully it won't be as loud as the last one
Click to expand...

Had a look at picture 1 and 3, they really look good for color uniformity. There is ~2% red deficiency close to the right edge (you can see it as a very slight cyan). There is a slight horizontal darkening along the bottom of the screen.
I would keep this one.

Tom B.
 
jicka said:
Ya I'm keeping it either way I just wanted him to test them to see if there is any. This is the first one of 4 that I cant really see any yellow and I don't mind the gray bar.

I wouldn't buy a refurb, I'm sure that's where all the returns go and I doubt they switch out the screens. I would recommend to anyone getting an iMac to do it at an apple store if possible cuz it isn't much of a hassle to switch it out if you end up with a bad one.
Click to expand...

I agree Jicka. I got tempted by the "savings" of a Refurb. Getting more for your buck i5 Quad for $100 less than an i3. But, if it's a bust, it's a pain to re-pack and ship back etc.

I've only had one experience with a Refurb and it was disaster. When the White G5 iMac's were refurb, just before the Intel Core Duo refresh, I ordered one and YES it had coffee splashes on the LCD. I took a damp cloth and actually wiped it off. Now the line I was given on the phone by the Salesman

"All refurbs are thoroughly checked and inspected to ensure that they meet the same standard of a new machine". There is no difference other than price."

Ummm yeah. A screen with Coffee splashes was hardly inspected. In fact, that thing came in one truck and went right out on another.

So, maybe one should learn from the past and not be tempted by the fruit again.
 
My Theory Is....

I forgot to mention above that if the Gizmodo article is correct, that the machines are leaving the factory perfect but it's the movement during shipping causing the Yellowing, then the Apple Store route sounds much safer.


These things are shipped by Air Cargo. BUT, when the Apple Store gets them, they get a tight wrapped skid at a time. So no bouncing and shaking around. When you order online or build to order, it's just your computer couriered from China and god knows how much it's been bounced.
 
jicka said:
Btom will you check these pics for me. all three are zoomed in from about 15 feet away and I took them at the same time

I returned my other one today it went smooth but I didn't have to deal with anyone that knew me so I didn't tell the genius bar guy that I had already returned 2 lol

I think this is the best screen out of the 4 I have had, It has the gray bar pretty bad at the bottom and maybe a little yellow at the bottom right and at the top just to the right of the middle. I might just be seeing yellow cuz I'm trying so hard. Either way it seems way better than my other ones overall, no obvious yellow blotches.

I got stuck with a seagate hdd again hopefully it won't be as loud as the last one
Click to expand...

Jicka- most people have been using the Grey Bars at top and bottom test but I see you are using the blank screen. Any special settings to do the test? 50% brightness etc? Did you do it in-store before leaving or when you got home?

Like Tom, I have held off since Nov. to buy the 27 inch so I really want to check it when I dive in now.
 
I just placed an order for a refurb 27" late 2009 knowing all these yellowing issues exist and I have little chance of picking up a non-yellow screen. I am just hoping it doesn't bug me that much ahah. Every apple product I have gotten has met my standards - I am picky but not anal about my apple gear. While people exchange their macs/ipods/ipads 3-4 times over - the first one I get has been fine for me. Maybe I am just lucky.

Heres to hoping the same for my new refurb! From reading the thread it seems like the refurb screens haven't been fixed or anything. I'll post my results, and if it is too yellow, I will post my results of my visit with the genius. If I end up visiting the genius, I will have them do the screen swap. That is the plan. Just curious about what I can do for a nice machine.
 
Comparison with the LCD HDTV screen.

I was just thinking that this might be of interest to some people on this forum.

I finally decided to have a quick look at and test a LED HDTV screen. Nice folks at my local friendly Best Buy store let me run my own slide show on one of the TV sets in the store and take pictures of the screen (thank you guys).

I was testing just one screen, a 42", anti-glare, 1080p LED HDTV from Insignia. I was using a USB memory stick and the internal TV driver to run the slideshow (this TV has also 4 HDMI ports).

The test conditions were not perfect. All lights in the store were ON and the screen was placed a little bit in the front - in the full light (didn't really want to ask for the lights in the store to be dimmed, and such).

Here are my key observations.

  1. Pictures seen on the large screen can be really STUNNING (I did watch them also on a 55" screen before);
  2. White and 50% uniform grey screen were very much uniform color - at par with the best iMac screens presented on this forum;
  3. There was some light bleeding along the top and the bottom edge of the screen, at par with the bad iMac screens I have seen here;
  4. The left and right side of the screen were slightly darker, than the center, top and the bottom (due to LED placement?);
  5. The 50% grey screen was less uniform, than a typical iMac screen picture presented here.
I didn't really want to push my luck and test another TV screen(s) (some of the brand name units?), but my main observation of the uniform white/gray on the LCD TV screen were fully confirmed (nothing similar to the yellow tinge).
The most unexpected finding was non-uniform grey at 50%. I think it was caused by surrounding lighting and reflections (from the semi mat, antiglare screen surface).

This post is slightly off topic, so I don't want to push my luck with the moderators, but I'll try to answer additional questions, if I can.

Tom B.
 
solman said:
Jicka- most people have been using the Grey Bars at top and bottom test but I see you are using the blank screen. Any special settings to do the test? 50% brightness etc? Did you do it in-store before leaving or when you got home?

Like Tom, I have held off since Nov. to buy the 27 inch so I really want to check it when I dive in now.
Click to expand...
I use those tests to look with my eyes I just figured it is better for btom tests to have a full gray background. I checked the second one I got in the store I noticed the gray bar but didn't really see any yellow. It's hard to see in the light of the stores so I have just checked all of mine at home with the gray bar test and just moving gray windows around the screen. All my pics are just under 50% brightness too.

Thanks for checking those Tom, I can't believe I finally got a good one.
 
solman said:
I forgot to mention above that if the Gizmodo article is correct, that the machines are leaving the factory perfect but it's the movement during shipping causing the Yellowing, then the Apple Store route sounds much safer.


These things are shipped by Air Cargo. BUT, when the Apple Store gets them, they get a tight wrapped skid at a time. So no bouncing and shaking around. When you order online or build to order, it's just your computer couriered from China and god knows how much it's been bounced.
Click to expand...

I was planning on getting mine from an Apple store so this is nice to hear. Hopefully it'll work in my benefit.
 
Imac 27" Possible Yellowish tint

Hey Guys!

I just received my new 27" Quadcore Imac a few hours back and decided to put it to the yellow screen test. Here are some of the pics I snapped. I feel like it has a yellowish tint to it. I have been rather unfortunate when it comes to purchases from apple. Had to return my macbook pro twice owing to different issues associated with each of them. I was hoping to get a issue free Imac. Anyway, I would greatly appreciate your opinions on the same. Would you consider it worthy of a replacement?

http://img514.imageshack.us/img514/2299/dsc03311ym.jpg
http://img64.imageshack.us/img64/7238/dsc03310s.jpg
http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/2263/dsc03308o.jpg -With Camera Flash
http://img571.imageshack.us/img571/7239/dsc03307t.jpg -With Camera Flash

Thanks
Mak
 
BTO i7 from China. no yellow tint. found a small spec of something on the display tho, might be dust under the glass or dead pixels, not quite sure... but its not really noticeable.
 
mak713 said:
Hey Guys!

I just received my new 27" Quadcore Imac a few hours back and decided to put it to the yellow screen test. Here are some of the pics I snapped. I feel like it has a yellowish tint to it. I have been rather unfortunate when it comes to purchases from apple. Had to return my macbook pro twice owing to different issues associated with each of them. I was hoping to get a issue free Imac. Anyway, I would greatly appreciate your opinions on the same. Would you consider it worthy of a replacement?

http://img514.imageshack.us/img514/2299/dsc03311ym.jpg
http://img64.imageshack.us/img64/7238/dsc03310s.jpg
http://img294.imageshack.us/img294/2263/dsc03308o.jpg -With Camera Flash
http://img571.imageshack.us/img571/7239/dsc03307t.jpg -With Camera Flash

Thanks
Mak
Click to expand...

Look at the other thread.

Tom B.
 
Amazing this thread is still going on. Kudos to Btom for his testing and input regarding this issue. Very helpful in putting things into a perspective thorugh empirical evidence.

My understanding is that ALL of them have varying degrees of color uniformity or inconsistency, depending on how you look at it. It's part of the design.

One needs to either accept this and keep thir iMac or just request a full refund and look elsewhere.

Some are bothered, others not. Apple is NOT going to fix this inside of the current generation. It is what it is.
 
Btom said:
I was just thinking that this might be of interest to some people on this forum.

I finally decided to have a quick look at and test a LED HDTV screen. Nice folks at my local friendly Best Buy store let me run my own slide show on one of the TV sets in the store and take pictures of the screen (thank you guys).

I was testing just one screen, a 42", anti-glare, 1080p LED HDTV from Insignia. I was using a USB memory stick and the internal TV driver to run the slideshow (this TV has also 4 HDMI ports).

The test conditions were not perfect. All lights in the store were ON and the screen was placed a little bit in the front - in the full light (didn't really want to ask for the lights in the store to be dimmed, and such).

Here are my key observations.

  1. Pictures seen on the large screen can be really STUNNING (I did watch them also on a 55" screen before);
  2. White and 50% uniform grey screen were very much uniform color - at par with the best iMac screens presented on this forum;
  3. There was some light bleeding along the top and the bottom edge of the screen, at par with the bad iMac screens I have seen here;
  4. The left and right side of the screen were slightly darker, than the center, top and the bottom (due to LED placement?);
  5. The 50% grey screen was less uniform, than a typical iMac screen picture presented here.
I didn't really want to push my luck and test another TV screen(s) (some of the brand name units?), but my main observation of the uniform white/gray on the LCD TV screen were fully confirmed (nothing similar to the yellow tinge).
The most unexpected finding was non-uniform grey at 50%. I think it was caused by surrounding lighting and reflections (from the semi mat, antiglare screen surface).

This post is slightly off topic, so I don't want to push my luck with the moderators, but I'll try to answer additional questions, if I can.

Tom B.
Click to expand...

Tom you're a true scientist. Well done!
 
After having sold my Mac Mini (as a temporary computer until the new iMac comes out) I finally got my iMac today!

Very happy with the computer, except where the quality control of the screen went up, other bits went down.

The glass of the screen had a poor tolerance and is misaligned with the frame.

The keyboard has a rougher surface and is not properly machined. The rounded part at the front which houses the batteries are poorly moulded and is not properly rounded... I suspect they've used a different mould (this thing looks like it's been cast)...

The aluminium back is so easily scratched -- it's evident the material has relatively high porosity... made a big scratch mark close to the apple logo :(

Anyway, back to the screen. The screen is fantastic. I can't see yellowing unless you actually look for it. There is just a sight feint yellow area on the bottom right of the screen, but really that is nothing compared to what I had a while ago. If you stand back a few metres the left of the screen is slightly cooler than the centre-right. But again that difference is very small.

So overall I'm happy, they should've upped the specs a bit more :p Good computer.
 
IndustrialSpace said:
.....

My understanding is that ALL of them have varying degrees of color uniformity or inconsistency, depending on how you look at it. It's part of the design.

.....
Click to expand...

All screens have non-uniformities, and we can see just a few kinds with a naked eye. Some market segments are more sensitive to white, or grey tinges (like the TV market), some are less (like computers), some require much higher color accuracy, than provided by TV (medical, publishing). An interesting popular paper of how it is done, with some good pictures can be found here.

It was accepted by most computer users that colors on the screen change with the viewing angle, as happens for TN panels (used in laptops and low cost monitors). IPS panel is a great step forward from the TN technology. Still, if parts of the screen may miss up to 10% of a specific color component, it is, at least for me, not acceptable.

Tom B.
 
Yellow tinge of doom

2nd refresh imac.

21.5" entry level model. (£999 in UK). Serial W8023.......

Both of them have yellow issues.

This one has quite a significant 'blob' in the centre of the screen and bottom right hand corner is pretty bad.

The top of the screen is lovely bright white, I also have the dog whistle!

Think I give up now.
 
My 2nd 27" iMac (1st replacement) is coming tomorrow and I was wondering if anyone's SECOND computer was the one that they ended up keeping because it was flawless/near flawless? It seems to me a lot of people get the perfect iMac on either their 1st (lucky), 3rd, or 4th one. I'm really hoping I don't have to return this one again but I have a bad feeling.
 
thedon1,

I had a quick Photoshop look at the picture of your screen and it has a bad case of orange tinge on the left and right sides of the screen.

It would help if you took a picture of the uniformly gray background (~20% gray?), but right now I'd say you have ~~20% blue deficiency and 7% green deficiency in the low left corner alone. In fact it is at par with the worst cases of the yellow tinge I've seen (is your iPhone camera OK?).

I'd also suggest let's keep all this in one (this) thread, even if it is not strictly speaking a "yellow tint issue".

Tom B.
 
Here are some more pics, i hope the grey background is ok. I did the curtains and turned the lights on.

Grey background
http://img651.imageshack.us/i/img0364uf.jpg/

Different bars
http://img338.imageshack.us/i/img0366lc.jpg/


As far as I can tell, my camera is ok. I have taken a lot of pictures with it and have not seen any colour problems. I don't have a case on it that could interfere with the flash.

Here's a picture i took so you can have a look at just incase, you may be right, there could be a problem.
http://img835.imageshack.us/i/img0358m.jpg/




I really appreciate you taking the time to look at this, cheers

Sorry i posted it in the other thread by accident
 
Just for fun

No words...
 

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