Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

pragmaLT

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 13, 2017
25
36
I had previously returned a MBP16 because the display was mysteriously causing eye strain literally seconds after use.

However today after fiddling with a store model MBP16 which didn't seem to be nearly as bad, I noticed it had the "automatically adjust brightness" setting disabled and also brightness maxed out.

I played around with it and noticed two peculiar things:

1. If "automatically adjust brightness" is ON, the brightness never reaches the display's true max brightness. It caps at something around 90-95%. I have no idea why this is the case.

2. If the brightness was anything but "true max", I would get eyestrain.

If anyone out there is experiencing eye strain and still has their MBP16, could you try disabling auto brightness, setting brightness to max, and see if it alleviates the issue?
 

Nacho98

Suspended
Jul 11, 2019
729
674
1. If "automatically adjust brightness" is ON, the brightness never reaches the display's true max brightness. It caps at something around 90-95%. I have no idea why this is the case.

ummmm...because its doing what its supposed to. the store lighting clearly wasnt bright enough for the autobrightness to crank all the way to 100%, so it settled in where it felt was correct, at 90-95% in this case.
 
  • Like
Reactions: M3Jedi77

pragmaLT

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 13, 2017
25
36
ummmm...because its doing what its supposed to. the store lighting clearly wasnt bright enough for the autobrightness to crank all the way to 100%, so it settled in where it felt was correct, at 90-95% in this case.

Don't think you quite understand

Auto brightness ON: slider 100%
And

Auto brightness OFF: slider 100%

show different levels of brightness (OFF being slightly brighter)

Unless you are implying that it was obvious to everyone that when auto-brightness is ON, it is only using the slider setting to indicate a range of brightness settings.
 

leman

macrumors Core
Oct 14, 2008
19,153
18,920
You are correct, auto brightness will change the brightness range based on ambient light conditions (e.g. if you are in a dim room, it will scale the max brightness down).

If you are experiencing eye strain with brightness set to anything than 100%, then you are probably one of the rare people overly sensitive to the PWM used to modulate the backlight brightness. I cannot recommend running a laptop on 100% brightness because a) it will kill your battery life and b) it is not good for your eyes.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.