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Maybe it's a secret software meant to be deployed sometime next year thus will makes us believe our phone burned-in so bad that a brand spanking new iPhone 16 Pro is the solution?
/s
 
Could have been a driver bug causing things not to clear or refresh properly that made it look like burn in.
i thought of those e-ink displays that can have image retention when flipping the page. it was noticeable more when reading manga. if you turn display refresh in settings then it does a harder refresh when flipping the page. maybe it's something like that.

or it could just be a nasty visual bug. i've had whacky graphic glitches on my PC where parts of the screen get stuck.

this didn't affect me but i'm glad it seems like it was just a software bug and not defective displays. yeey
 
I wonder if this is some algorithm Apple is using to combat burn in? Maybe they’re constantly adjusting the brightness/color of individual subpixels based on what’s previously been on screen to help level the wear, in a way that’s not perceptible in normal use, unless there’s a bug like this?

They’re definitely doing some kind of magic behind the scenes, my keyboard is up ~40% of the time I’m using my phone, and even on 2+ year old iPhones there’s no hint of it being burned in. Or the time or status bar icons for that matter
 
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you can't fix "burn in" with a software update lmao. it's obviously an issue with the graphics processor (if it's really been fixed).
It could very well be a software bug that is not related to the graphics processor. Modern OLED displays utilize software algorithms to mitigate screen burn by essentially keeping track of how long individual sub-pixels are lit, and at what intensity. This allows them to adjust nearby pixel luminance to account for the degradation that the pixels have encountered from normal use, and continue to produce a clean image on a display that would otherwise have screen burn. My guess is that there was a bug in the display driver firmware that caused these algorithms to overcompensate for the amount of usage that these screens were seeing, essentially causing it to over adjust the luminance of certain pixels resulting in what looked like real screen burn when these compensation values were utilized by the display driver.
 
Wow so it’s not burn in like that click bait headlines and people were outraged once again by nothing, lol.
It wasn’t “nothing” but it’s not burn in so you’re 50% correct. 😄

People calling it burn in were clearly incorrect. It looked like that but there’s a close to zero percent chance it could have been burn in with new screens. Based on tests (rtings, for one), OLED screens need at least 4,000 hours of use with a static image on the screen to burn in. That means unless someone had been using their iPhone 15 for 166 days already, it was highly unlikely to be burn in. That, again, didn’t mean it wasn’t an issue. It means it was something Apple could fix through software/firmware.
 
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A bug that mimics screen burn in. Wow. I’m a huge nerd, and I would have definitely thought it was burn in.
 


The iOS 17.1 update that Apple is set to release in the near future addresses an issue that "may cause display image persistence," according to Apple's feature notes for the software.

iphone-15-sizes.jpg

Since the launch of the iPhone 15 models, there have been sporadic reports of severe screen burn-in impacting the new devices. There was speculation that it might be a hardware issue with the OLED display, but based on the iOS 17.1 update, Apple has found and addressed a software problem that mimicked screen burn-in.

iphone-15-display-burn-in.jpg


Image via MacRumors reader Josh

While most of the reports of display problems were coming from iPhone 15 users, there were also some users with iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro devices that saw similar issues, which is likely why Apple's release notes do not mention the iPhone 15 specifically.

Those who have noticed "burn-in" on their iPhones should update to iOS 17.1 to ensure that it solves the problem.

The iOS 17.1 update also addresses a number of other bugs. It fixes an issue that could cause the Significant Location privacy setting to reset when transferring or pairing an Apple Watch for the first time, plus it addresses a bug that could cause custom and purchased ringtones not to appear as options for a text tone.

There is a fix for an issue that could cause the iPhone keyboard to be less responsive, and Apple says that it has added crash detection optimizations for the iPhone 14 and iPhone 15 models to further refine how the iPhones respond when a vehicle crash event is detected.

Article Link: iOS 17.1 Fixes iPhone Display Image Retention Issue

"image persistence"
"neural engine"
"thunderbolt 3"

welcome to AppleSpeak. I know I missed several more.
 
How do bugs like these even happen? I've been an engineer for almost two decades and I've never seen anything like this lol

I feel like Apple's QA department is in shambles.
I agree. It’s almost as if they don’t spend days or weeks with the phones. Like on launch day, many people had issues with setup in terms of transferring data from an older phone to the new phone. That was a bug in the OS. Then the overheating issue. Another bug. Now image retention.

All it takes is using the phone normally for those bugs to have been found and squished. So it’s unclear what Apple’s QA department is doing.
 
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"image persistence"
"neural engine"
"thunderbolt 3"

welcome to AppleSpeak. I know I missed several more.
Thunderbolt is a trademarked term that is trademarked, implemented, and overseen by Intel. and Apple had significant involvement in its development.

Usb4 is based on Thunderbolt 3, as Intel donated it to the usb-if. It is a tunneling protocol that tunnels various things on a wire such as pcie, Ethernet, DisplayPort, power delivery. in fact apple’s implementation of thunderbolt 3 (with a software-based connection manager) inspired Intel and Microsoft to do the same with usb4.

Thunderbolt 5 is the next generation and coming next year with 80 Gbps data, up to 120 Gbps for video, and 240W power delivery. I hope the new m3 Macs are equipped with Thunderbolt 5…
 
I was literally just about to upgrade to iOS 17 (only stopped because I thought I should probably make a backup first).

I will be waiting for 17.1 now.

And I really don’t understand people who buy iPhones on launch day. This sort of stuff happens so frequently, I just feel like buying right after the holidays is the way to go. Any major showstopper bugs are usually resolved by then.
 
I was literally just about to upgrade to iOS 17 (only stopped because I thought I should probably make a backup first).

I will be waiting for 17.1 now.

And I really don’t understand people who buy iPhones on launch day. This sort of stuff happens so frequently, I just feel like buying right after the holidays is the way to go. Any major showstopper bugs are usually resolved by then.

Agreed!!

I've always been the anti-early adopter. I never buy anything on launch, or even right after...phones, software, anything.

Wait for a bit and see what happens has worked for me, and continues to do so. Being first in line doesn't bring me joy.
 
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It could very well be a software bug that is not related to the graphics processor. Modern OLED displays utilize software algorithms to mitigate screen burn by essentially keeping track of how long individual sub-pixels are lit, and at what intensity. This allows them to adjust nearby pixel luminance to account for the degradation that the pixels have encountered from normal use, and continue to produce a clean image on a display that would otherwise have screen burn. My guess is that there was a bug in the display driver firmware that caused these algorithms to overcompensate for the amount of usage that these screens were seeing, essentially causing it to over adjust the luminance of certain pixels resulting in what looked like real screen burn when these compensation values were utilized by the display driver.
Possibly the best post here. 👍
 
It could very well be a software bug that is not related to the graphics processor. Modern OLED displays utilize software algorithms to mitigate screen burn by essentially keeping track of how long individual sub-pixels are lit, and at what intensity. This allows them to adjust nearby pixel luminance to account for the degradation that the pixels have encountered from normal use, and continue to produce a clean image on a display that would otherwise have screen burn. My guess is that there was a bug in the display driver firmware that caused these algorithms to overcompensate for the amount of usage that these screens were seeing, essentially causing it to over adjust the luminance of certain pixels resulting in what looked like real screen burn when these compensation values were utilized by the display driver.
This is the magic I was talking about! Thanks for the explanation ☺️
 
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For those of you who don't know.

Image Retention is not the same as OLED Screen burn. Image Retention is temporary and happens to different types of displays such as OLED, Plasma and LCDs. On the other hand, "burn in" only happens to degraded OLED displays.

That's why Apple can solve Image Retention through a software fix, since they can manipulate how the screen drivers behave when it comes to screen refresh.

And no, this is not the first time that this happens, some manufacturers that use OLED even have websites dedicated to this topic, e.g. https://www.sony.co.uk/electronics/support/articles/00173479
 
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