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Is the MacBook screen REALLY that bad?

Apple always has put in a lower quality screen on its consumer notebooks. Put a ibook screen next to a powerbook, and the difference is noticeable.

The macbook screen does not compare to the macbook pro; you can tell a difference in contrast, especially when looking at black and dark colors, and the viewing angle. Why does Apple do this, other than its sense of tradition? Profit. If it can save ten bucks with a cheaper screen that most people can live with, it will. It also encourages people to buy the macbook pro; Apple shows positive genius in upselling customers to higher end products.

That being said, it is still an improvement over the previous plastic macbooks.

You have to decide if you can live with the display. Some can, and some can't. Going on the threads you can find a custom setting for your make of screen that can help a lot with this issue.
 
It depends how picky you are. I have a unibody MacBook, and I notice the screen could be better, especially compared to my 24" Apple Display. On the other hand, people who use my computer sometimes say how nice my screen is. I think if I asked 100 random people to rate the MacBook screen, 90 would rate it as great. The other 10% would be geeks or picky people.
 
I switched after 3 years from a powerbook 15" to a unibody 13" and couldn't be happier. I don't know how it compares to a macbook pro but certainly the macbook is a very pleasant machine to work with (I use it for iPhone development too).
 
If your the following you might not like it:
Photo Editor
Videographer
Gamer
A picky user

I personally love it, might be because I mentally made myself think that after putting so much cash into it.
 
Brycew said:
If your the following you might not like it:
Photo Editor
Videographer
Gamer
A picky user

I personally love it, might be because I mentally made myself think that after putting so much cash into it.
Click to expand...

I'm not a photographer/artist/videographer, but I am pretty picky, and I'm perfectly happy with the screen I received in my MacBook. In fact, I prefer the way it looks to the Apple 20" ACD that my wife uses - the matte coating on that display gives everything a subtle grain or texture that I find quite distracting.
 
I have the 9C8C Screen
 

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I have the White Macbook screen (the one without the pixelated lines) and I find the viewing angle to be quite frustrating (coming from a 15" MBP w/ Matte). The blacks seem a little bright as well.

At first, everything seemed really bright and over-exposed but I changed the gamma to 2.2 and it fixed a lot of those issues. Now I just use a minimalistic background to check my viewing angle.
 
It depends on what you're looking for...

In all honesty, the screen quality on the Macbook isn't bad. All the colors are vibrant and apparent. Unless someone here does photo-editing as their primary bread and butter for income, I don't think anyone has a justifiable reason to complain. On the other hand, if you're looking at this strictly from a number of defects perspective, you WILL be disappointed. Unless you're not super picky, you WILL find some dust under your monitor, you WILL find a dead or perma on pixel eventually, and you WILL eventually develop magically appearing white pinch spots on your display. If you're after a great display, buy a desktop / monitor combo, otherwise enjoy your Macbook :)
 
I think the macbook screens are good... at only one angle and when not doing photoshop stuff... I hate using it for photoshop because the colors are extremely washed out, and the viewing angles are horrible.. but its not like im doing anything professional, just hobbies =D
 
Listening to opinions here will do you no good without knowing what model LCD the reviewer has and what model LCD your Macbook has.

Do you have the LG Philips LCD, the Samsung LCD, or the AU Optronics LCD in your Macbook? The white 13.3" models used all of these. I would not be surprised if in other models, they use different LCDs as well.

They use any one of those three models. You can't listen to different reviews on the web without knowing what model they are looking at, and you can't choose what LCD will come with your Macbook.
 
l.a.rossmann said:
You can't listen to different reviews on the web without knowing what model they are looking at, and you can't choose what LCD will come with your Macbook.
Click to expand...

Which is a bad point for a 2000$ machine.

It could at least have a screen that doesn't wash out blacks while watching movies. Very annoying.
 
Are glossy screens really that bad? I have a MacBook Air and have no problem using it outside, or inside with the lights on. I don't understand why people complain about the macbook and pro glossy screens, unless they're somehow different than the MacBook Air.
 
Unprocessed1 said:
Are glossy screens really that bad? I have a MacBook Air and have no problem using it outside, or inside with the lights on. I don't understand why people complain about the macbook and pro glossy screens, unless they're somehow different than the MacBook Air.
Click to expand...

It is the extra glass cover over the screens that make the current unibody MBs/MBPs "horrible" to look at in terms of glare. :( However, the quality of the screens themselves are not bad at all. :)
 
Is the MacBook screen REALLY that bad?

56733884_8a9876603c.jpg


The MacBook's screen is god-awful. I was in the Apple store two days ago trying my damnedest to adjust the color settings, but no luck...it still looked like ass. Especially compared to the antiglare 17" MacBook Pro. There have many many complaints flying about on the interwebs that the antiglare bezel looks ugly and "broken," which it does in photos. But if you actually get to see it in person, it's totally awesome. :eek:

Speaking of which, I'm ordering said MacBook Pro here in about a week I believe (heavily subsidized by my parents.) :D I'll try to post some flattering photos when it arrives.
 
Actually the new screen are not so bad, if you look for a thread there are three new screens, I have owned two of the them the LG and the new AUO. They are extremely good compared to the older UMB's. I have always agreed that macbook screens were sub par but now they are a lot better. The viewing angles are better and the blacks black opposed to grey. I returned my ssd air and got a new 2.4 for my knock around machine and love it.
 
My screen is manufacturer 0610, model 9CA7, and its absolutely fantastic. And this is coming from a guy who has nothing but IPS and MVA panels on his desktops.

Colors are not grossly washed out, viewing angles are perfectly acceptable for a laptop - i.e., better than average for a TN panel in my opinion. There are no lines or abnormal artifacts.

Does Apple use less expensive displays in the MacBook as compared to a $2900 17" MacBook Pro with an antiglare display? Yes. Do they have more than one screen supplier? Apparently so. Are they 6-bit TN panels? Yes, and this is well documented. Did I get a display that is of appropriate quality for a $1500 laptop? Yes, I did.
 
People - just change your white gamma to 2.2 and that should ease up some of the hate...
 
The only subpar feature on the white MacBook screen to me would be the viewing angle. Other than that (not really much of an issue to me) the display looks brilliant. I love the glossy display on my pre-unibody MacBook. I went to an Apple store when the unibodies first came out to see them in person and couldn't really see myself using/buying a machine with so much glare/reflection on the display. Hopefully with the next revisions they will offer a matte option on all models.
 
MacManiac76 said:
I love the glossy display on my pre-unibody MacBook. I went to an Apple store when the unibodies first came out to see them in person and couldn't really see myself using/buying a machine with so much glare/reflection on the display. Hopefully with the next revisions they will offer a matte option on all models.
Click to expand...
The new ones have a bit more glare than the plastic body ones, but not a huge amount. I moved from a 2.2GHz black MacBook to a 2.4GHz unibody and while there's a slight increase in glare, one more notch up on the brightness is all it takes.
 
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