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Is your screen dimmer at the top?

Bill Gates

Bill Gates

macrumors 68030
Original poster
Jun 21, 2006
2,500
14
127.0.0.1
What the title says. It's most apparent if I turn the phone sideways, in which case it's the left (or right) edge. Take a look at your own iPhone 4 and see if it's the same.

Edit: Note that I'm talking about a slight difference here, nothing drastic.
 
Ya funny you mention it. I noticed today when I was using the kindle app to read a book in a dimly lit room with auto brigtness on such that the brightness setting was low. Right at the edge, on top of the phone, there is a slightly darker area that becomes obvious when compared to other areas.

I think it may just be the placement of the lighting elements to light up the LCD.
 
reaborg said:
Ya funny you mention it. I noticed today when I was using the kindle app to read a book in a dimly lit room with auto brigtness on such that the brightness setting was low. Right at the edge, on top of the phone, there is a slightly darker area that becomes obvious when compared to other areas.

I think it may just be the placement of the lighting elements to light up the LCD.
Click to expand...

ajohnson253 said:
Yes I noticed this also
Click to expand...
I suspected that this was normal and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one noticing it.

Thanks to everyone for the feedback thus far.
 
Bill Gates said:
I suspected that this was normal and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only one noticing it.

Thanks to everyone for the feedback thus far.
Click to expand...

I don't low about normal, but I'm suspecting most iPhone 4's to be this way. I don't even notice it anymore. I blacked out my screen and it's all equal lighting. I did the white, same thing. Maybe it disappeared?!!:eek:
 
Well nevermimd just checked again, dimmer at the top still. I wonder why it could be like this.
 
I have a few dark streaks that extend from the top to around halfway down the screen. They are so slight that you can't see them by simply looking at the screen, but if you slowly swipe some text horizontally with a solid background (when browsing a web page for instance), and follow the text with your eyes, you can see the slight variance in brightness.

I'm not even contemplating a return, as I have a feeling the staff in the apple store won't be able to see it (the wife can't), and I suspect it's just something I'm sensitive to.

If it ever becomes noticeable when simply looking at a static screen, then it will be going back :)
 
Mine has it too. At first i thought that it was a problem with the screen, but my sister in law and her husband phones are also like that. It shows when the screen dims with with low light.
 
Yeah it seems that all of the 4's have this. It's nothin bad though. A normal thing I suspect it to be. All the demo phones seem the same way at my Apple store also. It's so slight it takes a while to really notice.
 
Not all LCD screens are uniform. That's one of the issues in production. My launch-day iP4 had a light leak in the lower left corner. AppleCare sent an advance replacement and got it a couple days later. No light leak, but slightly dimmer towards the top. You can take it back, but you may get a phone with a different problem.

I suspect this relates to the different suppliers for the LCD component. You'll have differences between suppliers, between manufactured batches, etc. There will always be variances. I suspect the only "perfect" iP4 is the one owned by Steve Jobs and his executive management team.
 
Bill Gates said:
What the title says. It's most apparent if I turn the phone sideways, in which case it's the left (or right) edge. Take a look at your own iPhone 4 and see if it's the same.

Edit: Note that I'm talking about a slight difference here, nothing drastic.
Click to expand...

You should have just asked "Is your screen uniformly lit?"
Now some will see that it's dimmer even if it isn't. :D

Mine's fine, btw.
 
Yes mine is more dim or darker in the top left corner. not VERY darker but it is darker. noticed in iBooks. Made an appt, genius said normal and the displays had it too.
 
Glad I found this thread. I've been looking for info all over the web about this issue and have been able to find very little, but it appears to be a common issue.

I'm on my 2nd iPhone 4, the first one had a loose and buzzing earpiece. As far as I can recall, it had a uniform screen. My girlfriend's iPhone 4's screen is also uniform. The phone I have now (the replacement) is noticeably darker as you work your way to the top.

I have an appointment at the Genius Bar tomorrow morning to see if they'll swap it.
 
I swapped my phone out today. Overall this screen seems to be nicer than the others I've had, with more vibrant color. But, still darker up near the earpiece. It's not as widespread as my previous phone, but definitely still there. Oh well. I guess this is just something we're going to have to live with.

I looked at about 10 of their demo models while I was there and found about half of them had the same issue. These were all 16 GB models and mine is a 32. It leads me to believe it's an overall manufacturing or design issue across all factories, suppliers, and models.
 
Does anyone have a picture of your screen that you can post here? I'm at work now so I can't but I'd like to compare them to mine.
 
ProMod said:
Glad I found this thread. I've been looking for info all over the web about this issue and have been able to find very little, but it appears to be a common issue.

I'm on my 2nd iPhone 4, the first one had a loose and buzzing earpiece. As far as I can recall, it had a uniform screen. My girlfriend's iPhone 4's screen is also uniform. The phone I have now (the replacement) is noticeably darker as you work your way to the top.

I have an appointment at the Genius Bar tomorrow morning to see if they'll swap it.
Click to expand...

Wow, I was about to write this same post nearly word for word. Just replace girlfriend with wife and change the appointment from tomorrow to Friday. Seriously, I had the same loose and buzzing earpiece.. and I was planning to go in to see about the darkened top of the screen on friday.

If it is as common as it appears to be, I might not bother going in.

For the record, mine is a 32gig and it has the darkened area at the top of the screen. It's not bad.. and really only noticeable when reading website with white backgrounds (ie. macrumors) My wife's phone is a 16gig and it appears uniform across the entire screen.
 
Bill Gates said:
Does anyone have a picture of your screen that you can post here? I'm at work now so I can't but I'd like to compare them to mine.
Click to expand...

I did a super quick photoshop mockup that simulates what my screen looks like. This is shown horizontal (where it is more noticeable to me) with the top of the phone being the left side.
 

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zed said:
I did a super quick photoshop mockup that simulates what my screen looks like. This is shown horizontal (where it is more noticeable to me) with the top of the phone being the left side.
Click to expand...
Thanks- that's about the same as mine.
 
Dim at bottom when setting home screen

In general, when I look at a photo on my phone it looks great. However, I have noticed that when I set a photo as my homescreen, the image gets darker the closer to the bottom you get. Is this normal?

Thanks,
 
So I went to the Apple store to compare my phone with the display models. It was roughly 50-50, with half the phones somewhat better and half worse. Looking it the screen at full brightness, it appears that Apple placed the LEDs used for backlighting the screen at the top, the area where it's somewhat dimmer. It appears to be a combination design flaw and quality control issue, with the light not properly diffusing right at the edge. My guess is that it's a result of using a low-quality display. The other thing I noticed is that no two screens had the same white point, although some screens were similar to each other. My screen has a slight reddish hue; one at the store had a horribly blue cast to it.

I should also add that I spoke with a Genius when I first arrived and he said that he and the other Geniuses did not see cause for replacement with my phone, adding that some could not discern a difference between the top and bottom portions of the screen. I thus opted to look at the display models in order to avoid getting needlessly angry and frustrated over a potential non-issue, and reached the conclusion noted above.

I will also add that I'm not not entirely satisfied with the outcome of my little experiment and may attempt an exchange in the future.
 
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