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

New 'Anti-Flicker' Firmware Ready to Download...

Interesting to see the responses

I have wanted to order the i7 for my wife, but have been hesitant since I have heard and seen so many issues. At the Apple store the other day, there were eight (8) people in line with their 27 inchers trying to exchange/refund them because of the problems. I am interested to see if this resolves the issue. Also, I noticed the shipping delay is back to 2 weeks from the 3 weeks it was yesterday.
 
Bodycalming said:
I have a Week 50 iMac (27" i7) that has Black/Flicker and a 'Split Screen', that is to say the Dock moves to the top of screen, for no good reason, then when I move the mouse pointer to where the Dock should be (at the bottom) the pointer appears at the top along with the misplaced Dock. I have installed the firmware update this morning, I will see what happens before the new replacement iMac 27" i7 arrives this week. Ex PC Windows user, even with these problems I will not be going back to Windows.
Click to expand...
Yeah, we have two week 52 27' i7 iMacs at work, one flickers and one has shown the screen wrapping you've shown in your image.

So far the flickering one seems OK with the firmware update, no idea on the other one as the problem was so bad its not been plugged in awaiting either a response from Apple or this current firmware update.
 
Yellow Tinge Seems Improved!!

After this update it seems that my Week 42 C2D's yellow Tinge problem is greatly improved!! I would say the difference is quite obvious on my machine!

Apple well done! ;)
 
week 47: flickered after 4 days and exchanged
week 52: bad flickering right out of the box. exchanged
week 53: no problems before, or after the update. I've been working it pretty hard for just over a week without a hitch.

.....however now that I'm looking for it, the bottom looks a tad yellow. crap.
I'll do the yellow tinge test after work. it might all be in my head

either way I'll probably keep this machine and just have it repaired. it's been a workhorse so far.
 
bcb23 said:
I have wanted to order the i7 for my wife, but have been hesitant since I have heard and seen so many issues. At the Apple store the other day, there were eight (8) people in line with their 27 inchers trying to exchange/refund them because of the problems. I am interested to see if this resolves the issue. Also, I noticed the shipping delay is back to 2 weeks from the 3 weeks it was yesterday.
Click to expand...

8 people, eh? They were 8 people, each of them with 1 (one) iMac 27" model waiting to return it, is what you're saying? :rolleyes:
 
My week 46 i5 had minor flickering issues out of the box. They became less frequent with the first update, but had color problems (the screen would tint slightly bluer 5 seconds after restart or wake). Color issue has been corrected with this new update, and so far, no flickers.

I don't think Apple ever actually acknowledged the yellowing, even though it has clearly been addressed with this update.
 
JerseyMike73 said:
My week 46 i5 had minor flickering issues out of the box. They became less frequent with the first update, but had color problems (the screen would tint slightly bluer 5 seconds after restart or wake). Color issue has been corrected with this new update, and so far, no flickers.

I don't think Apple ever actually acknowledged the yellowing, even though it has clearly been addressed with this update.
Click to expand...

My week 48 i5 also makes this weird tint change about 1-2 seconds after waking from sleep, but actually I don't think mine turns blue... I think it just reverts to a whiter tint after having progressively turned yellow the night before; the fact that the screen has some kind of "tint memory" leads me to think that the yellowing problem is either on the display itself or on the graphics card, and is not heat-related (otherwise, why would it wake momentarily to a yellowish screen, despite being at room temperature when waking?).

On a different note, my iMac has been showing very slight and rare symptoms of graphics corruption. Not a full blown screen displacement as usually reported, but just small flashes (for no longer than roughly one frame) of garbled horizontal bands on top of whatever is displayed on the screen, with no image displacement at all (strangely, I haven't seen reports of minor glitches, just from extreme cases of graphic corruption or screen flashes, which fortunately didn't affect my computer – yet?). I've counted, I'm guessing, less than ten flashes during the last two weeks: the first two on the same day, the second an isolated episode, maybe a couple some other day, and yesterday it seemed they were getting more frequent but I still got no more than four flashes.

Here's to hoping that, my case not being so severe, the second update fixes those glitches for good. If I get any more flashes, I'll let you know (and will try to get my iMac replaced, even after the legally-required 15-day period, because my screen is also slighty yellowish on the lower-right corner).
 
Mainyehc said:
On a different note, my iMac has been showing very slight and rare symptoms of graphics corruption. Not a full blown screen displacement as usually reported, but just small flashes (for no longer than roughly one frame) of garbled horizontal bands on top of whatever is displayed on the screen, with no image displacement at all (strangely, I haven't seen reports of minor glitches, just from extreme cases of graphic corruption or screen flashes, which fortunately didn't affect my computer – yet?). I've counted, I'm guessing, less than ten flashes during the last two weeks: the first two on the same day, the second an isolated episode, maybe a couple some other day, and yesterday it seemed they were getting more frequent but I still got no more than four flashes.

Here's to hoping that, my case not being so severe, the second update fixes those glitches for good. If I get any more flashes, I'll let you know (and will try to get my iMac replaced, even after the legally-required 15-day period, because my screen is also slighty yellowish on the lower-right corner).
Click to expand...

My i7 was doing the garbled horizontal bands, never flickered though. There was nothing wrong with the screen but yellow gradient, week 46, then just two weeks ago it started the horizontal banding problem. Apple support told me to do PRAM reset, and if that didn't help, bring in for replacement of graphics card. It has been over a week now and the screen has behaved, the PRAM reset seems to have fixed it.
 
FearlessFreep said:
They also weren't LED-backlit.
Click to expand...
Okay, but that poster was implying that these problems are here because Apple is using IPS screens.
But Apple has been using LED backlit screens since 2007. However, the iMac was the first combination of a LED backlight and an IPS screen on an Apple product, however there is no reason that this combination should cause any problems. It's most likely faulty screens/backlights or driver issues.
 
Update OK

Just updated the display firmware on a 27" i7 W8945xxxxx. This iMac did not have any problems before and is working just fine. I shut down the iMac at night, it runs from 7:00 AM to 10:00 PM every day.
 
no problems here from the update, but I can surely confirm that it does NOTHING to address the yellow.
 
This update seems to have fixed my iMac's flickering problems, been using it all day and not seen any flickering. Previously I'd see it after using for about 30 mins. Great.
 
JimAtLaw said:
So you have both the first and the second updates and your machine is still flickering? I.e., they still have not fixed the issue?
Click to expand...

Correct. BTW by flickering, what I mean is that every so often (maybe once every 2-10 minutes or so) the screen will momentarily go black (or fade). It comes right back, and it happens in the blink of any eye. It is so quick that at first I thought it was my imagination. Now I can spot it every time. It's very annoying, far more so than the yellow tint.
 
I haven't installed the update yet, but I actually managed to stop the flickering problems by just increasing my fanspeeds. Don't live by this yet though, I haven't actually tested it much today since I have a lot of coursework etc to do, but you get the point. I'm starting to suspect it's heat related, but I don't think it got much hotter than 70C at most.

Also, the fact that it's getting worse over time implies to me that it's a hardware issue, and that this update either has:
A: The placebo effect
B: Masked the problem (underclocking, perhaps?)
 
I have had the more rare blank screen when woken from sleep issue, BUT tentatively pleased to announce that the update has so far seemed to have fixed the problem.

Around about 70-80% of the time when i woke the iMac up the screen would be blank and further attempts of sleeping and waking would be required to get the screen to display.

iMac C2D week 41

EDIT!!! well turns out the update hasn't fixed my problem as I just got a blank screen from wake. Oh well I guess it really is time to box her up and take her back her back. I think i jinxed it by posting here.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back