New Mac User....Dimming Problems

[JayKay321]

Hello All,

New late '08 MBP user here after going my entire life with a PC. After seeing how seamless everything was, I had to make the switch. I've done my research about all the MBP issues and so far everything seems good except for a couple of the dimming issues.

#1: After about 2 minutes, my MBP's screen dims if I haven't moved the cursor. And yes, I have "automatically adjust brightness as ambient light changes" checked OFF. My settings for "display sleep" and "computer sleep" are set well AFTER 2 minutes. I have searched this forum and the only official answer seems to be here: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS2309?viewlocale=en_US

Is this still the only answer/solution available? With only two days before my 14 day return policy is up, I'd really like to make sure it's not a defect in my computer.


#2: My keyboard also dims and brightens based on how much light is in the room despite having checked off "automatically adjust brightness...."


Are these issues bugs in the OS or computer specific issues? Thanks in advance for any help/suggestions.

-Jay

 

[J the Ninja]

For #1, go to System Preferences > Energy Saver and disable "Automatically reduce display brightness before sleep". You can choose to have this off for AC and on for battery, if you like.

For #2: Go to System Preferences > Keyboard, and disable automatic backlighting (it's a separate switch from the screen's auto-dim)

 

[duffyanneal]

#1: After about 2 minutes, my MBP's screen dims if I haven't moved the cursor.

In the Energy Saver preference panel uncheck "Automatically reduce the brightness of the display before display sleep".

 

[ninja10]

i have a similar problem with my keyboard. i have the energy saver setting to not to turn off the keyboard. after about 2 mins the keyboard turn off by itself and i have to move my mouse to light it back up. haven't found a solution yet so i will have to call apple when i have time.

 

[sal]

#1: After about 2 minutes, my MBP's screen dims if I haven't moved the cursor.

wow, this problem is still around even with the new macbook pro? I figured apple would have fixed this bug by now. anyways, this is how I solved the issue on the previous macbook pro. It's worth a shot.

I experienced the same problem you and others have described, on both tiger and leopard. My screens' backlight would go off 3 or 4 minutes(it goes dark but you can barely make out the screen). It didn't matter what i did with the energy saver settings, problem persisted.

After searching google endlessly and reading what others have to say, I came across a solution that worked for me.

You start off by deleting your energy savings preferences. Restarting your machine. Set your energy savings to better performance THEN using terminal, you set your sleep to 0, autodim to 0, disksleep to 0, and displaysleep to 0. You might also disable your screen saver. I have mine for 15 minutes.

Do not mess with your energy settings anymore.

The drawback to this, is your screen will NEVER go to sleep and according to apple, "never letting your display sleep may shorten it's life"

I always just close the lid on my machine, so this isn't an issue. I also have a shortcut key(thanks quicksilver) to sleep my machine. I haven't experimenting with setting the sleep to something like 30 minutes because everytime I do, the problem returns and I have to do all of the previous steps again.

conclusion
I think a lot of it had to do with corrupt energy saver settings and possibly a bug that corrupts your settings if you mess around with the energy savings settings. The workaround as I described is trashign the preferences and changing the energy saver settings via terminal.(Turning off sleep, dim, sleepdisplay)

 

[ryanwarsaw]

Open terminal and copy and paste this into it and hit enter.

sudo pmset -a halfdim 0

Thats has solved this problem on every Mac I have owned.

That solves the screen dimming but not sure about the keyboard.

 

[plinx0r]

Not sure if this is the answer you're looking for but I've fixed the issue with Caffeine: http://lightheadsw.com/caffeine/

 

[JayKay321]

Thanks for all the suggestions! Unchecking "automatically reduce brightness of the display before sleep" did the trick.

As for #2, it appears that this setting is under "keyboard and mouse." Initially i thought the fluctuating keyboard backlight had to do with the "automatically adjust brightness as ambient light changes" setting, but apparently, completely separate things.

Glad to have found this forum; it's a great resource for the noobs.

 

[Tex-Twil]

Hi,
my screen is also dimming and this is perfectly right when I don't use the notebook so I don't want to deactivate it. The problem is that it dims when I'm watching a movie with VLC cos I don't want it to dim. When I watch a DVD with the DVD player it doesn't dim.



Thanks,
Tex