OLED iPad Pro Users Report 'Grainy' Displays, But It May Not Be a Defect

[technoholic]

Why are you being difficult about this? A small percentage of panels are coming out of the factory seemingly poorly implemented, causing grain on a small percentage of iPad Pros. This is a quality control issue. Exchanging for another panel seems to be resolving the issue.

If your OLED panel doesn't have the grain issue, then you won the panel lottery.

As I said, I know what I saw, 2 very different panels, doesn’t really matter what anyone else thinks, I’m surprised at the difference between a good and bad panel and people can call it what they want, or not call it anything, I just know, I had a defective screen, now I have a good screen. That’s all I care about!

 

[PaperMag]

Not just OLED, an implementation of OLED which Apple have pretty much hyped up as the best thing since sliced bread.

The tandem OLED technology seems to be everything Apple said it was.

The problem is this is Apple's first batch, with Samsung and LG both supplying panels, but some Samsung is having issues. In fact it was reported weeks/months ago that Samsung was having yield issues and that Apple was going with LG only, so I'm uncertain why Apple changed their mind—clearly a mistake from our perspective.

 

[PaperMag]

As I said, I know what I saw, 2 very different panels, doesn’t really matter what anyone else thinks, I’m surprised at the difference between a good and bad panel and people can call it what they want, or not call it anything, I just know, I had a defective screen, now I have a good screen. That’s all I care about!

Hey people—the problem isn't tandem OLED, the problem is (allegedly) Samsung has quality control issues. Hopefully this will all get worked out in future batch shipments.

If you don't have a problem with grain—its because you got a good panel—and not that everybody else is making up the issue and exaggerating.

 

[G5isAlive]

I don’t really care what people do or think but I know I had a problem, side by side, one was fine, one was completely different. Now I have a new one and the problem isn’t there apart from the colour temperature being off. Whether it was an isolated incident or not, not for me to say. What I don’t understand is other people being so sure of the fact that no one else could potentially have a problem just because they don’t. Like, psychologically what must be going on to have that kind of thought process.

I appreciate you sharing with us your direct experience with a bad unit versus a better unit, it helped me evaluate my own OLED iPad Pro to see if I should return it. Fortunately I don’t have a problem like you did with your bad unit.

I won’t speak for others, but what I find irritating are the people who don’t own one, probably never will, taking your experience to say this is a widespread quality issue, or a bad implementation of OLED, or Timmy selling cheap screens, or whatever their hater agenda du jour is. I suspect there are two issues here, yours with a bad screen, and ’Mura’ which is common to OLEDs, and some haters are conflating the two, leading some with good screens to perhaps become aggressive in saying there isn’t a problem, chill. Not making excuses for anyone.

Like any other product there are going to be some that should be returned because of a fluke defect. It remains to be seen how common your experience is that would indicate a design or manufacturing issue or if it’s a fluke defect. But we have seen plenty of Apple products where early fluke defects are reported and the sky is falling group rolls out, but months down the line we never hear about it again because it’s just not systematic. Mind you, we have seen the reverse where problems persisted (like those keyboards). It’s just too soon to tell which this is.

Again, thank you for sharing your direct experience.

 

[Marshall73]

Didn’t experience that on the M4 13 inch pro I received today but I am returning it as it just isn’t a big enough upgrade over my M1 Pro.

 

[PaperMag]

I appreciate you sharing with us your direct experience with a bad unit versus a better unit, it helped me evaluate my own OLED iPad Pro to see if I should return it. Fortunately I don’t have a problem like you did with your bad unit.

I won’t speak for others, but what I find irritating are the people who don’t own one, probably never will, taking your experience to say this is a widespread quality issue, or a bad implementation of OLED, or Timmy selling cheap screens, or whatever their hater agenda du jour is. I suspect there are two issues here, yours with a bad screen, and ’Mura’ which is common to OLEDs, and some haters are conflating the two, leading some with good screens to perhaps become aggressive in saying there isn’t a problem, chill. Not making excuses for anyone.

Like any other product there are going to be some that should be returned because of a fluke defect. It remains to be seen how common your experience is that would indicate a design or manufacturing issue or if it’s a fluke defect. But we have seen plenty of Apple products where early fluke defects are reported and the sky is falling group rolls out, but months down the line we never hear about it again because it’s just not systematic. Mind you, we have seen the reverse where problems persisted (like those keyboards). It’s just too soon to tell which this is.

Again, thank you for sharing your direct experience.

Yesterday I told you it was a panel lottery (manufacturing issue) and you didn't believe me. I'm glad you came around. Welcome. We have punch and cookies at the table. Restroom is down the hall, two doors down.

 

[G5isAlive]

Yesterday I told you it was a panel lottery (manufacturing issue) and you didn't believe me. I'm glad you came around. Welcome. We have punch and cookies at the table. Restroom is down the hall, two doors down.

Did you read my whole post? Because I mentioned two groups of people talking about the problem, those who owned one and had a bad unit, and others speculating based one what they read. Remind me which OLED do you own? How many devices have you personally seen with this (Pictures don’t count)? You were claiming it was a wide spread problem, I still don’t believe you . I DO believe owners that have problems, but calling it a lottery and suggesting it’s an Apple product to corrrect (other than replace bad units?). Sorry, jury is still out. I am about numbers not sky is falling down paranoia. Can I still have a cookie?

 

[InformationLandmine]

I worry that my use case is just a recipe for disaster with this screen unfortunately. A lot of my iPad time is spent reading in bed with brightness at minimum PLUS the "reduce white point" setting at 90%, making the screen about as dim as possible. I've been really looking forward to this release but if that will make the picture grainy it will drive me nuts.

 

[jmgregory1]

Didn’t experience that on the M4 13 inch pro I received today but I am returning it as it just isn’t a big enough upgrade over my M1 Pro.

Can I ask, what were you expecting the difference to be? I’m an M1 12.9” iPP user upgrading to the M4 13” (1TB matte screen) and I don’t expect the OLED screen to be much different than the mini-LED screen. I do expect to get better battery life, as well as it being lighter (paired with the MK) and the nano-textured matte screen will also be a great upgrade. Of course the M1 iPP has been and continues to be a fantastic device - one of the best Apple products I’ve owned over the past 30+ years, so the tweaks Apple has made with the M4 iPP should just make it that much better, imho.

 

[PaperMag]

Did you read my whole post? Because I mentioned two groups of people talking about the problem, those who owned one and had a bad unit, and others speculating based one what they read. Remind me which OLED do you own? How many devices have you personally seen with this (Pictures don’t count)? You were claiming it was a wide spread problem, I still don’t believe you . I DO believe owners that have problems, but calling it a lottery and suggesting it’s an Apple product to corrrect (other than replace bad units?). Sorry, jury is still out. I am about numbers not sky is falling down paranoia. Can I still have a cookie?

False. This is what I told you:

"Or maybe its a panel lottery where you're not one of the unlucky ones that got a grainy screen visible in normal conditions. Also, some people need to pixel-peep for their job (eg. photography) so telling them you personally don't care isn't helpful. If someone can't differentiate between a photo having noise, and it being inherent OLED grain, thats no bueno."​

​

and your response was:

​

"Or maybe its a non issue for normal work conditions, you say normal conditions but no one has described a normal condition in 'seeing' this, they all talk about dark rooms, a specific brightness setting, etc.... its not apparent this is a panel issue at all."​

So yeah...enjoy the cookies.

 

[Dexterama]

I posted in another thread, but I have the grainy screen as well on my M4 11” iPad Pro. I noticed it before I saw threads about this issue. I came on here to see if other members are seeing the same things, and it appears i’m not alone. I wanted to know whether it’s a defect with some units or if grainy screen is normal for OLED panels of this size or larger. I hope this is not normal because my 14” MBP with miniLED doesn’t have a grainy screen at the same viewing distance or any distance. I can only speak for my unit, and I understand the issue other members experienced. I will return my unit, but will wait awhile to repurchase because this is an excellent device other than the grainy screen.

 

[Naraxus]

More like a made-up chum-in-the-water controversy to get people going non-linear.

Please explain how it's "made up" when people are clearly experiencing an issue with their new iPads.

 

[Exoid]

Mini led is better that’s why Sony dropped oled from its flagship tvs this year

*MicroLED

 

[bushman4]

Apple looked at these displays for months
Not one but thousands of Apple associates
Is it possible they didn’t spot the graininess??? Hard to believe
I was in 2 different Apple stores this week looking at the M4 13”. iPad Pro. I didn’t notice any graininess
Going to go back to Apple next week and do some different Apps and pictures. And see what happens

 

[Blowback]

All OLED displays exhibit this. The brightness of each subpixel is different at low voltages. If you've got an OLED device from any manufacturer, turn it to low brightness in a dark room and look at a 25% grey solid image, you'll see it if your eyes are good enough.

My eyes are no longer good enough AND I keep my screens very bright. Good to know as I'm planning on getting the 11 inch iPadPro very soon. Will 'look' for it but probably just deal with it....based on comments here .

 

[Rainshadow]

Yes, focus on my slight hyperbole, which was tangential to the main point.

The main point was it wasn’t worth it. I get that. It doesn’t have a ton of utility for many people.

But this particular issue is very niche that seems nearly never visible even IF you have the issue. To claim a device is rendered not worth it for that reason specifically, to me, is the hyperbole.

The level of criticism that these devices get when I pick up some other tablets is truly amazing.

…But criticism is what pushes us all to be better.

 

[Blowback]

A couple hundred bucks? You can’t get anything of value for a couple hundred bucks anymore.

This is a not-widely reported issue that’s visible under fun screens and flat grays. Give me a break.

If you paid $200 for other tablets, you get far more issues to live with that a specific set of grain causing conditions.

Why...you can't even get the Magic Keypad for a couple of hundred bucks.....😂

 

[Blowback]

Ladies and Gentlemen....

The world is round.
The Sky is blue.

And for every new apple product..... we have a 'gate'.

Some things never change.

😂

 

[Blowback]

Thanks for pointing this out.

So it's a lottery with the new Pro's display, just like panel lottery on many OLED televisions.

My experience with LG OLEDs is that the higher-end models (such as the G-series) have less of a lottery, because LG uses more stringent quality control for their more expensive models. My understanding is that the panels are also graded by their quality at the factory.

It's good to know there are 11" iPad Pros without the grain issue. When I get my new Pro, I'll exchange it if it has this issue.

But it only appears at about 40% brightness? If so...not a problem for me as I keep the screen very bright.

 

[Blowback]

View attachment 2379360

This is a visual representation of what mine looked liked in real life, of course exaggerated.

New one is not like that at all, looks like the right

Did you mostly see it at low brightness and in Dark Mode? How did it look in 'Normal' mode?

 

[Blowback]

I have the 11 inch 2024 iPad Pro. You notice graininess if you really crank up the screen in a dark environment but that’s an abnormal thing to do so outside of that and just using auto-brightness I do not feel this is a problem. Though I will say if I bring my eyes close to the screen there is some graininess. But holding it at a regular distance it’s not noticeable.

So....it's an issue at HIGH brightness? Some of the other comments seem to say it's apparent at LOW brightness. Which is it? Also: is it a DARK MODE phenomena or also 'Normal' mode?

 

[G5isAlive]

and your response was:

If you’re going to quote me don’t forget

I won’t speak for others, but what I find irritating are the people who don’t own one, probably never will, taking your experience to say this is a widespread quality issue, or a bad implementation of OLED, or Timmy selling cheap screens, or whatever their hater agenda du jour is. I suspect there are two issues here, yours with a bad screen, and ’Mura’ which is common to OLEDs, and some haters are conflating the two, leading some with good screens to perhaps become aggressive in saying there isn’t a problem, chill. Not making excuses for anyone.

Guess which category I think you’re in? You never did answer my question on which OLED iPad Pro you’re in or how many bad screens you’ve personally seen.

I don’t have the data to say if those with legit bad screens are flukes or a sign of bad design/manufacturing issues. Nobody does. Time will tell. Until then I will keep encouraging people to evaluate the screens they own and return as they see fit (pun intended) and ignore the alarmists who haven’t seen a bad screen but like to say the sky is falling down.

You can keep the koolaid, smells off.

 

[bassexpander]

Reddit is packed with "Grain" complaints about the Samsung Galaxy S24 phones.

 

[PaperMag]

If you’re going to quote me don’t forget

"I won’t speak for others, but what I find irritating are the people who don’t own one, probably never will, taking your experience to say this is a widespread quality issue, or a bad implementation of OLED, or Timmy selling cheap screens, or whatever their hater agenda du jour is. I suspect there are two issues here, yours with a bad screen, and ’Mura’ which is common to OLEDs, and some haters are conflating the two, leading some with good screens to perhaps become aggressive in saying there isn’t a problem, chill. Not making excuses for anyone."

You said that Today at 3:48 PM, hopping on the bandwagon now that you look bad. But yesterday you had the opposite attitude and said this to me:

"its clear you don’t understand. you have a fear that it’s a manufacturing issue, that even if true has zero practical implication, but it’s just as likely it’s a limitation of the technology that is highly subjective and only evident under a very contrived situation. For some reason you feel the need to turn this into a crusade when at this point it’s all speculation."​

So yesterday you had the wrong attitude. I said it was a manufacturing issue, a panel lottery, and you told me I don't understand. You owe me an apology. I'm waiting...

 

[G5isAlive]

You said that Today at 3:48 PM, hopping on the bandwagon now that you look bad. But yesterday you had the opposite attitude and said this to me:

"its clear you don’t understand. you have a fear that it’s a manufacturing issue, that even if true has zero practical implication, but it’s just as likely it’s a limitation of the technology that is highly subjective and only evident under a very contrived situation. For some reason you feel the need to turn this into a crusade when at this point it’s all speculation."​

So yesterday you had the wrong attitude. I said it was a manufacturing issue, a panel lottery, and you told me I don't understand. You owe me an apology. I'm waiting...

I’ll give you an apology when you tell me which oled iPad Pro you personally own and returned for a bad screen, until then I stand by what I said then and now. Cheers.