Screen brightness change

[MacBH928]

Hello
I do not know how to search for this topic on google

I got a fairly new macbook 13, the last model before the firewire.

I notice something very weird. The screen brightness changes. At first I thought I am imagining or maybe its like LCD's where color and brightness changes from one angle to the other but that is not the case...

If i come closer to the screen it takes a bit then it lowers the brightness, if I go further it does the opposite. If I adjust the screen it happens too, and I notice it happens a lot more if I am sitting in a darker room that a bright room.

I can almost swear the isight it doing some adjusting by its own calculating my distance from the screen. These are LEDs I believe.

Any one heard of such a thing? What is this? Sometimes to happens while I am reading an article without moving.

 

[NewMacbookPlz]

The screen has an ambient brightness sensor...it's right next to the iSight. As it detects less light (you putting your head near it) it dims, and vice versa.

To disable it, go to System Preferences-->Display and uncheck "Automatically adjust brightness as ambient light changes."

I shut mine off, just because my TV is bright enough bouncing off the wall behind the couch, and that would cause the sensor to react and pulse the screen brightness up and down as the TV's brightness changed.

 

[celticpride678]

This is the ambient light sensor that detects light changes and then changes the screen brightness to the appropriate level compared to the room brightness.

 

[MacBH928]

WOW
some technology, did Apple really find this to be a necessary add-on while they take out backlit keyboard and the firewire?

I knew it though I could see it happening.
Thanx for the helps guys

NewMacbookPlz
great avatar!

 

[Takuta-Nui]

Plus, it doesn't actually measure how close you are. It's because your head/body would be changing how much light reaches the sensor (top of the display, to the left of the camera). I know this because sometimes I sit at my desk with the window behind me, and when I shift position, tilting my head one way, the screen brightness sometimes changes.

Now the next step is for it to indeed sense how close you are, so you can wave your hand over the closed lid and it opens and starts/wakes up all by its own.

 

[NewMacbookPlz]

WOW
some technology, did Apple really find this to be a necessary add-on while they take out backlit keyboard and the firewire?

I knew it though I could see it happening.
Thanx for the helps guys

NewMacbookPlz
great avatar!

The ambient light sensor has been around since the days of the last powerbooks IIRC, but never on an iBook or MacBook prior to the Unibody. They also didn't "take out" the backlit keyboard, that was a new feature for the Unibody MB as well at the 2.4ghz level, never before offered for the lower end models. As for the FW removal, I think the move to put it back on the 13" MBP just proved they "messed up" with the initial removal.