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Someone at Apple needs to fix their screens

S

SilentCrs

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 2, 2006
215
0
Well, actually, fix the default color profile the new MacBook Pro 15" comes with. It sucks.

Caveat: I know nothing about calibration, photography, etc. I worked in IT at both a PR and advertising firm prior to my current job and I'm glad I switched -- those folks can get whiny. :p

That said, I do appreciate a screen "looking good", especially if I drop 2 grand on the machine. I do a fair amount of programming but also a fair amount of movie watching and video games, and having reasonable colors and blacks is important to me.

That's why I have to say I was a bit surprised when I first turned on my new MacBook Pro 15" (the "highest-end" model). The screen looked incredibly washed out. I messed around with the brightness and it did nothing. It looked like the entire thing was faded.



I'm not one to fiddle around with the default settings (especially when it comes to calibration, which I know nothing about). That said, this just flat out looked wrong.

I took out my old MacBook Pro 15" (late 2006) and compared them. Sure enough, the old one wasn't nearly as washed out.



Fortunately, I found the very excellent profile posted by bcalsis here:

https://forums.macrumors.com/posts/7792331/

The result:



Much prettier. Richer blacks and not nearly as washed out. Should be perfect for movies and gaming.

Here's a final side by side (new calibrated vs. old standard profile). They look about the same:



Someone at Apple needs to take a good look at the default profile these things are shipping with the new 15" Pros. I can imagine someone seeing one of these in a store (uncalibrated) would think it looks worse than the machines sitting right next to it. The 24" iMac I own was properly calibrated out of the gate (using the default "iMac" profile). The new MacBook Pro a fine machine otherwise and deserves a little better treatment.
 
Can you check your SATA connection ? to do this, click on the apple at top left - about this mac - more info - click sata under hardware section - look at speed
 
Ricanlegend said:
Can you check your SATA connection ? to do this, click on the apple at top left - about this mac - more info - click sata under hardware section - look at speed
Click to expand...

It's 1.5. And I'm not happy.

I'm going to go into Bootcamp and see if I get the same result.
 
I'm purely guessing here, but the problem is probably that the software imaging is completely separate from what display is put on the computer. Meaning, that all computers with hardware spec. A get software image A, even though some may have LCD A and some may have LCD B. If Apple were to put a calibrated profile on the computer, it would match for one screen but not another. I suppose if it's within reach it would be ideal to have multiple profiles on the disk from the factory, and apply the proper one at first boot using some sort of script that checks the LCD ID, whether it be 9CAA or 9CAB.

With my previous MBP, when I first got it, it came decently calibrated from the factory. That is to say that it looked OK to my untrained eyes. After a screen replacement it looked awful, however, and took a good bit of calibration in order to make it look passable.
 
Bill Gates said:
I'm purely guessing here, but the problem is probably that the software imaging is completely separate from what display is put on the computer. Meaning, that all computers with hardware spec. A get software image A, even though some may have LCD A and some may have LCD B. If Apple were to put a calibrated profile on the computer, it would match for one screen but not another. I suppose if it's within reach it would be ideal to have multiple profiles on the disk from the factory, and apply the proper one at first boot using some sort of script that checks the LCD ID, whether it be 9CAA or 9CAB.

With my previous MBP, when I first got it, it came decently calibrated from the factory. That is to say that it looked OK to my untrained eyes. After a screen replacement it looked awful, however, and took a good bit of calibration in order to make it look passable.
Click to expand...

My 24" iMac actually has an "iMac" profile as the default. Why they didn't do this with with the MacBook Pros is beyond me.
 
It's called gamma.

Macs ship with gamma set to 1.8, and always have done. PCs generally use 2.2 by default, altering the contrast and making the Macs look "washed out" in comparison.
 
It's not gamma and it has nothing to do with a comparison of PCs. If you read what I wrote, I was comparing a 2006 MacBook Pro with a 2009 MacBook Pro and a 2008 iMac.
 
SilentCrs said:
It's not gamma and it has nothing to do with a comparison of PCs. If you read what I wrote, I was comparing a 2006 MacBook Pro with a 2009 MacBook Pro and a 2008 iMac.
Click to expand...

And you checked the gamma settings on those machines to make sure they weren't at 2.2?

Lots of people when calibrating also change their gamma to 2.2 without even realising it.
 
How do you change the Gamma? I have a 13"MBP with the 9C9E screen and my blue links seem purple.
 
I have a 15" MBP and a 13" MB. Both screens look great and identical when sitting side by side. Both look better than my HP notebook!
 
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