16" MacBook Pro ghosting / smearing...

[Royksöpp]

Welcome to the Macrumors Insane Asylum.

 

[Lukáš Ernst]

Im very sad about 16" display, its a amazing device, but displej is worst when my old 13" (more blurry/ghosting, worst colors, worst bright...i measure nits with sonde and ma 16" have 420-450 NITS, apple promise 500...my old 13" have 550, apple promise 500 too...)

 

[stephanc]

Im very sad about 16" display, its a amazing device, but displej is worst when my old 13" (more blurry/ghosting, worst colors, worst bright...i measure nits with sonde and ma 16" have 420-450 NITS, apple promise 500...my old 13" have 550, apple promise 500 too...)

Send it back. Those MBPs I have checked are good.

 

[Quu]

I got my BTO yesterday, build date 11-25. I had been worried about this issue, reading this forum. Mine is OK (for me), if not perfect! I'm coming from a late 2013 retina 15", which does not have ghosting to any noticeable degree. This new one is definitely blurrier when scrolling. I have been absolutely a read-while-scrolling guy, so I feared this 16" was going to suck. It is blurrier when scrolling for sure, but I don't notice the ghosting at any other times, and it snaps into clarity instantly as soon as I stop scrolling -

That is the ghosting we're talking about guy. I don't see it in videos either, but take a window and drag it around and look at the trailing edge of the window, look at text while scrolling etc - that is ghosting. That blurriness is caused by the panel keeping the image visible for 3 "frames" instead of our old monitors doing it for 1.5 to 2 frames.

 

[badsimian]

I posted this earlier and am going to post it again. That's going to occur with any camera when you take a photo like that. The camera is going to pick up blurred artifacts because the transition happens to fast for it to capture. I can do that with literally any screen and it will look the same. The level of blur is going to depend on the point at which you snapped the photo. If it was during the fastest part of the transition the blur will be more.

And I don't know why anyone cares what a screen looks like in slow motion. You don't look at your screen in slow motion and EVERY screen is going to show some blur when you watch it slowed down.

Someone posted that they see some ghosting when they quickly drag the settings screen around in dark mode? Ok, at what point are you doing that every day to a level that you are going to let it bother you?

This is very similar to the iPhone threads where someone swears up and down they have a yellowish oled screen. Return after return with pictures posted and then they finally get one with a different manufacturing date and are convinced that because it was manufactured later that its fixed. They have pictures to prove it, unfortunately the photos only show that their screen looks exactly like the 5 previous models they had before.

I agree with you, I only posted this because someone else asked for it. It was also me who said the only way I could see any proper ghosting was dragging the windows around. it is the same on most other non-gaming panels I have seen including the iMac I have access to.

I actually didn't understand why the camera still of the UFO would show anything useful, especially seeing as though surely the shutter stays open longer if not in bright light.

Personally I am very happy with my machine, screen included.

 

[Quu]

Also I concur that the issue is worse when the display is cold. In the mornings the ghosting is unbelievably bad. In the evenings after its been on a few hours in a warm room it's much more tolerable.

 

[sat24]

Also I concur that the issue is worse when the display is cold. In the mornings the ghosting is unbelievably bad. In the evenings after its been on a few hours in a warm room it's much more tolerable.

Have definitely seen this!

 

[Donnation]

Welcome to the Macrumors Insane Asylum.

Where there are "bad batches" of panels and where Apple has secretly fixed the problem in MBP's made at a later date. Forget that these are mass produced in a factory with thousands made each day with panels already purchased from a supplier. The panels have now all been changed because a "defect was found" and now anyone buying one later will be free from the haunting of ghosts in their displays.

 

[inhalexhale1]

its miniLED not micro which is not as big a step forward

...and naive to think any "new" feature is going to solve all problems and not create new headaches

 

[StONE_ROdGEr]

Given we’re now seeing A4 panels, perhaps it’s time I try again and see what I get?

 

[Quu]

Given we’re now seeing A4 panels, perhaps it’s time I try again and see what I get?

Go for it. I'm on SJA1 and its pants.

 

[StONE_ROdGEr]

I wonder if Amazon’s stock is using the newer ones. I reckon they are one of the few UK retailers that will be shifting large quantities.

 

[paddylaz]

I wonder if Amazon’s stock is using the newer ones. I reckon they are one of the few UK retailers that will be shifting large quantities.

Wouldn't a guarantee (or at least likely) way to get the newest possible stock be to order a custom 16inch of the apple site. Even if the customisation you've made is something very small, like paying that extra £90 for the 4gb 5500 gpu?

 

[sat24]

Given we’re now seeing A4 panels, perhaps it’s time I try again and see what I get?

My only concern is:

1) if I tried to EXCHANGE it, I might get local store stock (for my spec, it says I can pickup / delivered TODAY; So very very likely I will not get A4+.

2) If I instead returned it and then ordered a brand new BTO machine that's not available in stores, then the likelihood is higher. What I mean is - I have to change the spec of my machine. Because if I kept it the same spec (32GB/2TB) then it says "delivery: TODAY" . Maybe I will save some cash ($200) and go for the 2.3Ghz instead of 2.4Ghz? If I do that, it says delivery date is Dec 26.

 

[StONE_ROdGEr]

Wouldn't a guarantee (or at least likely) way to get the newest possible stock be to order a custom 16inch of the apple site. Even if the customisation you've made is something very small, like paying that extra £90 for the 4gb 5500 gpu?

It would. However, I’ve only ever wanted the base 16” and if I do want any additional GPU power then I was always planning on an eGPU addition, later.

 

[CloudsNeverDie]

I checked my panel version, it's LP160WT1-SJA2. Definitely seeing ghosting, response times are ~2x worse than my late-2013 MBP Retina 15", as per the photo comparison I posted earlier in the thread. I'll repost it here since it's been buried. This was captured using the Halide app in manual exposure mode with a fixed shutter speed much faster than the refresh rate.

 

[Nacho98]

That terminal command prompted me to install some developer tools? So I looked up my display the old fashioned way through the color profile and found:

Manufacturer: 610
Panel: A044

And as mentioned, no ghosting and no different than my 2015 15".

For real though, y'all ain't manufacturing engineers - you're out of your mind if you think Apple can release a product, find an issue, fix it, and **** out revised products in a 2-3 week span. Doesn't happen that way in manufacturing engineering because of some little things called IQs/OQs/PQs.

 

[Sanpete]

Welcome to the Macrumors Insane Asylum.

While I think some may have made more of the difference at first than there was, there are measurements from Notebook Check showing a small slowing in some response times for the 16" relative to the 2016-19 15" screens, and it's entirely plausible the screens from before that were faster.

And it's plausible that some 16" screens are worse than others.

Some are more sensitive to it than others, doesn't make them crazy.

I haven't been able to see evidence here of the more recent screen numbers correlating with better performance, but that's not a crazy theory either. Apple gets and tests these well before we do, so they could have noticed an issue and addressed it before any of us got one.

So, no need to overstate the issue, but no reason to overreact to concerns about it either.

 

[Viamusic10000]

While I think some may have made more of the difference at first than there was, there are measurements from Notebook Check showing a small slowing in some response times for the 16" relative to the 2016-19 15" screens, and it's entirely plausible the screens from before that were faster.

And it's plausible that some 16" screens are worse than others.

Some are more sensitive to it than others, doesn't make them crazy.

I haven't been able to see evidence here of the more recent screen numbers correlating with better performance, but that's not a crazy theory either. Apple gets and tests these well before we do, so they could have noticed an issue and addressed it before any of us got one.

So, no need to overstate the issue, but no reason to overreact to concerns about it either.

I haven't seen a single in store demo where the ghosting was so bad on this website to make reading scrolling text impossible. I only see it when moving a window around over a dark screen and even then its not that bad and no worse than the other Macbooks I checked right next to it.

 

[Sanpete]

I haven't seen a single in store demo where the ghosting was so bad on this website to make reading scrolling text impossible. I only see it when moving a window around over a dark screen and even then its not that bad and no worse than the other Macbooks I checked right next to it.

How many did you try that way, and what's your conclusion relative to this thread?

 

[sat24]

BTW, we have at least one instance where we are seeing same manufacturing date (2019-11-25) but different panels revisions (SJA2 vs. SJA3). And A2 owner has ghosting but A3 does not.

See:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/what-is-your-16-mbp-delivery-date.2211363/post-28068026

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/what-is-your-16-mbp-delivery-date.2211363/post-28069530

 

[sat24]

A REQUEST

Can everyone with this issue please visit the WIKI thread at https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...aring-mfg-dt-panel-rev-database-wiki.2215886/ and post your information so we can track the relationship between mfg. date, panel rev, and the ghosting issues.

Let's get Apple the data they may need to help fix this problem!

 

[Viamusic10000]

How many did you try that way, and what's your conclusion relative to this thread?

I tried two and I have no idea. The response time isnt very good and its possible its worse than older macs but it was on par with the macbooks I tried in the store. I can check it again. I can see how it could irritate someone who is sensitive to this type of stuff but I have yet to see anything approaching scrolling text being unreadable, including in the videos posted by the OP. I can't see apple fixing this issue since it doesn't seem like a defect but just something resulting from the panel choice. If apple did respond I feel like it would look like digitex's reddit post where he takes the response times of other thin and light LCD's and compares them to the macbook pro 16in.

 

[LunchMercenary]

Meh I’ve noticed ghosting while scrolling but it isn’t terrible. I actually never thought about it until I came into this thread. I’m also going to chalk it up to the fact that I’ve been using an iPad pro for the past month so I might still be used to the 120hz refresh rate.

 

[avkam]

BTW, we have at least one instance where we are seeing same manufacturing date (2019-11-25) but different panels revisions (SJA2 vs. SJA3). And A2 owner has ghosting but A3 does not.

See:
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/what-is-your-16-mbp-delivery-date.2211363/post-28068026

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/what-is-your-16-mbp-delivery-date.2211363/post-28069530

I have A2 and for my eyes there’s no real ghosting problem. UFO test is looking exactly the same with late 2012 Retina MBP. But, this is just my personal experience.