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Kevin Patrick Long

macrumors newbie
Oct 1, 2020
3
2
Seattle, WA
I had a 90 day return window for my "refreshed" MBP 16 and returned it, partially because of the screen feeling weird to me. I wanted to love it. The speakers were great. The M1 macbook air is suiting me nicely and was much less expensive.
 
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ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
So is this still a thing?

Yes and no. The display doesn't have a particularly fast response time and it is definitely slower than the 2016-2019 15-inch and the 2012-2015 15-inch. However, the issue has arguably been overblown on a computer that is designed for long battery life. If you are looking for a computer with a built in screen that has a crazy fast response time, this is probably not the computer for you. That said, it is not something that has ever bothered me in real-world usage...I am much more interested in pixel density, color reproduction, and brightness...and this display absolutely excels in these areas.
 

BarrettF77

macrumors 6502a
May 24, 2015
922
1,272
I’ll be dumping my 2019 16 inch Once the new M processors are available in the graphics performance comes up to at least where we’re at right now
 

ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
I’ll be dumping my 2019 16 inch Once the new M processors are available in the graphics performance comes up to at least where we’re at right now

We're at about 5.5 teraflops now. I'm thinking the base model 16-inch is probably going to modestly beat it, and an upgraded 16-inch will absolutely obliterate it.
 

jay-A

macrumors member
Oct 6, 2020
31
26
So is this still a thing?

The thing is, this panel is in some respects quite a bit worse than the panels of the 2012-2014 macbook pros, which is definitely not the normal course of technology. The problematic aspects are mostly the viewing angles (a bit too narrow for 2020 tbh) and the dreaded response time, which is very noticeably slow, as many others have pointed out.

Looking at the 2020 breed of laptops (windows+mac) though, you'll notice that slow response times have become a standard. In other words, the industry has got lazy and is churning out stopgap products in the wait of new, disruptive technology.

This tech will come soon - mini leds on a ARM-based machine. These machines will completely supersede the current ones, so if you're dissatisfied with the current laptops the wait is not very long.

Myself I had to replace my laptop out of necessity last fall, so I took one of those 16 inch macbook pros. While the machine has quite a lot of things going for it (keyboard, sound, processing power, speed) the display is kind of making it hard for me to really appreciate the machine, and I can't help thinking that a few more months wait would have brought me a disruptive machine that by all metrics would be superior to my former 2013 15 inch, instead of being better in some aspects and worse in others.
 
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BillyHW

macrumors newbie
Dec 18, 2020
3
1
Just curious, but are there any "overdrive" settings or hacks that can be installed to improve the built-in panel's pixel response time at the expense of say colour accuracy and whatnot?
 

jay-A

macrumors member
Oct 6, 2020
31
26
Yes I found one - the built-in profile that came with my display was too light, which was detrimental to ghosting. Building a profile with a stronger gamma using the built-in apple eyeball calibration tool improved things quite a bit. A more contrasty display indeed will show significantly less ghosting streaks. Still, that's not what I would have expected from Apple, but it looks like it's a turn taken by the whole industry. Having products that regress in some respects from a generation to another is a sign that the time is ripe for a disruption.
 

kaans

macrumors regular
Nov 17, 2014
239
67
We still don't have mini-leds etc. on the ARM Macbooks, so even if you upgrade immediately, it's a slightly better slow display

I'll personally wait until a new LED technology comes into play - and I immediately sell my old devices, but I'll keep my 16" Macbook with the Intel processor to probably use it as a Windows device as I need one, and this is arguably one of the best :D

Honestly, day to day, I don't have any issues and I'm an obsessive person, so it's ignorable even with OCD - but the paranoia is real, sometimes movies/tvshows etc. have very low FPS, when they do a faster than they can afford camera shift and create jitter, you're like, damn was this just bad fps or did I just get ghosted :D
 

kaans

macrumors regular
Nov 17, 2014
239
67
Honestly just give us easily replaceable OLED panels, I'll gladly get a new panel every 2 years or so :D
 

ght56

macrumors 6502a
Aug 31, 2020
839
815
Looking at the 2020 breed of laptops (windows+mac) though, you'll notice that slow response times have become a standard. In other words, the industry has got lazy and is churning out stopgap products in the wait of new, disruptive technology.

I've observed this as well--many Windows laptops also seem to have slower response times, but I am not sure if it is necessarily related to getting lazy or even cost savings, but potentially for purposes relating to battery life. For a while now, Intel's just been adding more and more cores while they've been fighting their manufacturing challenges. They are stuffing a 45 watt processor in this thing that needs two fans to cool it, but they want it to get exceptional battery life, and I think the slower response (and slower refresh) time winds up being a sacrifice to get there. As you noted, new technologies will fix this.
 

jay-A

macrumors member
Oct 6, 2020
31
26
Yes, battery life is probably in the mix of things leading to the decision, too. Another thing where they have really cut the corners is the iGPU, which has barely enough power to drive the display (and contributes to the impression of lagginess/ghosting somehow). The dGPU is almost required to get a smooth display. All in all, this 16 inch is a nice machine without fatal flaws like those seen in the 2016-2019 machines, but I'd hardly call it an exceptional machine, as there are simply too many under-the-hood compromises that have been made, some of these indeed to maximise battery life. And the M1 platform together with mini-led displays will of course remove these compromises and yield machines as revolutionary as say, the 2012-2013 retina macbook pro.
 
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emraha06

macrumors 6502
Dec 1, 2017
285
70
These are the worst displays which a laptop can have. If you scroll a web page or document, every pixel loses their mind and a terrible blurry, smearing view happens. There is no explanation for this. These are Pro labeled expensive devices. A monitor has to view dynamic images as well. But mbp 16 can not do this correctly. It causes eye strain and headache.
But if someone wants a photo viewer or portrait viewer. This mbp 16 display is only suitable for that... and also you can assamble it to wall as a portrait.
 
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jay-A

macrumors member
Oct 6, 2020
31
26
Emraha06 thanks but we already know your opinion. The more interesting question is did you sell yours at last? and if yes, to buy what? South of OLEDs (which have their own problems like PWM flickering) all laptops have slow displays these days.
 

jay-A

macrumors member
Oct 6, 2020
31
26
then lower the price, it's gonna go at some point, it's a good machine. You can buy a M1 macbook air, the display is slowish but not as slow as the 16 inch. And it's 1/3 of the price, so you'll get some spare change.
 

kaans

macrumors regular
Nov 17, 2014
239
67
lol wtf, dreams torn, can you capture it with the iPhone slow motion camera?

what's the point of 120hz if it's going to ghost
 
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kaans

macrumors regular
Nov 17, 2014
239
67
It´s very annoying when u are scrolling twitter and u cant read anything until u stop scrolling. I will return it.

View attachment 1883653

Thank you so much, similarly I'll not order it and wait

For science, is ProMotion on, what happens if you forcefully set it to 120Hz in display settings if it wasn't?

Maybe it's a ProMotion software bug where it doesn't increase fps, but even if it is, what's the point of ProMotion if they didn't make things smooth ...
 
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ahrian

macrumors member
Oct 10, 2021
45
32
Vigo
Thank you so much, similarly I'll not order it and wait

For science, is ProMotion on, what happens if you forcefully set it to 120Hz in display settings if it wasn't?

Maybe it's a ProMotion software bug where it doesn't increase fps, but even if it is, what's the point of ProMotion if they didn't make things smooth ...
I tried at 60hz and same issue.
 
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