How obvious is the iMac screen problem?

[imacericg]

Got my 24” iMac yesterday and I am trying to determine if it has the infamous “iMac Screen Problem”.

I changed the background to all white, and I see a slight fading about ½ inch to the edge of the screen and their seems to be a slight brightness in the center on the vertical axis.

Is this “with in” spec? Do the people with screen problems have more obvious symptoms?

 

[trip1ex]

Well if you can't tell without doing some tests then don't worry about it. There's better things to worry about.

 

[mzd]

your screen sounds exactly like mine. def something i can live with. with current LCD technology coupled with a screen this large, i think that is about as best as can be expected. LED screens take care of all the LCD limitations, but they don't make LED screens this big yet. soon maybe. but they will be prohibitively expensive for a while.

 

[imacericg]

Thanks for the replies. I should of stated above that I have to look very hard to see what I noted above. Sounds like mine is "within specs".

Are there any pictures out there of screens with the gradiant issue? I would love to see what everyones talking about.

 

[RickT67]

I noticed my gradient issue when I brought up Apple's website and used 1/2 the screen for it.
I brought up another window with the same website, and I could tell the left window's web page wasn't as bright as the right side. When I brought it back to the mac store, I did the same demo for the genius behind the bar - and got a new iMac.
The funny thing is that I did the same test on 3 of the demo iMacs in the store and 2 had the same issue as mine, the 3rd was fine. Very happy with my iMac now

 

[ditzy]

I can't believe I'm writing this as I am probably the worlds worst cynic. However if you have to look for a problem there really isn't one. Real problems tend to just jump out at you.

 

[czachorski]

Thanks for the replies. I should of stated above that I have to look very hard to see what I noted above. Sounds like mine is "within specs".

Are there any pictures out there of screens with the gradiant issue? I would love to see what everyones talking about.

Leon has posted pictures of the bad ones he got. If it is even close to those, take it back. Do you have a digital camera with some manual controls? Leon came up with a nice way to use such a camera as a light meter. The reference posts contains my questions that were helpful to figure out how to do it (I am a digital photography amateur point-and-shooter). If you do this and get a max to min ratio less than about 1.2 to 1.3, you are within spec. Anything in the range of 2 to 2.5 like leon was seeing is an absolutely dud.

Good luck!