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My 2009 20" iMac is crooked!

C

Canadian Bacon

macrumors regular
Original poster
Nov 27, 2007
100
0
On the Baltic Sea
Hello all.

I have a 2009 Nvidia 20" iMac, and the screen sits crooked on the stand. The right side of the screen is about 3mm higher than the left side of the screen. I've even used a water level to check. At first I thought it was just an optical illusion, but it really is crooked. There appears to be no warping on the iMac's foot, or screen housing. Anybody else with this weird issue? Would you send your iMac back if it had this issue?

Thanks in advance.
 
Hellhammer said:
Where did you buy it? I'd send it back and get replacement because that doesn't sound normal
Click to expand...

HH after your experience and this, one wonders about the quality of the new line of iMacs..... I know they are made to Apple specs but I seem to be lacking the belief that the Chinese workers can assemble them correctly...:(
 
gasport said:
HH after your experience and this, one wonders about the quality of the new line of iMacs..... I know they are made to Apple specs but I seem to be lacking the belief that the Chinese workers can assemble them correctly...:(
Click to expand...

I'm also starting to suspect the quality... Stuck/dead pixels shouldn't appear because of poor assemble. Apple only wants big profit nowadays and don't care about quality. I'll replace it once more and if it still has those ****ing pixels I'll go for Hackintosh
 
I would try gently tilting the screen to the left/right first, but then I would definitely return it. I don't think I could live with such an... unsymmetrical defect.
 
djc6 said:
Where are you making these measurements? Are you sure the table surface is perfectly flat?
Click to expand...

Water level measuerment of table = absolutely flat
Water level measurement of iMac foot (placed on top of foot surface) = absolutely flat
Water level measurement of underside of iMac screen housing = crooked
Water level measurement of top side of iMac screen housing = crooked
Water level of left/right sides of iMac screen housing = crooked

The actual measurements were made from:

Table surface to underside of iMac screen housing (left and right). Right side is 3mm higher.
Table surface to top side of iMac screen housing (left and right). Right side is 3mm higher.

I shifted the iMac from the left side to the middle to the right side of the table. The table is flat (inch-thick solid oak BTW)

Tilting the iMac gently from left to right results in the solid aluminim foot gently lifting off the table surface (which would be expected).

The iMac was purchased from the Apple Online Education Store here in Germany, where I live.

And...I think I have one of those BUZZING iMacs to boot.

UPDATE: Apple Care is taking care of it and sending me a new one. Now I know how it feels to be really apprehensive about the replacement unit being better than the original.
 
Canadian Bacon said:
Water level measuerment of table = absolutely flat
Water level measurement of iMac foot (placed on top of foot surface) = absolutely flat
Water level measurement of underside of iMac screen housing = crooked
Water level measurement of top side of iMac screen housing = crooked
Water level of left/right sides of iMac screen housing = crooked

The actual measurements were made from:

Table surface to underside of iMac screen housing (left and right). Right side is 3mm higher.
Table surface to top side of iMac screen housing (left and right). Right side is 3mm higher.

I shifted the iMac from the left side to the middle to the right side of the table. The table is flat (inch-thick solid oak BTW)

Tilting the iMac gently from left to right results in the solid aluminim foot gently lifting off the table surface (which would be expected).

The iMac was purchased from the Apple Online Education Store here in Germany, where I live.

And...I think I have one of those BUZZING iMacs to boot.

UPDATE: Apple Care is taking care of it and sending me a new one. Now I know how it feels to be really apprehensive about the replacement unit being better than the original.
Click to expand...


Did you use your iphone app to level it?
 
Similar thing happened to my MacBook Pro. Base was not straight, was minor so I didn't really care but had some hardware problems so was able to get a new MacBook Pro that didn't have a crooked base.
 
So it sounds like the frame itself is crooked. It's not the picture within the frame, right?
How much is a mm? Isn't that like really small? Like the tickness of a dime?
If it's that little I bet it's within spec. I could live with say, 1/4" which is about 4 dimes worth.

Rich :cool:
 
Hellhammer said:
I'm also starting to suspect the quality... Stuck/dead pixels shouldn't appear because of poor assemble. Apple only wants big profit nowadays and don't care about quality. I'll replace it once more and if it still has those ****ing pixels I'll go for Hackintosh
Click to expand...

Stuck or dead pixels are a problem with any type of screen, and are simply part and parcel of the display technology. Whilst a perfect screen would be nice, Apple don't guarantee you'll get one, and neither do most manufacturers.
 
RichardI said:
So it sounds like the frame itself is crooked. It's not the picture within the frame, right?
How much is a mm? Isn't that like really small? Like the tickness of a dime?
If it's that little I bet it's within spec. I could live with say, 1/4" which is about 4 dimes worth.

Rich :cool:
Click to expand...

Yeah, I was thinking the frame might be crooked, too, but there's that glass bezel around the screen, and the rectangular screen itself, and I can't see any uneven gaps anywhere around it. A 3mm rise or fall sounds like nothing at all to worry about, except when it's spread out over 20 inches and staring you in the face...believe me, you notice pretty quick. On a 24" screen I imagine it could be perceivably worse.

On a side note, nice to hear from someone from my neck of the woods (Southern ON). ;)
 
iLog.Genius said:
Similar thing happened to my MacBook Pro. Base was not straight, was minor so I didn't really care but had some hardware problems so was able to get a new MacBook Pro that didn't have a crooked base.
Click to expand...

I just look at it this way: If I'm readily paying a premium for sound industrial engineering, I'd like to have one the way it was designed to be. That said, it's a quantum leap from the Powerbook 150 I bought at the U of T bookstore in 1996 that had a trackball and a monochrome screen with 4 shades of grey. :eek:

Anyhoo, hope your new MBP is working out well for you.
 
I'm also starting to suspect the quality... Stuck/dead pixels shouldn't appear because of poor assemble. Apple only wants big profit nowadays and don't care about quality. I'll replace it once more and if it still has those ****ing pixels I'll go for Hackintosh
Click to expand...

LG Philips make the screens. Moan at them, not Apple.
 
At the end of the day, you paid premium for a computer. You wouldn't expect it for something cheaper and shouldn't accept it from Apple. More-so with the recent price increases.

As for stuck pixels, I can buy a cheaper monitor and computer which will do the same job as my iMac, but I could guarantee no stuck pixels.

Just my .02 I got my 24" iMac in September and its perfect, not found any flaws with it. Beach balls happen but I think its due to the hard drive having been tuned for acoustics, oh and the droopy screen. Over the course of a day while using it or not, the screen will if flat tilt downward.
 
Canadian Bacon said:
I just look at it this way: If I'm readily paying a premium for sound industrial engineering, I'd like to have one the way it was designed to be. That said, it's a quantum leap from the Powerbook 150 I bought at the U of T bookstore in 1996 that had a trackball and a monochrome screen with 4 shades of grey. :eek:

Anyhoo, hope your new MBP is working out well for you.
Click to expand...

Nice, you attended UofT! :D Agree with you. As much as I want(ed) a perfect Apple computer, I had to pick my battles. If it was a few years back, I would push for a perfect computer but with Apple being as popular as it is, quality has definitely dropped as everything is "mass produced". More times than none, you'll find at least one problem - you just have to decide what you can tolerate most. Something like a crooked base which doesn't really affect performance was something I could tolerate - dead pixels, speaker popping not a chance.
 
Update: happy now

In the unlikely event that anyone is still following this thread, my replacement unit has arrived, and I can happily announce that I am the proud owner of a non-crooked iMac. :) BTW, Apple Care made the exchange process really easy, and phone service was super quick.
 
Canadian Bacon said:
In the unlikely event that anyone is still following this thread, my replacement unit has arrived, and I can happily announce that I am the proud owner of a non-crooked iMac. :) BTW, Apple Care made the exchange process really easy, and phone service was super quick.
Click to expand...

My 2008 iMac was crooked too, but it took me 2 weeks to get a new one :(
 
Hmmm...

peskaa said:
Stuck or dead pixels are a problem with any type of screen, and are simply part and parcel of the display technology. Whilst a perfect screen would be nice, Apple don't guarantee you'll get one, and neither do most manufacturers.
Click to expand...

In my experience stuck/dead pixels is a rarity. Sure I've seen some develop over time but to have them out of the box is very rare, so far (knock on wood)...

On edit: My MBP has about seven 'stuck' pixels in a very small grouping in the upper left of the screen. They disappear under many colour combinations. They seen to be 'grayish' and don't bother me too much. Now, if they turn red or something...

I did see a display Apple monitor at an Apple Store (a very large one, more than I could afford) that had many dead pixels and a shimmer to the image. It was actually marked down for sale. Wonder if AppleCare would have fixed it for whoever had the guts (stupidity) to buy it...
 
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