[BigCanoe]

I was about to order a refurbished MBP today till I ran across all the screen complaints. Are the screen issues pretty wide spread? Any better luck with glossy than matte?

[HarriganC]

Although I see areas at the edeges of the screen with illumination differences, I have seen this in all apple notebooks I have owned (which is many), I find my colors to be rich and true and no grain in my 15" c2d glossy.

CH

[TailsToo]

Some people are very picky about their screen - I see nothing wrong with my 15" MBP C2D screen. Does it show a little grain? I guess, but I have it next to my Dell 2405WFP, and I kinda see the grain in it when I look close.

Best thing to do it stop in a store and look for yourself.

[Film Prof]

There's nothing wrong with my glossy. I find it to be an excellent middle ground between the too-glossy screens I've seen on PCs and the dullness (IMHO) of the matte screen.

[TailsToo]

Originally Posted by TailsToo 

Some people are very picky about their screen - I see nothing wrong with my 15" MBP C2D screen. Does it show a little grain? I guess, but I have it next to my Dell 2405WFP, and I kinda see the grain in it when I look close.

Best thing to do it stop in a store and look for yourself.

Oh, and I have the matte, BTW.

[atc ben]

I have the speckle/sparkle/grain on my 15" matte MBP, but ultimately, I'm happy. The grain, or whatever you want to call it, is apparent on my Sony LCD on my desktop, and my Toshiba LCD TV as well, so I don't think it's anything to worry about. It should be noted that my MBP screen is also quite a bit brighter than the 20" Sony LCD on my desktop. The bottom right of my screen was also a bit darker than the rest of it, but it seems to have either evened out, or I've gotten used to it. I've received quite a few compliments on the screen from PCers and Powerbook owners at school too.

[dahcar]

I love my matte finish. i'm a VERY picky person, yet the "grain" doesn't bother me. ever LCD i've seen has it.

[bloodline]

I'm happy with the Matte screens in both of my MBPs. No dead pixels, a good even ilumination, VERY BRIGHT and a great viewing angle!

[mrmister]

I have a matte 15" C2D, and it's great.

[BigCanoe]

Just ordered one with a glossy screen, will let you know how I like it

[wancothesane]

i think i have the first batch of mbp c2d's with the matte screen. i don't know why people are complaining about the grainy screens... i think they're just whining. the screen is great!

[Simon]

My CD 2 GHz MBP has a matte screen (when I bought it there was glossy option yet). My C2D 2.33 GHz MBP is glossy. Both screens are absolutely flawless. The glossy has more intense colors and a very nice black, but the horizontal viewing angle on the matte is better.

[mark.s]

I'm happy with my matte 15" CD screen - no dead or stuck pixels and it's really bright (I usually run it at around 20% brightness).

[ghporter]

I am ecstatic about my screen. Just remember that it's rare for someone to post on a technical help forum that they're NOT having issues. Of course you'll see more problems posted than "I'm just happy as all get out about this" posts.

And as far as I've been able to glean from the screen posts here, the complaints are very minor and limited to "it isn't perfect." I have yet to see a string of gripes about dead pixels or bad backlights. Most complaints are that a few people think the matte screen looks "fuzzy" and a few others think the colors aren't "right" with the glossy screen.

[wingdo]

I love the matte screen on my 15" MBP. Big, bright and beautiful.

[Javizun]

matte rules period.

i did not notice the grain until i saw the thread here.

my first reaction to the screen when i first purchased the laptop "HOLY **** THATS A BEATIFUL SCREEN" and to this day i think and see it the same way. I see the grain but overall-why would you not buy such a beatiful laptop because of some grain you probably would have never caught YOURSELF.

All lcd's are imperfect. No matter what you think theres no way a liquid crystal display can be 100% faulty free.

Take a look at any lcd while it may appear to be perfect in reality is not-artifacts exist on every screen. 'edge crawl' 'hanging dots' pixelation on digital screens you name it something is there.

i can care less about the grain i hardly see-dead pixels to me is a greater issue then grain. And luckily apples displays really dont have this problem.

[Blasphemy]

glossy 15" MBP C2D. Love it.

[danengel]

I recently exchanged my 15" matte MBP with horrible grain against a 17" glossy MBP. The 17" is good, there is some grain, few reflections, uneven illumination, bad color resolution. All in all it's fine for working with text.

[Alphazap]

I just recently purchased a MBP 15" Matte, and I see no grainy look on the screen, the screen in my opinion is very nice looking, nice even illumination and good viewing angle. So far very impressed with my new mac

[iREZ]

i love my mbp screen....but thats coming from somebody who used to own a 12" pb.

[Arroz]

Hi!

I'm the owner of a PowerBook G4 1.67Ghz with a "low resolution" 15'' screen.

I unpacked and installed two new MacBook Pro Core2Duo this week, with a 15'' matte screens.

I find both screens to be worst than my powerbook's in almost every way, except resolution, of course. The reasons are:

1) Totally unconsistent brighteness from one area of the screen to another. Specially, at the bottom of the screen, there's a zone with about 1 cm tall, full width, that is much brighter than the rest of the screen. That does not happen on my powerbook, or the powerbooks those macbooks will replace.

2) Very narrow view angle. If you move your head a little, specially up or down, colors on the screen will change dramatically. Some colors will invert (white going to dary gray) at about 20 degress up. That also happens on the powerbooks, but only at a much wider angle, and even so, not with as much intensity as in the MacBooks.

3) Bad color reproduction. One of the lucly new MacBook Pro owners is a web designer. He still could not calibrate the new screen to a setting of his like, a task he could easily do with his old Al 15'' powerbook (a little older than main).

If I place my powerbook right next to the new MacBook Pros, the difference in quality is quite noticable. Even with almost 2 years, main is *much* better.

Also, I have a friend who has an iMac G5 with a 17'' screen and a MacBook Pro CoreDuo 15'', and he says the MacBook screen is much worse than the iMac one. I never compared those to machines mytself, but I have compared his MacBook Pro with my Powerbook and both agreed that my powerbook screen was much better.

Even worse, I know several people with MacBook (non-pro) with their 13'' glossy screen, and I find those screens to be much better than the MacBook Pro ones, even with all the glossy downsides (reflections, mostly).

I think Apple should really improove the quality of the MacBook Pro built-in displays.

At least, for those who may ask, the screens of both MacBook Pros I unpacked this week looked exactly the same. So, at least, it's consistent.

EDIT: Just a side note... I have not noticed the grain. I suppose you'll find it only if you really look for it.

Yours

Miguel Arroz

[MrN79]

I have no complaints with my 15" MBP C2D Glossy screen. i bought the glossy after i purchased the 13" Black MB.

I opted for the glossy screen on the 15" MBP after seeing how brilliant it was on the 13" MB.

Running my 15" MPB next to my PB 15", there is a noticible difference (as would be expected), i would curious to see what it looks like next to a similiar MBP matte screen.

Overall, i'm satisifed with my screen/computer.

[PowerPc = Pwnage]

Damn reflections, piss me off, but thats me, some people can take it, like the cashier you yell at that doesn't take your coupons...and I think we all know how that ends, if you don't you need to get a life and rent Anger Managment.

[FozzieUK]

Originally Posted by mark.s 

I'm happy with my matte 15" CD screen - no dead or stuck pixels and it's really bright (I usually run it at around 20% brightness).

Well my C2D screen seems dark at 20%. I have it on 100% all of the time!

[MRTrauffer]

I'll add my vote to the "I love my 15" Matte screen" group.

[Film Prof]

I really don't get all of the complaints about reflections. Unless I turn the screen to an angle I'd never be viewing it from, anyway, there are no reflections.

Of course, I'm not sitting with a light source directly behind me, either, but I wouldn't do that with a matte screen, either.

[SierraDragon]

I bought a matte 15" CD MBP for an associate and he and his family love it, thrilled by the visual quality of DVDs played on the MBP. Mine is an (excellent) C2D matte 17".

-Allen Wicks

[fuzzball963]

15 inch glossy MBP owner here. I love the brightness and contrast on the display. Looks absolutely stunning and is very easy on the eyes if you're staring at it all day

[pete]

Originally Posted by Arroz 

Hi!

I'm the owner of a PowerBook G4 1.67Ghz with a "low resolution" 15'' screen.

I unpacked and installed two new MacBook Pro Core2Duo this week, with a 15'' matte screens.

I find both screens to be worst than my powerbook's in almost every way, except resolution, of course. The reasons are:

1) Totally unconsistent brighteness from one area of the screen to another. Specially, at the bottom of the screen, there's a zone with about 1 cm tall, full width, that is much brighter than the rest of the screen. That does not happen on my powerbook, or the powerbooks those macbooks will replace.

2) Very narrow view angle. If you move your head a little, specially up or down, colors on the screen will change dramatically. Some colors will invert (white going to dary gray) at about 20 degress up. That also happens on the powerbooks, but only at a much wider angle, and even so, not with as much intensity as in the MacBooks.

3) Bad color reproduction. One of the lucly new MacBook Pro owners is a web designer. He still could not calibrate the new screen to a setting of his like, a task he could easily do with his old Al 15'' powerbook (a little older than main).

If I place my powerbook right next to the new MacBook Pros, the difference in quality is quite noticable. Even with almost 2 years, main is *much* better.

Also, I have a friend who has an iMac G5 with a 17'' screen and a MacBook Pro CoreDuo 15'', and he says the MacBook screen is much worse than the iMac one. I never compared those to machines mytself, but I have compared his MacBook Pro with my Powerbook and both agreed that my powerbook screen was much better.

Even worse, I know several people with MacBook (non-pro) with their 13'' glossy screen, and I find those screens to be much better than the MacBook Pro ones, even with all the glossy downsides (reflections, mostly).

I think Apple should really improove the quality of the MacBook Pro built-in displays.

At least, for those who may ask, the screens of both MacBook Pros I unpacked this week looked exactly the same. So, at least, it's consistent.

EDIT: Just a side note... I have not noticed the grain. I suppose you'll find it only if you really look for it.

Yours

Miguel Arroz

Thank you. Your experience is the same as mine. While the brightness is significantly better than the previous (not high resolution) generation, everything else is worse: illumination distribution, viewing angles and color reproduction. Also, the very limited tilt of the display further exacerbates the problem since the vertical viewing angles are so incredibly limited.

I simply don't understand how anybody can say these are good screens, but maybe they are not comparing them with previous powerbook 15" screens? Brightness is only one factor, and I feel that the manufacturers of displays are now crazily obsessed with brigtness over everything else.

[NewOldbie]

I just took delivery of a C2D 15", matte screen on Friday w/ a 30" cinema display. Spent a good part of the weekend setting it up for a project to start next week.

I must say all the talk about grain on the screen over the last few weeks made me hesitate about this purphase for a little while. I made several trips to separate Apple stores to look at the screens trying to judge if the display will be a problem.

I spend way too much time (anywhere from 8 - 18 hours/day while working) in front of my computer and will not accept inferior quality for my hard earned $$. My 1 year old Quad G5 has treated me well, although the DVD drive failed two weeks ago and this week it will get replaced. I have also had to get the lcd panel on THAT 30" monitor replaced TWICE. I just bought Applecare for that system last week in case it were to die on me again.

Guess what I am trying to say is the 15" matte screen is acceptable right now, we'll have to see how it holds up over time -- my gen 1 17 AL and my original 22" cinema have both held up well. But I have noticed a decrease in quality of products, even from Apple.

[EdipisReks]

i'm perfectly happy with my glossy screen.

[Javizun]

I agree with oldbie 100% the quaility on apple products have changed dramatically.
As their market share gain,their whole focus on quaility is becoming just like every other computer company where quality holds no weight against quanity. We will soon have no hardware company we can look at and say thier top notch, unfortunetly apple is disguising their quality with design.

While i love my macbook and the grain does not bother me-i have had my 30" apple cinema display lcd changed 3 times and like oldbie my superdrive on the g5 stopped working 2 weeks after i purchased the computer. My macbook was sent in because of numerous issues i had with it then i upgraded to a revA macbook pro sent that in like 4 times because of numerous issues once again. Have not had any issues with the c2d so far but because of my past with apple products i am unfortunetly expecting it.

[ghporter]

One source of "decreased quality" is simply Apple using available, common parts rather than extremely expensive custom parts. Oldie's dead DVD drive is an example-DVD drives are as comoditied as blank DVDs-and are effectively as disposable. Apple's overall quality is still over the "industry average" with fewer customers requiring assistance (and more satisfied after they do) according to the latest (August 2006) PC Magazine customer satisfaction survey, in particular the notebook portion of the survey. So if this is "declining" quality, they must have been godlike before!

[freudling]

It all started with the dual USB iBook. Up until that point, the protable market had not been secured by Apple. The USB iBook boosted their laptop sales but the USB iBook is rather cheaply made: it had to be, it brought the cost way down and people started buying it. The only option before this point was the very pricey PowerBook line and the Clamshell iBook. Both these latter, up until the aluminum PowerBook and USB iBook were exceptionally built. From the PowerBook 5300 to the Wallstreet to the Pismo to the Clamshell which you could run over with a car and burn with a blow torch, it thwy would probably still power on.

The point, because Apple wants a larger market share, they have sacrificed quality for quantity. I remember when the logic board issue was abound on the USB iBooks. Mine failed twice. People were confused and taken back: this was supposed to be Apple. There are still PowerBook 5300s out there and they these computers are still kicking. Very, very well built. People actually took a microscope and compared these old PowerBooks circuit board with newer ones and they revealed that, on newer models, like the USB iBook, the ends were, in some places, frayed on the microcircuitry. The older PowerBook's microcircuitry were incredibly "clean."

[Arroz]

Hi!

Originally Posted by ghporter 

One source of "decreased quality" is simply Apple using available, common parts rather than extremely expensive custom parts. Oldie's dead DVD drive is an example-DVD drives are as comoditied as blank DVDs-and are effectively as disposable. Apple's overall quality is still over the "industry average" with fewer customers requiring assistance (and more satisfied after they do) according to the latest (August 2006) PC Magazine customer satisfaction survey, in particular the notebook portion of the survey. So if this is "declining" quality, they must have been godlike before!

Well, as I said before I have a powerbook 1.67 15'' "old resolution". The only thing that is original is the lower part of the lower case, and the optical drive. Everything else has been replaced. The screen and top shell, once. The board, twice. All the video cables, video inverter, etc, once. Battery, it's the fourth, between exploding ones and non-functional-in-less-than-a-year ones. The top part of the lower case (ie, the part that has the keyboard and trackpad) is going to be replaced as soon as the replacement part arrives, because the ink is coming out.

Man, I had a pismo before. The only thing that broke on it was the DVD drive and the screen because a collegue has kicked a football right to the middle of it (I worked on robotic soccer, so it's more or less normal! ). I used and abused it A LOT, I took the CPU out many times for adding memory, changing the hard drive, etc, and as the little plastic broke, I did it with a screwdriver used as a lever that made the CPU jump and land some inches away. It NEVER broke! This powerbook, I handle it with moderate care, and well.. it's everything but reliable.

Yours

Miguel Arroz

[Javizun]

spoke too soon, i noticed today that even though my macbook pro was plugged in the entire day while i was at work when i disconnected it the battery only showed 2:20 remaining on battery juice, before i use to get 3:00hrs or max 3:30 with bluetooth off and up to 4:00+ with brightness dimmed to 20%. No matter what i do it appears that my batter is not holding a charge.

Damn this sucks-BATTERY HEALTH 60% on a less then 1 month computer-thats just *******g pitiful.

[ghporter]

Javizun, have you calibrated the battery meter lately/yet? The only way it can evaluate the battery is for you to run it down now and then. I use the iStat Pro widget, and it tells me a LOT about my battery, including that the battery meter in the menu bar isn't always perfect.

AND IF THE BATTERY IS DEFECTIVE, IT'S UNDER WARRANTY AND THEY'LL REPLACE IT RIGHT AWAY. What's all the drama for?

[SierraDragon]

Originally Posted by Javizun 

spoke too soon, i noticed today that even though my macbook pro was plugged in the entire day while i was at work when i disconnected it the battery only showed 2:20 remaining on battery juice, before i use to get 3:00hrs or max 3:30 with bluetooth off and up to 4:00+ with brightness dimmed to 20%. No matter what i do it appears that my batter is not holding a charge.

Damn this sucks-BATTERY HEALTH 60% on a less then 1 month computer-thats just *******g pitiful.

So rather than whining instead (a) calibrate the battery and (b) get it fixed under warranty if it is not to spec.

-Allen Wicks