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iamnotmad · Feb 26, 2008, 09:45 PM

Hi all, I'm looking at getting a new MBP 17" hi-res glossy, hoping against all hope they put a 24 bit display in there with the LED backlighting.

I'm the guy that had a SR MB black that I loved but could not stand the dithering display (my wife got one of the first SR MB (white) and her display was so much better, different manufacturer, but apple apparently changed to the not as good ones).

So I'm hoping maybe all or at least the 17" hi-rez (now with LED) has a 24bit display. Any chance at all?

Thanks!

mduell · Feb 27, 2008, 01:45 AM

Yes, all current Mac laptops are 6-bits per subpixel, or 18-bit.

iamnotmad · Feb 27, 2008, 08:38 AM

Thanks. Yep 18 bit is what I meant. 6x3.

oh and bummer. I'm probably getting the 17" hi-rez so the high res on "small" display should help reduce the appearance of dithering quite a bit.

Atheist · Feb 27, 2008, 08:59 AM

How can the average person even tell the difference? I'm not even sure what to look for. Is this really only an issue for people that do graphics work?

iamnotmad · Feb 27, 2008, 10:55 AM

Hey Atheist, go to the apple store and look at a MB, or an MBA. There are a couple easy ways to see the "problem".
1) open a safari window to about:blank, or make the desktop white. Then open a finder window and take a look at the drop shadow. It's pretty bad on the newer (not just latest, but shortly after the SR update) and on the MBA.

2) Make the highlight color green in preferences, and highlight the address bar in safari. Look at the green highlight from an angle and you'll easily see a checkerboard patter in the "solid" green color.

My wife has one of the first MB from the SR update (nov07) and her display is pretty good, I got a black macbook (tried 2 actually) and did not like the banding and dithering, especially when it was clear they went to a less capable panel for the same machine. The MBA has the problem also.

A higher resolution even at the same depth (18 bit) would reduce the appearance of the problem simply because the pixels are smaller. It's really a shame apple uses these 18 bit panels in all laptops, but I don't know if any laptop maker uses 24bit panels in laptops.

mduell · Feb 27, 2008, 11:55 AM

Originally Posted by Atheist

How can the average person even tell the difference? I'm not even sure what to look for. Is this really only an issue for people that do graphics work?

Take a look at this and the comments here.

Atheist · Feb 27, 2008, 12:19 PM

Thanks guys... very enlightening. I use a 24" Dell 2405FPW at home and from what I can tell it must be 24-bit based on the test images in the link mduell provided. Is this primarily a laptop LCD issue?

richwig83 · Feb 27, 2008, 12:28 PM

Isn't 18bit a 'bit' lame????

hookem2oo7 · Feb 27, 2008, 02:16 PM

my SR 2.2 MBP has a 24bit panel as far as i can tell from those test images

Jo.Li. · Feb 27, 2008, 04:49 PM

Also my 2.2 MBP.

Love Calm Quiet · Feb 27, 2008, 05:30 PM

"iamnotmad" ....

Is that you, Malvolio?

justinkim · Feb 27, 2008, 05:50 PM

My 2.33MBP appears to have a 24bit display based on those test pics, too.

iamnotmad · Feb 27, 2008, 06:17 PM

I am not malvolio "Love Calm Quiet". I don't think those test pics are revealing whether you have 18 or 24 bit panels.

pat++ · Feb 27, 2008, 06:20 PM

Same here. MacBook Pro 2.2ghz with LED display. From the test image, it's using 24 bit panel...

kikkoman · Feb 28, 2008, 07:35 AM

My white MacBook 2.4 GHz shows a smooth 24 bit image, no bands.

mduell · Feb 28, 2008, 02:56 PM

Originally Posted by Atheist

Thanks guys... very enlightening. I use a 24" Dell 2405FPW at home and from what I can tell it must be 24-bit based on the test images in the link mduell provided. Is this primarily a laptop LCD issue?

Yes, desktop LCDs are 24-bit aside from the really low end.

Originally Posted by hookem2oo7

my SR 2.2 MBP has a 24bit panel as far as i can tell from those test images

Originally Posted by Jo.Li.

Also my 2.2 MBP.

Originally Posted by justinkim

My 2.33MBP appears to have a 24bit display based on those test pics, too.

Originally Posted by pat++

Same here. MacBook Pro 2.2ghz with LED display. From the test image, it's using 24 bit panel...

Originally Posted by kikkoman

My white MacBook 2.4 GHz shows a smooth 24 bit image, no bands.

*grumble* Shows the power of positive thinking and/or dithering. Maybe it's just a bad test.

iamnotmad · Feb 28, 2008, 02:59 PM

mduell, yes, I think the test is bad, since we know that these are all 18bit displays.

Simon · Feb 28, 2008, 04:21 PM

Yep, the test sucks. My 2.4 GHz MBP easily passes the 24bit test.

silver · Feb 28, 2008, 05:07 PM

Flawed test as my MBP 17" CD looks good looking at the 24bit image.

My MBP came with a Samsung, the specs here. On the Samsung spec page the LCD is listed as capable of 262K colors, which is way less than Apples million plus colors.

For those that still believe your LCD is actually displaying the 24bit image correctly can check to see what model LCD you have then just google for the specs, I used PCwizard in XP and found that I have a LTN170P2, which is a Samsung with the specs in the above link.

So what to do now, I love how OS X does it's magic to make it seem like where getting the million+ colors but dislike how the LCD looks in XP as you can see some dithering and banding in quite a few images that look really good in OS X.

Oh well maybe LCD manufactures will produce better screens and hopefully Apple will use them.

Cheers

P · Feb 28, 2008, 06:43 PM

Note that recent GPUs from ATi (from the 2x00 series on) and nVidia (from the 7x00 series) dither across both time and space, which makes it quite hard to detect an 18-bit panel - and correspondingly, it matters less. Intel's GMA 950 does not dither across time, and it seems that the X3100 doesn't either - at least Intel doesn't mention it in their spec sheets.

(Dithering across space, or spatial dithering, means that to show a color that the panel can't display, you show the two closest colors in a checkerboard pattern in that area. Dithering over time, temporal dithering, means that the graphics card tells each pixel to flip back and forth between the two closest colors. The hope is that the pixel will be stuck between two endpoints, showing a color inbetween the two stable states.)

alex_kac · Mar 2, 2008, 05:47 PM

Originally Posted by P

Note that recent GPUs from ATi (from the 2x00 series on) and nVidia (from the 7x00 series) dither across both time and space, which makes it quite hard to detect an 18-bit panel - and correspondingly, it matters less. Intel's GMA 950 does not dither across time, and it seems that the X3100 doesn't either - at least Intel doesn't mention it in their spec sheets.

(Dithering across space, or spatial dithering, means that to show a color that the panel can't display, you show the two closest colors in a checkerboard pattern in that area. Dithering over time, temporal dithering, means that the graphics card tells each pixel to flip back and forth between the two closest colors. The hope is that the pixel will be stuck between two endpoints, showing a color inbetween the two stable states.)

That could very easily explain the difference between MBP and MB displays then. On my MBP 17 glossy-HD every pic and thing I've tested has been awesome.