I think you may have received a defective macbook actually.. Those symptoms sound like something isn't as it should be, if you're actually seeing artifacts and banding I'd take it in to an Apple store. Maybe check that there isn't any kind of super magnet lying around near where you use your MB too.. Your house doesn't happen to be near the Swan Station does it?
Magnets need to be incredibly strong to screw up an LCD display, it might even be unhealthy to sit near that strong of a magnet. It's not like a CRT where a refrigerator magnet can distort it. Even if it was, banding is a symptom of too low of a color depth. I'd double check the color depth setting in Display Preferences.
So if all fast food joints sold you a beverage that they called "coffee," resembled the taste of coffee, but was actually concentrated monkey urine, you'd be okay with that?
...After all, only a bean connoisseur would actually know the difference...
I'm sorry, but there's no excuse for indutry-wide lying. Just because everyone does it, doesn't make it right.
-Clive
The displays are showing millions of colours though. There is no lying.
Coffee comes from coffee beans, it's a stupid example. It's more like being sold kenyan coffee, when in fact it is ethiopian. It's still coffee, it's from the same general area, and the difference is from the species, soil, water. 8-bit native panels with slow response times versus 6-bit with fast response times (that allow temporal dithering that emulates 8-bits to the point that most people can't tell the difference).
So, pray tell, if we assume that I'm buying a new Apple laptop, how do I find out which panel it will use for its LCD?
If it's a laptop, it has a 6-bit display. I don't think any laptop uses 8-bit displays. Did you ever wonder why Apple's Studio Displays cost 3 times as much those you find at Best Buy? It's because they're using true 8-bit displays.
Black is still black, white is white, there are 62 greys in-between. Is there any need in their work to show all 256 levels of grey (even ignoring temporal dithering) exactly? There isn't. Because it's irrelevant to the overall image they're working on.
Well, yes there is. Any gradient from black to white will show banding. 62 is not enough greys. However, for the most part temporal dithering takes care of it for all but the most demanding proofing tasks.
It's a naming scheme (scam), but it's legit. At least they print on HDD boxes that 1GB = 1000MB.
Pardon? Those two pricks are, technically, correct. While the human eye interprets the display as showing millions of colors, the display isn't actually capable of showing millions of descrete colors. This causes a problem when a photograph on screen is printed in CMYK color.
How would you like it if you had wedding pictures taken by these two "pricks," they looked great on screen, but when printed, the colors were all out of whack?
Thank you. I applaud anyone who has the guts to stand up against Apple on such a web forum. Prepare to be chastized.
Some people just don't understand that Apple isn't "the Way the Truth and the Light" for every single product it produces and service it offers. Yet there are so many blind followers...
-Clive
And as I am sure you know, the accuracy from computer screen to paper is not just CMYK conversion ... can any computer display take in to account GCR, UCR, Dot Gain, paper discoloration, humidity ink spread, poor inks ... need I go on? I am sure anyone who relies on a computer screen for printed output is delusional. I owned a company that specialized in press to computer profiling. It is far from simple and good luck to anyone expecting a perfect match be it on a MacBook Pro or a calibrated monitor on a high end Scitex Scanner.
The displays are showing millions of colours though. There is no lying.
No, it's showing less than millions of colors and tricking the human eye into perceiving more. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditheri...age_processing ... First sentence: "Dithering is a technique used in computer graphics to create the illusion of color depth"
The display is not actually producing millions of discrete colors, it's producing less than that and dithering.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hattig
Coffee comes from coffee beans, it's a stupid example. It's more like being sold kenyan coffee, when in fact it is ethiopian. It's still coffee, it's from the same general area, and the difference is from the species, soil, water.
I hate people who pick apart analogies for technical flaws. IT'S AN ANOLOGY. IT'S TO MAKE A POINT, WITH A SIMPLIFIED HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION.
What a headache.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Hattig
8-bit native panels with slow response times versus 6-bit with fast response times (that allow temporal dithering that emulates 8-bits to the point that most people can't tell the difference).
So you agree that the MBP panels are NOT actually producing millions of colors? What are we fighing about then? Apple's documentation says nothing about temporal dithering, it says the display produces millions of colors, which is a lie, K.O. End of Match.
So the focus on whether this claim was legit or just a money grab seems to have stalled on the FIRST part of the case. The millions of colours part. What about the 'offering views "simply unavailable on other portables."'. Anyone care to take a stab at that one? Seems like that one is a little harder to excuse. If I was under the impression (as, say, a professional photographer) that the apple displays were better than on other portables and then paid a premium for that quality, I would also be pretty annoyed to discover they are the SAME as other displays. Anyway, what do I know...
Well, yes there is. Any gradient from black to white will show banding. 62 is not enough greys. However, for the most part temporal dithering takes care of it for all but the most demanding proofing tasks.
So what if there is banding on screen, when you view it on the expensive monitor back in the office it won't be there, and if it is printed it won't be a problem because you would have calibrated the display anyway, so that grey on screen is that grey on paper. For photographs you're not worrying about differences of 1/256th in levels, you're worrying about the overall photo or portions of a photo, and you can do that on a 6-bit panel with temporal dithering. Maybe Photoshop needs an "exaggerate levels" editing mode, because clearly some people would need that even on an infinite colour resolution monitor.
And Apple's calibration technology is very mature, so that would be an identifiable advantage of the Mac's otherwise identical 6-bit laptop panel over the same panel in a Windows system.
Sure, we'd all like 10-bit panels with >100% NTSC gamut, but back in the real world ...
I just can't see where Apple lied, although I can see that they could have been more open up front about what they meant. Millions of colours? Yes. Better than other computers - arguably with calibration ...
Nope. Beg to differ. I love Apple, and have bought almost every model since my 1984 Plus, but they know better than to say "millions" when they mean "thousands."
"Millions of colors" as traditionally used by Apple means, and has always meant, "the ability to display millions of colors simultaneously." Not every device does that, some display less. Since 1984, we have progressed from black and white (1 bit) machines to 256 color/gray (8 bit) machines to machines capable of displaying thousands (16 bit) of (simultaneous) colors. This laptop apparently still does. Then we stepped up to millions of (simultaneous) colors - (32bit). This laptop apparently did not, but someone at Apple wished it to appear to.
So Apple bent a definition. Some one called them on the lie. Perhaps this seems a frivolous lawsuit. Still, I wonder who will keep them honest on specifications. What mechanism besides lawsuits would stop them from other deceptive claims?
Would it be any different if this were about deceptive RAM claims? What if the spec for RAM included not only the actual hardware RAM, but also the"virtual" hard drive RAM as well? Would that be okay? Would it be reasonable to claim, say 6 gig of RAM on a machine with only 4 gig of physical RAM?
Or are specifications FACTS?
IMHO, specifications should be factual. To hedge on specs is deceptive. And unfortunately, a lawsuit like this is the only way to reign in overzealous (non-factual) specifications.
Dollars are something everyone understands. No color theory there. What if Apple submitted a written offer of 4 million for your fancy house, but on closing day only paid you 4 thousand? Would that be okay? Would you say, "Well, that's all I really need, anyway? Thousands, millions, whatever." Most would probably insist on a literal definition of "millions."
Video display systems differ in other ways... speed, resolution, and number of colors they can display simultaneously. The lawsuit is not about whether the human eye can be tricked by dithering, it is about whether the human consumer should be tricked by false claims.
IMHO, specifications should be factual. To hedge on specs is deceptive. And unfortunately, a lawsuit like this is the only way to reign in overzealous (non-factual) specifications.
These two are just on a money grab. Every PC manufacturer advertises "millions of colour". Apple only did what is industry standard for displays.
It is really sad when a legal system allows for these kinds of frivolous suits to even be considered. The term Caveat Emptor seems to have no meaning to some people.
If I made a living needing millions of colors for my whatever I would hardly call this lawsuit frivolous.
Every PC manufacturer? Is there a link where Dell etc advertises products as having "millions of colors"? I thought that was an Apple slogan primarily. You see it under every product heading, clear as day. I just can't find this on PC's websites. Thank you.
No, it's showing less than millions of colors and tricking the human eye into perceiving more. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditheri...age_processing ... First sentence: "Dithering is a technique used in computer graphics to create the illusion of color depth"
The display is not actually producing millions of discrete colors, it's producing less than that and dithering.
A 6-bit TN panel can show a total of 190 colours.
One hundred and ninety. Black, and 63 reds, 63 greens, 63 blues.
Via the use of spatial placement of these colours, they can show 260,000 colours.
Via the use of temporal alterations of these colours, they can show 16.2 million colours in a way that the human eye cannot detect. However some screens clearly have issues that make the dithering (either spatial or temporal) noticeable.
[quote]
I hate people who pick apart analogies for technical flaws. IT'S AN ANOLOGY. IT'S TO MAKE A POINT, WITH A SIMPLIFIED HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION.
What a headache.
[quote]
It was a really really awful analogy. It didn't even use a car, it compared COFFEE with MONKEY URINE SOLD AS COFFEE. WTF! It was retarded.
Quote:
So you agree that the MBP panels are NOT actually producing millions of colors? What are we fighing about then? Apple's documentation says nothing about temporal dithering, it says the display produces millions of colors, which is a lie, K.O. End of Match.
-Clive
It's either producing 190 colours, or millions of colours, unless the panel's display controller was messing up the dithering.
What astounds me is not that Apple would pay out the go-away money, but the fact that, as reported in other accounts, 'evidence' included posts from forums such as this by the professional whiner class. Absolutely astounding, and horrible precedent.
As an aside, if dithering produces the impression of 'millions of colors', then as far as I'm concerned, it IS millions of colors. Has no one heard of Seurat? The colors are in your brain, not on the screen.
Thank you. I applaud anyone who has the guts to stand up against Apple on such a web forum. Prepare to be chastized.
Some people just don't understand that Apple isn't "the Way the Truth and the Light" for every single product it produces and service it offers. Yet there are so many blind followers...
-Clive
The funny thing is there are more people who criticize everything without knowing anything, but we must consider this right because supporting Apple is a "fan-boy" thing. Congratulatiosn really. LOL.
While I would not call this lawsuit "frivolous", I certainly hope the settlement was very small! Yes, it is industry practice to call dithered 6-bit displays as offering "millions" of colors. Some folks here suggest that Apple should be better than that and admit their displays use trickery to mimic millions of colors. And how exactly would you suggest Apple market that? How would that look to a potential buyer comparing a Dell to a Mac? Apple needs to be able to compete on a level playing field. They do that by following industry conventions for describing the capabilities of their machines. If you think that every marketing line you've ever read is 100% true, then you are a fool.
Apple never claimed it's laptop displays were 8-bit displays. Vision is all about perception. Above a certain refresh rate, human vision can not disinguish temporal changes in the color of a sub-pixel. If technology has advanced to the point of being able to take advantage of that, then it's great they do so. As long as you are able to perceive at least 1,000,000 color variations on the display (even if it's not 1.67 million as for 8-bit color), then Apple's claim of millions of colors is accurate (even if a little misleading in that poeple assume millions=8-bit ...it is marketing after all!). And as long as your system is calibrated (they are "professionals," right?), then what you see on the screen should be what you get in print...even if that means only 1,000,001 colors instead of 1,670,000 colors.
when a "class-action" suit is won, everybody gets paid. the lawyers take 33%, and the CLASS gets the rest in a relatively even split.
When a suit settles, who gets the money, the class, or the lawyers and the two dickheads who started the suit?
It actually never achieved class action status...
From Fortune...
"Well, Greaves and Gately didn’t get their jury trial. Their lawyer told the Tribune that they weren’t able to pursue the case as a class action because it was difficult to find other people who bought Macs solely based on the “millions of colors” claim."
In other words they couldn't identify enough other buyers who were as stupid as they were.
One hundred and ninety. Black, and 63 reds, 63 greens, 63 blues.
Via the use of spatial placement of these colours, they can show 260,000 colours.
Via the use of temporal alterations of these colours, they can show 16.2 million colours in a way that the human eye cannot detect.
That's a very interesting way to look at it. From a purely technical point, which seems to be the argument here, any display can only show brightness variations of three different colors (or "colours" ). No display element can actually show yellow, and yet that is counted amoungst the colors in an 8-bit, millions of colors, display.
So why should the use of temporal placement of a limited set colors to simulate other colors be considered "trickery" when the spacial placement of the same limited set of colors is not trickery???? In either case, the eye is perceiving something that is not actually there.
Comments
I think you may have received a defective macbook actually.. Those symptoms sound like something isn't as it should be, if you're actually seeing artifacts and banding I'd take it in to an Apple store. Maybe check that there isn't any kind of super magnet lying around near where you use your MB too.. Your house doesn't happen to be near the Swan Station does it?
Magnets need to be incredibly strong to screw up an LCD display, it might even be unhealthy to sit near that strong of a magnet. It's not like a CRT where a refrigerator magnet can distort it. Even if it was, banding is a symptom of too low of a color depth. I'd double check the color depth setting in Display Preferences.
So if all fast food joints sold you a beverage that they called "coffee," resembled the taste of coffee, but was actually concentrated monkey urine, you'd be okay with that?
...After all, only a bean connoisseur would actually know the difference...
I'm sorry, but there's no excuse for indutry-wide lying. Just because everyone does it, doesn't make it right.
-Clive
The displays are showing millions of colours though. There is no lying.
Coffee comes from coffee beans, it's a stupid example. It's more like being sold kenyan coffee, when in fact it is ethiopian. It's still coffee, it's from the same general area, and the difference is from the species, soil, water. 8-bit native panels with slow response times versus 6-bit with fast response times (that allow temporal dithering that emulates 8-bits to the point that most people can't tell the difference).
So, pray tell, if we assume that I'm buying a new Apple laptop, how do I find out which panel it will use for its LCD?
If it's a laptop, it has a 6-bit display. I don't think any laptop uses 8-bit displays. Did you ever wonder why Apple's Studio Displays cost 3 times as much those you find at Best Buy? It's because they're using true 8-bit displays.
Black is still black, white is white, there are 62 greys in-between. Is there any need in their work to show all 256 levels of grey (even ignoring temporal dithering) exactly? There isn't. Because it's irrelevant to the overall image they're working on.
Well, yes there is. Any gradient from black to white will show banding. 62 is not enough greys. However, for the most part temporal dithering takes care of it for all but the most demanding proofing tasks.
Maybe check that there isn't any kind of super magnet lying around near where you use your MB too.
Sometimes when i get home, i forget to take the super magnet out of my pocket. lmao!
fARG
1GB = 1000MB.
1GiB = 1024 MiB; 1MiB = 1024KiB; 1KiB = 1024 Bytes
It's a naming scheme (scam), but it's legit. At least they print on HDD boxes that 1GB = 1000MB.
Pardon? Those two pricks are, technically, correct. While the human eye interprets the display as showing millions of colors, the display isn't actually capable of showing millions of descrete colors. This causes a problem when a photograph on screen is printed in CMYK color.
How would you like it if you had wedding pictures taken by these two "pricks," they looked great on screen, but when printed, the colors were all out of whack?
Thank you. I applaud anyone who has the guts to stand up against Apple on such a web forum. Prepare to be chastized.
Some people just don't understand that Apple isn't "the Way the Truth and the Light" for every single product it produces and service it offers. Yet there are so many blind followers...
-Clive
And as I am sure you know, the accuracy from computer screen to paper is not just CMYK conversion ... can any computer display take in to account GCR, UCR, Dot Gain, paper discoloration, humidity ink spread, poor inks ... need I go on? I am sure anyone who relies on a computer screen for printed output is delusional. I owned a company that specialized in press to computer profiling. It is far from simple and good luck to anyone expecting a perfect match be it on a MacBook Pro or a calibrated monitor on a high end Scitex Scanner.
The displays are showing millions of colours though. There is no lying.
No, it's showing less than millions of colors and tricking the human eye into perceiving more. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditheri...age_processing ... First sentence: "Dithering is a technique used in computer graphics to create the illusion of color depth"
The display is not actually producing millions of discrete colors, it's producing less than that and dithering.
Coffee comes from coffee beans, it's a stupid example. It's more like being sold kenyan coffee, when in fact it is ethiopian. It's still coffee, it's from the same general area, and the difference is from the species, soil, water.
I hate people who pick apart analogies for technical flaws. IT'S AN ANOLOGY. IT'S TO MAKE A POINT, WITH A SIMPLIFIED HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION.
What a headache.
8-bit native panels with slow response times versus 6-bit with fast response times (that allow temporal dithering that emulates 8-bits to the point that most people can't tell the difference).
So you agree that the MBP panels are NOT actually producing millions of colors? What are we fighing about then? Apple's documentation says nothing about temporal dithering, it says the display produces millions of colors, which is a lie, K.O. End of Match.
-Clive
Well, yes there is. Any gradient from black to white will show banding. 62 is not enough greys. However, for the most part temporal dithering takes care of it for all but the most demanding proofing tasks.
So what if there is banding on screen, when you view it on the expensive monitor back in the office it won't be there, and if it is printed it won't be a problem because you would have calibrated the display anyway, so that grey on screen is that grey on paper. For photographs you're not worrying about differences of 1/256th in levels, you're worrying about the overall photo or portions of a photo, and you can do that on a 6-bit panel with temporal dithering. Maybe Photoshop needs an "exaggerate levels" editing mode, because clearly some people would need that even on an infinite colour resolution monitor.
And Apple's calibration technology is very mature, so that would be an identifiable advantage of the Mac's otherwise identical 6-bit laptop panel over the same panel in a Windows system.
Sure, we'd all like 10-bit panels with >100% NTSC gamut, but back in the real world ...
I just can't see where Apple lied, although I can see that they could have been more open up front about what they meant. Millions of colours? Yes. Better than other computers - arguably with calibration ...
"Millions of colors" as traditionally used by Apple means, and has always meant, "the ability to display millions of colors simultaneously." Not every device does that, some display less. Since 1984, we have progressed from black and white (1 bit) machines to 256 color/gray (8 bit) machines to machines capable of displaying thousands (16 bit) of (simultaneous) colors. This laptop apparently still does. Then we stepped up to millions of (simultaneous) colors - (32bit). This laptop apparently did not, but someone at Apple wished it to appear to.
So Apple bent a definition. Some one called them on the lie. Perhaps this seems a frivolous lawsuit. Still, I wonder who will keep them honest on specifications. What mechanism besides lawsuits would stop them from other deceptive claims?
Would it be any different if this were about deceptive RAM claims? What if the spec for RAM included not only the actual hardware RAM, but also the"virtual" hard drive RAM as well? Would that be okay? Would it be reasonable to claim, say 6 gig of RAM on a machine with only 4 gig of physical RAM?
Or are specifications FACTS?
IMHO, specifications should be factual. To hedge on specs is deceptive. And unfortunately, a lawsuit like this is the only way to reign in overzealous (non-factual) specifications.
Dollars are something everyone understands. No color theory there. What if Apple submitted a written offer of 4 million for your fancy house, but on closing day only paid you 4 thousand? Would that be okay? Would you say, "Well, that's all I really need, anyway? Thousands, millions, whatever." Most would probably insist on a literal definition of "millions."
Video display systems differ in other ways... speed, resolution, and number of colors they can display simultaneously. The lawsuit is not about whether the human eye can be tricked by dithering, it is about whether the human consumer should be tricked by false claims.
Or are specifications FACTS?
IMHO, specifications should be factual. To hedge on specs is deceptive. And unfortunately, a lawsuit like this is the only way to reign in overzealous (non-factual) specifications.
Good post.
These two are just on a money grab. Every PC manufacturer advertises "millions of colour". Apple only did what is industry standard for displays.
It is really sad when a legal system allows for these kinds of frivolous suits to even be considered. The term Caveat Emptor seems to have no meaning to some people.
If I made a living needing millions of colors for my whatever I would hardly call this lawsuit frivolous.
Every PC manufacturer? Is there a link where Dell etc advertises products as having "millions of colors"? I thought that was an Apple slogan primarily. You see it under every product heading, clear as day. I just can't find this on PC's websites. Thank you.
No, it's showing less than millions of colors and tricking the human eye into perceiving more. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ditheri...age_processing ... First sentence: "Dithering is a technique used in computer graphics to create the illusion of color depth"
The display is not actually producing millions of discrete colors, it's producing less than that and dithering.
A 6-bit TN panel can show a total of 190 colours.
One hundred and ninety. Black, and 63 reds, 63 greens, 63 blues.
Via the use of spatial placement of these colours, they can show 260,000 colours.
Via the use of temporal alterations of these colours, they can show 16.2 million colours in a way that the human eye cannot detect. However some screens clearly have issues that make the dithering (either spatial or temporal) noticeable.
[quote]
I hate people who pick apart analogies for technical flaws. IT'S AN ANOLOGY. IT'S TO MAKE A POINT, WITH A SIMPLIFIED HYPOTHETICAL SITUATION.
What a headache.
[quote]
It was a really really awful analogy. It didn't even use a car, it compared COFFEE with MONKEY URINE SOLD AS COFFEE. WTF! It was retarded.
So you agree that the MBP panels are NOT actually producing millions of colors? What are we fighing about then? Apple's documentation says nothing about temporal dithering, it says the display produces millions of colors, which is a lie, K.O. End of Match.
-Clive
It's either producing 190 colours, or millions of colours, unless the panel's display controller was messing up the dithering.
As an aside, if dithering produces the impression of 'millions of colors', then as far as I'm concerned, it IS millions of colors. Has no one heard of Seurat? The colors are in your brain, not on the screen.
Thank you. I applaud anyone who has the guts to stand up against Apple on such a web forum. Prepare to be chastized.
Some people just don't understand that Apple isn't "the Way the Truth and the Light" for every single product it produces and service it offers. Yet there are so many blind followers...
-Clive
The funny thing is there are more people who criticize everything without knowing anything, but we must consider this right because supporting Apple is a "fan-boy" thing. Congratulatiosn really. LOL.
Apple never claimed it's laptop displays were 8-bit displays. Vision is all about perception. Above a certain refresh rate, human vision can not disinguish temporal changes in the color of a sub-pixel. If technology has advanced to the point of being able to take advantage of that, then it's great they do so. As long as you are able to perceive at least 1,000,000 color variations on the display (even if it's not 1.67 million as for 8-bit color), then Apple's claim of millions of colors is accurate (even if a little misleading in that poeple assume millions=8-bit ...it is marketing after all!). And as long as your system is calibrated (they are "professionals," right?), then what you see on the screen should be what you get in print...even if that means only 1,000,001 colors instead of 1,670,000 colors.
When a suit settles, who gets the money, the class, or the lawyers and the two dickheads who started the suit?
when a "class-action" suit is won, everybody gets paid. the lawyers take 33%, and the CLASS gets the rest in a relatively even split.
When a suit settles, who gets the money, the class, or the lawyers and the two dickheads who started the suit?
It actually never achieved class action status...
From Fortune...
"Well, Greaves and Gately didn’t get their jury trial. Their lawyer told the Tribune that they weren’t able to pursue the case as a class action because it was difficult to find other people who bought Macs solely based on the “millions of colors” claim."
In other words they couldn't identify enough other buyers who were as stupid as they were.
Via the use of temporal alterations of these colours, they can show 16.2 million colours in a way that the human eye cannot detect.
16.2 million is a BS number, it's a marketing number that's chosen to be less than that of the ~16.8 million that an 8 bit panel can show.
A 6-bit TN panel can show a total of 190 colours.
One hundred and ninety. Black, and 63 reds, 63 greens, 63 blues.
Via the use of spatial placement of these colours, they can show 260,000 colours.
Via the use of temporal alterations of these colours, they can show 16.2 million colours in a way that the human eye cannot detect.
That's a very interesting way to look at it. From a purely technical point, which seems to be the argument here, any display can only show brightness variations of three different colors (or "colours"
So why should the use of temporal placement of a limited set colors to simulate other colors be considered "trickery" when the spacial placement of the same limited set of colors is not trickery???? In either case, the eye is perceiving something that is not actually there.