Google investigating reports of screen burn-in on Pixel 2 XL

Posted:
in General Discussion edited October 2017
Google is "actively investigating" accounts of OLED screen burn-in on its new top-end iPhone rival, the Pixel 2 XL, according to a spokerperson.

Image Credit: Alex Dobie on Twitter
Image Credit: Alex Dobie on Twitter


"We put all of our products through extensive quality testing before launch and in the manufacturing of every unit," the representative told The Verge. "We are actively investigating this report."

Some review units have begun showing faint ghosts of navigation buttons when a gray background is onscreen. Burn-in is an eventual problem with OLED panels, but it's rare for devices to begin displaying it so quickly.

The Pixel 2 XL uses a 2,880-by-1,440 pOLED display instead of the 1080p AMOLED found on the regular model, which could suggest the source of the defect. Modern pOLED, based on a plastic substrate, is extremely compact when compared with LCDs or glass-based OLED.

It's not certain how widespread the problem is, in large part because the Pixel 2 XL won't reach the public until Oct. 29. Review units are sometimes subject to defects missing in final hardware and software.

Google ran into a problem in preview hardware with the first batch of the Google Home Mini. Preview Google Home Mini hardware distributed at assorted release events had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house, which has since been pinned down to the now disabled touch-to-activate button.

Early opinions of the phone have been largely positive, despite it missing some features in comparison with the iPhone 8 Plus. The product is mostly just a 6-inch version of the standard 5-inch Pixel 2, which uses a Qualcomm 835 processor, 4 gigabytes of RAM, and 64 of 128 gigabytes of storage. Unusual sensor and software technology lets the phones achieve simulated bokeh -- as on the iPhone 8 Plus -- without a second camera lens.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 31
    Apple snatched up all the Sammy panels and Google got stuck with LG panels.  
    watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 2 of 31
    lkrupplkrupp Posts: 10,557member
    No wonder Apple delayed using OLED for so long. Let’s hope this problem doesn’t rear its ugly head in the iPhone X. And the who people screamed for “wireless” charging are now blasting the glass backs.
    dws-2anton zuykovbaconstangjbdragonwatto_cobrajony0
  • Reply 3 of 31
    dcgoodcgoo Posts: 280member
    What the heck does "Google Home Mini hardware... had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house" have to do with poor quality displays?
    supadav03cropr
  • Reply 4 of 31
    I LOVE the inky blacks produced by OLED screens. I HATE the potential for "burn-in".

    I was in Best Buy yesterday looking at an OLED TV. I almost bought it until I noticed a faint, LG logo "burned in" to the screen. :/
    king editor the gratepscooter63netroxwatto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 5 of 31
    MplsPMplsP Posts: 3,911member
    Yeah - really not good when your 1 month old display is already burned in!
    baconstangjbdragonwatto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 6 of 31
    k2kwk2kw Posts: 2,075member
    Apple snatched up all the Sammy panels and Google got stuck with LG panels.  
    The 5 inch is supposed to have a better display - a Samsung display but its supposed to be more like a 3 year old screen technically in that it has a graininess at low display intensity (not that I looked myself).   Google is going to regret doing a bad OLED screen as opposed to a nice LCD screen.  Then androidati will regret buying it and the general public will just turn of to Pixel2 XL.   There will probably be a few who will be happy with the 5 inch Pixel because they like smaller phones.

    I expect Apple will be using Samsung's best (same generation as the infinity display on the S8) but as per Apple's standards they will be individually calibrated for better quality.   It may take a little bit to ramp up production but I'm sure it will be a HUGE HIT.   Stock may fall on model 8 sales but will spring back even higher with X sales.


    edited October 2017 watto_cobra
  • Reply 7 of 31
    radarthekatradarthekat Posts: 3,842moderator
    This can’t be good for sales as even if these are just pre-release review units and even if Google figures out a fix, you’d have to think potential consumers would have cause to pause and not want to take the chance.  This phone might see its demise even faster than the Essemtial got its post-release $200 price cut.  Even faster than Samsung took to recall the Note 7.  Androidland.  What an adventure!
    edited October 2017 edredicoco3bb-15watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 8 of 31
    dws-2dws-2 Posts: 276member
    This a huge competitive advantage for Samsung. They literally make the only good OLED screens, and Apple seems to be pegging its future on OLED displays with the iPhone X. I expect this gives Samsung a lot of pricing power. Here's hoping that LG's phone-based OLED displays start to catch up fast.
  • Reply 9 of 31
    dws-2 said:
    This a huge competitive advantage for Samsung. They literally make the only good OLED screens, and Apple seems to be pegging its future on OLED displays with the iPhone X. I expect this gives Samsung a lot of pricing power. Here's hoping that LG's phone-based OLED displays start to catch up fast.
    Apple’s future is microLED, not OLED, they’ve bought a company for that. OLED (Samsung) may be just an interim solution until full Apple scale implementation of microLED. Until then LCD models may do the job, one absolutely doesn’t need an OLED iPhone just because OLED is the “future”

    http://iphone.appleinsider.com/articles/17/06/07/apple-may-use-micro-led-in-wearables-as-soon-as-2018
    edited October 2017 anton zuykovRayz2016baconstangbb-15pscooter63watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 10 of 31
    robjnrobjn Posts: 280member
    You write:
    Unusual sensor and software technology lets the phones achieve simulated bokeh —as on the iPhone 8 Plus —without a second camera lens.

    This feature is badly broken. Some of the pictures are horrible. Google should really have called this “beta”. It remains to be seen if they can really do it with just one camera.

    (actually you can get good optical bokeh in macro type shots with single lens cameras, I take these all the time with an iPhone 6 with the camera focused on a small subject, such as a butterfly, 2.5-4 inches away.)
    radarthekatpscooter63watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 11 of 31
    steven n.steven n. Posts: 1,229member
    dcgoo said:
    What the heck does "Google Home Mini hardware... had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house" have to do with poor quality displays?
    My guess it brings into question "We put all of our products through extensive quality testing before launch and in the manufacturing of every unit," from Google?
    airnerdgilly33radarthekatbaconstangbb-15pscooter63watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 12 of 31
    gatorguygatorguy Posts: 24,176member
    Apple snatched up all the Sammy panels and Google got stuck with LG panels.  
    On the Pixel 2 they used Samsung AMOLED displays. The 2 XL uses what I consider inferior-to-Samsung  LG P-OLED displays.
    radarthekat
  • Reply 13 of 31
    airnerdairnerd Posts: 693member
    dcgoo said:
    What the heck does "Google Home Mini hardware... had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house" have to do with poor quality displays?
    a trend of poor quality control?
    radarthekatbb-15watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 14 of 31
    ksecksec Posts: 1,569member
    And that is why I said Apple aren't investing into LG OLED for Mobile Phone.

    LG's P-OLED aren't likely to catch up to current Samsung's AMOLED in 2 years times, and that is assuming if Samsung's OLED tech are standing still. I have much more faith in JDI then LG on mobile OLED.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 15 of 31
    The problem is that LG is far behind Samsung in small panel OLED display manufacturing.

    Samsung panels originally had a host of problems which the company eventually became to solve. In some ways, the early Samsung panels back in 2011 were still superior to the LG ones being manufactured today. 

    The small model Pixel 2 has a Samsung display. That display is quite nice. The larger model has the much poorer LG built display. 

    The real issue concerns Apple’s planned use of LG as a high volume OLED display supplier next year. I can guarantee that LG will be nowhere near the quality of Samsung built displays in another year. It’s taken Samsung 6 years to get to this stage. No amount of money is going to enable LG to catch Samsung in only a year. It’s ridiculous to think that LG can. Google is finding it out the hard way right now. Apple is going to in 2018 if Cook continues his insane plans. 

    Cook made a critical mistake. He should have approached LG about building OLED panels for phones at least three years ago when Samsung was rapidly improving and expanding their manufacturing expertise in such panels. 

    It is now too late. Samsung is going to utterly dominate high quality small panel OLED display manufacturing. 

    With that dominance, Samsung is going to take full control of the non iOS portion of the smart device market. Apple will be forced to continue to source OLED panels primarily from Samsung. 

    Think about it. How will the market react if the flagship iPhone X2 or whatever Apple decides to name it, comes with an inferior panel to the iPhone X. Apple is tied at the hip to Samsung. There’s very little that can be done about it now 
    muthuk_vanalingam
  • Reply 16 of 31
    dcgoo said:
    What the heck does "Google Home Mini hardware... had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house" have to do with poor quality displays?
    Hardware problems. QA problems. Do you not see the connection? 
    airnerdwatto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 17 of 31
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    dcgoo said:
    What the heck does "Google Home Mini hardware... had a serious flaw that caused the device to listen in on every noise generated in a house" have to do with poor quality displays?

    because Google does not really test as they claim they do. Hardware Test engineers are a completely different beast then software test people. Google testing is giving hardware to their software engineers and telling them to test it and tell them what they think. They probably never bother to do burn in tests.
    airnerdbb-15watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 18 of 31
    Samsung phones have burn-in issues as well. OLED screens are vulnerable to burn-in but there are techniques to avoid it, at least short-term. It will be interesting to see if Apple incorporates any techniques in the iPhone X. It is obvious that Google did not.
    Rayz2016pscooter63watto_cobralolliver
  • Reply 19 of 31
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    The problem is that LG is far behind Samsung in small panel OLED display manufacturing.

    Samsung panels originally had a host of problems which the company eventually became to solve. In some ways, the early Samsung panels back in 2011 were still superior to the LG ones being manufactured today. 

    The small model Pixel 2 has a Samsung display. That display is quite nice. The larger model has the much poorer LG built display. 

    The real issue concerns Apple’s planned use of LG as a high volume OLED display supplier next year. I can guarantee that LG will be nowhere near the quality of Samsung built displays in another year. It’s taken Samsung 6 years to get to this stage. No amount of money is going to enable LG to catch Samsung in only a year. It’s ridiculous to think that LG can. Google is finding it out the hard way right now. Apple is going to in 2018 if Cook continues his insane plans. 

    Cook made a critical mistake. He should have approached LG about building OLED panels for phones at least three years ago when Samsung was rapidly improving and expanding their manufacturing expertise in such panels. 

    It is now too late. Samsung is going to utterly dominate high quality small panel OLED display manufacturing. 

    With that dominance, Samsung is going to take full control of the non iOS portion of the smart device market. Apple will be forced to continue to source OLED panels primarily from Samsung. 

    Think about it. How will the market react if the flagship iPhone X2 or whatever Apple decides to name it, comes with an inferior panel to the iPhone X. Apple is tied at the hip to Samsung. There’s very little that can be done about it now 

    You really do not understand how this works, just because Samsung has been working on this for so long does not mean LG or anyone else will not catch up quickly. Here the thing, Apple is not using an off the self Samsung display, Apple worked with Samsung to delivery Apple a display to Apple set of standards which work with Apple's video drivers and software. Apple also put in a huge capital investment into LG in the way of manufacturing equipment, Apple most likely share everything they learned about OLED so LG can make a display which meets their specs.

    LG will catch up, as they all catch up over time especially when you have Apple financing the R&D.

    edited October 2017 bb-15watto_cobra
  • Reply 20 of 31
    Rayz2016Rayz2016 Posts: 6,957member
    The problem is that LG is far behind Samsung in small panel OLED display manufacturing.

    Samsung panels originally had a host of problems which the company eventually became to solve. In some ways, the early Samsung panels back in 2011 were still superior to the LG ones being manufactured today. 

    The small model Pixel 2 has a Samsung display. That display is quite nice. The larger model has the much poorer LG built display. 

    The real issue concerns Apple’s planned use of LG as a high volume OLED display supplier next year. I can guarantee that LG will be nowhere near the quality of Samsung built displays in another year. It’s taken Samsung 6 years to get to this stage. No amount of money is going to enable LG to catch Samsung in only a year. It’s ridiculous to think that LG can. Google is finding it out the hard way right now. Apple is going to in 2018 if Cook continues his insane plans. 

    Cook made a critical mistake. He should have approached LG about building OLED panels for phones at least three years ago when Samsung was rapidly improving and expanding their manufacturing expertise in such panels. 

    It is now too late. Samsung is going to utterly dominate high quality small panel OLED display manufacturing. 

    With that dominance, Samsung is going to take full control of the non iOS portion of the smart device market. Apple will be forced to continue to source OLED panels primarily from Samsung. 

    Think about it. How will the market react if the flagship iPhone X2 or whatever Apple decides to name it, comes with an inferior panel to the iPhone X. Apple is tied at the hip to Samsung. There’s very little that can be done about it now 
    Unless they’re planning something else:

    http://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2017/09/advances-in-micro-led-displays-are-being-made-and-apples-luxvue-owns-a-key-patent-to-advance-production.html
    bb-15watto_cobrasockrolid
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