Apple Sued Over 'Lacking' Macbook Display

qu1j0t3 writes "Business 2.0 reports that two MacBook owners have filed a class action lawsuit charging Apple with deceptive advertising, as well as misrepresentation and unfair competition over the use of the phrase 'millions of colors' to describe the capability of the LCD displays in MacBook and MacBook Pro computers. The article likens the complaint to an an angry forum thread, and is more than a little bit skeptical of the plaintiff's motives. Perhaps it's their uncanny attention to detail. From the filing: 'The reality is that notwithstanding Apple's misrepresentations and suggestions that its MacBook and MacBook Pro display millions of colors, the displays are only capable of displaying the illusion of millions of colors through the use of a software technique referred to as dithering, which causes nearby pixels on the display to use slightly varying shades of colors that trick the human eye into perceiving the desired color even though it is not truly that color.'

Comments

Macs for artists

[Turn-X Alphonse]

It sounds dodgy but I can see some logic in this. If macs are sold as artistic machines (Apple sure tries to pull this off with the PC and Mac adverts) then shouldn't the monitors be as high quality and accurate as possible? I mean illusions are fun and all but you want the real thing if you're working on important art peices or photos

Re:Macs for artists

[Lumpy]

really? funny how I can see color banding when you look at photographs of blue skies on a 16,000 color display but you dont see the color banding when you go to a 24 bit color display.

you eye CAN see more than 16,000 colors. espically when it is looking at 3-4 colors all next to each other to show off color banding.

Re:Macs for artists

[iangoldby]

Parent poster describes how with a restricted number of colours, though the human eye can't see banding in the original, if you then process that image the quantisation of colours in the original can lead to banding in the processed version.

Yes, but that has nothing at all to do with this story.

There would be an issue if a 24-bit image was downsampled to 16-bit (for example) in order to display it on a 16-bit screen and then resaved (or processed) at the lower bit-depth. But it's not. Any transformations done in the image editing program are at the bit depth of the image, not of the display.

So if the eye can't see the deficiencies of the display before manipulating the image, it won't see them afterwards either.

Re:Macs for artists

[noewun]

but if you were a true professional

Look, if you want to get all big-dick-swinging about this, send me your client list, a link to your portfolio (including samples from all of the international ad campaigns you've worked on and the awards you've won) and your fee list and we can see who's the biggest, baddest, most calibratingest knowingest motherfucker of them all. If you don't want to do that, just try to be less of a dick when you post.

I've been doing this since Photoshop 1.0 (and PageMaker and Illustrator 88. . .) so I am sure of where I speak. Am I the bestest retoucher in the universe? No, because no matter how good you are, there's always someone better. The best guy I've ever worked with was a portrait painter in a former life (he painted the portrait of Reagan which hangs in the White House) and working next to him was a revelation: he could paint photorealistic images in Photoshop with the same effort I take to tie my shoes.

That aside, no monitor in the world will accurately show you low values of yellow and cyan. Sure, something will be on the screen, but to really check and make sure your whitest areas are 2/2/2/0 (or 5/5/5/0 or whatever standard the shop you work in uses for non-specular highlights) you need to use both the info palette and a matchprint/high end digital color proof. That's just the way it is, and all of the people I've worked with in all of the years will say the same thing. Trusting the monitor--any monitor--is asking for a surprise when things come off the press. It's just the nature of conversion from additive to subtractive color models.

Re:Macs for artists

[Lars T.]

Since your eyes can only detect about 16,000 colors, it's a moot point,

I recall reading an article in nature about trained visual artists being able to detect many times that number. I wouldn't be surprised at all. Hell, women can already see 7428 different shades of white.

Re:Macs for artists

[Stephen H-B]

Although the condition is not universally acknowledged, some women are reported to have four colour receptors in their retina, rather than the regular three. The condition is analogous to male colour blindness (now called colour deficiency since you can be colour deficient and 20/20). Since women have a backup of the gene (the allele is X-linked, thus why males predominate colour blindness), they can see blue, green, reddish-orange and red.

Search Wikipedia for 'tetrachromatism' for more info.

Dirty lies!

[Romwell]

Let's take it to the extreme: there are only tree colors (R,G and B). And there is no spoon.

The point

[Z0mb1eman]

How about providing the IMPORTANT part from the article in the summary, hmmm?

"At the heart of the case is plaintiff's claim that rather than delivering 16,777,216 colors with an 8-bit LCD, Apple chose a cheaper route, delivering the illusion of millions of colors using a 6-bit LCD and dithering."

2^24 = 16,777,216
2^18 = 262,144

Nothing wrong with 6-bit LCDs, but they shouldn't be advertised as 8-bit...

*gets ready to be torn apart by rabid mac fans*

Re:Err...

[Just Some Guy]

History, repeat thyself. Honestly, there's a legitimate point to that. If the advertised specs say that it can display "millions of colors", then there's a reasonable expectation that a given pixel will be able to represent over 1 million colors (most likely 16MiColors, but who's counting?). Yeah, this might seem a little silly, but if you can't deliver then don't promise it.

I can imagine a graphics geek being pretty legitimately pissed about seeing gradients where he shouldn't, in the same way that if they advertised a 128-bit FPU, a programmer might be a little annoyed to find that it was really "32-bit but we cleverly fake the rest".

Re:Err...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you think it's going to be laughed out of court? Apple have, according to the suit, marketed their machines as suitable for graphic designers and photographers etc., and that their monitors can display "millions of colors". If it turns out that "millions of colors" is really "thousands of colors that are made to appear like millions with dithering techniques", he very much has a case. Apple must not advertise that a product is suitable for purpose X when it is obvious that it is lacking in the most fundamental ways. The questions are: what does "millions of colors" imply, why is it misleading to Apple's target customers, and why does this cause harm Apple's target customers? And: can Apple be blamed for this?
 
I don't think this is going to get "laughed out of court".

Obscure reference, anyone?

[psicic]

There are FIVE lights.

Re:Err...

[dave420]

Hmm... dithered images are not true-colour, so they don't display millions of colours any more than a newspaper displays more than 4 (CMYK). It gives the illusion of more, but it's not actually giving more. This is far from a laughable claim. The whole 10^6/2^20 discrepancy is laughable, this is clearly a case of false advertising. And, fyi, courts of law are by definition the most pedantic out there, as they're dealing with really important things, and so have to get to the bottom of even the most ridiculous claim. The American Idol panel is the least pedantic example I can think of :)

Far more interesting: Better under Windows?

[Animaether]

From the PDF ( http://www.engadget.com/videos/PDF/apple_macbook_l awsuit.pdf ) :

''The extent to which a particular make of computer is capable of "dithering" is a function of the sophistication of the programming of the software. For example, in the case of the MacBook and MacBook Pro, because of the uniqueness of these computers to be able to run both Apple's OS operating system, and the PC's Microsoft Windows operating system, it is possible to compare the quality of the display between the two operating systems. In the case of the display that the MacBook and the MacBook Pro produces using the Microsoft Windows operating system at all resolution levels is superior to the display that those same computers display using Apple's OS operating system.''

Some nasty grammar in there, but in summary: no such problem when running Windows on the same machine?

If that is true, then it is indeed an Apple software problem. Note that software shouldn't be in charge of this sort of thing in the first place. LCD displays themselves handle incoming 8bit values on a 6bit displays in one of three ways:
A. 'as is', 91 becomes 92.
B. 'dither', 3 out of 4 pixels are 92, the other one is 88, averaging to 91
C. 'frame rate control', 3 out of 4 refreshes it draws the pixel as 92, the other one is 88, averaging to 91.

B&C are both common, and both have pros/cons. But either way, the software shouldn't be doing anything there (arguably, a driver might - i.e. if the monitor specifically allows you to specify which method to use, what dithering pattern, etc. by means of driver control).

not "smited"

[DJCacophony]

Today's conjugation of the day: smite.

God is a smiter.
God is about to smite Bob.
God is smiting Bob.
God has smote Bob.
Bob has been smitten.

Re:not "smited"

[Haeleth]

I love ignorant people who try to correct others' grammar, and only end up displaying how bad their own is.

To demonstrate a conjugation, you should use the active sense of the verb in nonconditional cases, rather than the passive form for each case.

How fortunate that he only used one passive, and no conditionals.

(By the way, who made you king and gave you the power to decree how conjugations shall be demonstrated, yea, even unto the end of time?)

2. God is about to smite Bob. - This is a conditional use, so at least your passive sense is correct;

There is no conditional in "God is about to smite Bob". There is also no passive there.

however, you shouldn't use two prepositions in a row (even if one is part of the verb "to smite"): try "God will smite Bob."

There is nothing wrong with using two prepositions in a row. Furthermore, "God will smite Bob" does not mean the same thing as "God is about to smite Bob" - the latter implies that the smiting will happen in the very near future, while the former merely implies that it will happen at some point in the future.

3. God is smiting Bob. - This is an action: the verb + participle makes it passive.

Um, no, it doesn't. There is no passive involved. You don't actually know what a passive is, do you?

If you're giving a conjugation lesson, conjugate the verb, don't turn it into a modifier: "God smites Bob."

He did conjugate the verb, and he didn't turn it into a modifier. And "God smites Bob" does not mean the same thing as "God is smiting Bob": the latter emphasises the fact that the smiting is an ongoing action at the present moment, while the former merely specifies that it happens without making any real statement as to when (are you saying "God smites Bob every Thursday", or "Here is God. God smites Bob. See God smite"?)

4. God has smote Bob. - This is a passive use

No, it is not a passive.

which means that, again, you're not conjugating "smite."

Where do you get these ideas?

5. Bob has been smitten. - This is acceptable; however, I might avoid the passive use altogether: you don't give an active agent: by whom was Bob smitten?

Congratulations! You have successfully identified a real passive. That's one out of four, which I'm afraid is not a pass mark round here.

(BTW, the question of who smote Bob can generally be inferred from context: something like "God is on a rampage. Bob has been smitten, and so has Fred" is sometimes better style than "God is on a rampage. He has smitten Bob, and Fred too".)

In the future, please remember to ensure correct use when fixating upon the errors of others.

The irony is killing me.

(Cue half a dozen posts telling me that I'm misusing the word "irony". Come on, don't disappoint me here!)

8-bit vs 6-bit LCD displays

[Trevin]

This got me wondering how many bpp my own Viewsonic Pro series monitor can display. I was surprised to find that it wasn't listed in the product specifications -- neither as bits nor total number of colors.

A little further digging brought me to this article which gave some good insight about the differences. Some highlights:

Since consumers were demanding faster screens, something needed to be done to improve response times. To facilitate this, many manufacturers turned to reducing the number of levels each color pixel render. This reduction in the number of intensity levels allows the response times to drop but has the drawback of reducing the overall number of colors that can be rendered.

High-speed LCD monitors typically reduce the number of bits for each color to 6 instead of the standard 8. ... This is far fewer than the true color display such that it would be noticeable to the human eye.

If no color depths is listed, it should be assumed that monitors of 12ms or faster will be 6-bit and the 20ms and slower panels are 8-bit.

This is very subjective to the actual user and what the computer is used for. The amount of color really matters to those that do professional work on graphics. For these people, the amount of color that is displayed on the screen is very important. The average consumer is not going to really need this level of color representation by their monitor. As a result, it probably doesn't matter. People using their displays for video games or watching video will likely not care about the number of colors rendered by the LCD but by the speed at which it can be displayed. As a result, it is best to determine your needs and base your purchase on those criteria.

Spatial and temporal dithering

[AlpineR]

I never heard of this LCD dithering before. A little bit of Googling found a simple explanation of what it is, a simple test to look for it, and a detailed explanation and test.

This seems to be a very common practice on LCD screens, not just a trick used by Apple. I'm still not clear whether most LCDs use spatial or temporal dithering. It seems like temporal dithering would work very well with an LCD. They're known for their sluggish response times, so sending "80-84-80-84" at 60 Hz should result in a nice smearing into "82-82-82-82" over time.

I didn't see any dithering artifacts on my MacBook Pro (Core 2 Duo). Either it doesn't dither (unlikely) or the dithering is better than my eyes can see.

We all know that screens are actually made of red, green, and blue (RGB) dots that combine to make the apparent color of each pixel. An 8-bit screen would have 256 levels of brighness for each of those subpixels, yielding 256 x 256 x 256 = 16.8 million mixed colors. But if you wanted to be really technical you could say that the screen can actually show only 256 + 256 + 256 = 768 colors; the mixed colors are an illusion. Likewise a 6-bit screen can generate only 262 thousand colors in a given pixel at a given instant, but it can simulate many more colors over time or space.

The argument depends on how many pixels the manufacturer claims to have. If they say their screen is 1024 x 768 with 16.8 million colors then we would expect to have 786,000 independently addressable pixels, each of which comprises three RGB subpixels. If in fact it takes four RGB subpixels (1-1/3 of each 6-bit subpixel to get 8 bits) to yield 16.8 million colors then they should really only claim a resolution of 768 x 576. If, however, they do the dithering temporally and the pulsation is unnoticeable then I think continuing to call the resolution 1024 x 768 is fair.

AlpineR

Virtually no laptop LCD can display 16.7M colors

[demon driver]

From one of the comments below TFA: "Out of 28 notebook LCDs manufactured by Samsung, only 2 can display 16.7M colors natively, a 15.4-inch panel with a lowish resolution of 1,280 x 800 (part number LTN154X5) and a 19-inch panel (part number LTN190W1). The rest, 26 LCDs, are 6-bit and can display 262,144 colors natively, without dithering, and millions of colors with dithering. [...] At LG.Philips, all of the 15 notebook LCDs are 6-bit and can display 262,144 colors natively, without dithering, and millions of colors with dithering."

So it seems virtually no laptop LCD can display 16.7M colors without dithering. It's a problem which affects the whole industry, and all laptop manufacturers seem to be, well, somewhat "optimistic" in their advertising claims.

Which doesn't make it better that Apple does so, too, and as far as I'm concerned, the suit is well justified.

Re:Incorrect

[untaken_name]

Did you mean, "Learn to talk n00b," as in a command to go out and find out how to speak a language called n00b, or did you mean, "Learn to talk, n00b," as in a command to a n00b to learn how to talk?
Punctuation: the Rodney Dangerfield of grammar.

That's pretty much the point

[Space cowboy]

EVERY manufacturer who advertises 16.2 million colours uses a 6-bit display and dithering. Apple has a setting of "millions of colours" in their preferences, and they stuck with that description when they used a 6-bit display.

The point is that this is temporal dithering, not spacial dithering. There's no point in saying "my eye can see the difference when there's dithering in an image" because that's not what's taking place.

Consider a nominally 1-bit system, a single red LED. Apply zero power, and it's black. Apply constant 5v (with appropriate resistors :-) and it's bright-red. Now apply a pulse-wave-modulation to that LED, and you will be able to *see* a smoothly-varying intensity between 0 and 1 (black and bright-red) even though the LED is only switching fully on or fully off. The pulse-train is controllable by a digital system, so you can electronically vary the effective brightness of this 1-bit system.

In this, the 1-bit output is temporally dithering its on/off state to give the illusion of a multi-bit system. Scale this up to a 6-bit system, and it's easy to generate the illusion of an 8-bit system. To the human eye there is no difference, we don't have the refresh-rate to catch the LED off or on, we just see the aggregated results of very fast controlled flickering.

Simon