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Apple Corrects Screen Color In New Firmware Update

Submitted by Edward Kirk on July 14, 2008 - 11:28am.
in

Remember how we've been talking about the new iPhone 3Gs having a slightly more yellowish tint? Apple has claimed that it was a design decision to make the viewing experience slightly more natural, and was better suited for viewing of photos. Well, it seems that the difference wasn't as subtle as they had hoped, and customers and bloggers picked up on the change. To fix this, Apple has released a new version of the iPhone firmware to cool the screen's color down a bit.

Ars Technica has tested the new software to see if it really does change the color tone. The new iPhone 3G ships with firmware version 5A345, which was the noticeably yellower one. When they did a back-up and restore, and updated it to the latest version of the firmware, version 5a347. The new version was significantly cooler than the previous one. They synchronized the brightness levels and auto brightness feature and confirmed that all hardware running 5A347 is less-yellow in calibration than the 5A345 phones.

click to view

[via Ars Technica]

Submitted by Kevin Dunahee on July 14, 2008 - 11:45am.
Ok so how does the new 2.0 firmware (cooled) compare to 1.1.4? Still warmer in appearance?

Submitted by WatersWest on July 14, 2008 - 1:02pm.
Glad to see Apple continues to tweak things, if even by baby-steps as opposed to leaps and bounds. You certainly wouldn't get upgraded firmware this often on any other phone.

Submitted by Mr. A (not verified) on July 14, 2008 - 1:15pm.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Superman View Post
Ok so how does the new 2.0 firmware (cooled) compare to 1.1.4? Still warmer in appearance?
couldn't we just get a temp dial right under brightness there

Submitted by SilentEcho13 (not verified) on July 14, 2008 - 2:01pm.
Well i have 5a347, and it's still very yellow compared to the original 2g iPhone which had an amazing display...

Help!

Submitted by xxx on July 14, 2008 - 2:56pm.
wow, that was quick.

apple listened?

Submitted by iswenson on July 14, 2008 - 3:02pm.
im surprised that apple listened to the complaints about it and put out an easy fix for it so quickly. now all we need is copy and paste, lol.

Submitted by ghp2006 on July 14, 2008 - 3:24pm.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SilentEcho13 View Post
Well i have 5a347, and it's still very yellow compared to the original 2g iPhone which had an amazing display...

Help!
And where is this wonderful firmware upgrade located?
Not in iTunes

ajm

Apple Love us?

Submitted by eclipse on July 14, 2008 - 3:46pm.
lol where is this firmware?

Submitted by agent6998 on July 14, 2008 - 4:00pm.
I for one actually like the warmer color on my friend's 3G. I compared my 2G with his 3G and I like his more. Go figure...

no fix

Submitted by *ktown8 (not verified) on July 14, 2008 - 7:01pm.
I did the restore and upgrade, however, there still is a noticeable difference in the colors. In fact, it's most noticeable while playing videos or movies. I still have my original iPhone and used the same settings, but during playback, the iPhone 3G's picture is much darker and not as crisp as my original iPhone. This is very disappointing. Maybe I have a bad phone.....there's a big difference in quality!

Submitted by TDB on July 14, 2008 - 7:45pm.
ILounge seems to disagree with ArsTechnica about this firmware changing the yellowish display color. Who knows what the truth is. Apple probably won't say.

I've heard that most people don't notice it unless next to an original iPhone. How bad is it? I love my current iPhone screen and don't want to upgrade if the screen suffers from an overly yellow hue.

Poor 3G build Quality

Submitted by Unregistered (not verified) on July 30, 2008 - 11:06pm.
i prefer the first gen display.
apple seems to be going backwards!
plastic back
bad bad bad bad build quality
buggy 2.0 software

id pay an extra 100$ to get some sort of Quality Control. Im on my 6th unit. Go apple