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iPhone 3G's "Yellow" Display Is By Design

Submitted by Michael Johnston on July 13, 2008 - 2:17am.
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Since getting their new iPhone 3Gs, many users have complained that the displays may be defective. Users reporting the issue have noticed a "yellowish" color when compared with the original iPhone which had a cooler blue tint. However, according to Apple, the "defect" may actually be by design.

Jason Snell of Macworld had a chance to talk with Bob Borchers, Head of Worldwide iPhone Product Marketing regarding the matter. According to Bob, the iPhone's "warmer" color is by design and most certainly differs from the original which was a cooler blue. In order to make the change, Apple chose a to move the white point in order to produce a more natural color. This, according to Borchers, is more pleasing to consumers when viewing photos and other media.

While this is technically a software adjustment made to the iPhone's color profile, it is not able to be adjusted by consumers. On your Mac, it's fairly easy to make changes to the white point and other color settings, however the iPhone isn't as customizable. Borchers did suggest that Apple may make the adjustment available in a future software update if demand is high, although there are no plans to do so.

[via Macworld]

Submitted by Snoop1990 on July 13, 2008 - 4:20am.
I hope the jailbreak is going to fix that !

Yellow?

Submitted by Stephen007 on July 13, 2008 - 7:28am.
I can't tell any difference in my display. Admittedly I don't have a 1st gen to put it up next to. I wonder how much of this is psychological. In other words, if you don't/can't put it next to a 1st gen would you really notice any difference?

Submitted by xxx on July 13, 2008 - 7:37am.
Here come the defects of the 3G. Maybe is was smart not to jump on it right away.

Submitted by MICHAELSD on July 13, 2008 - 10:09pm.
The iPhone 3G is nowhere near as bad as the picture. It's actually much better than my first-gen iPhone screen. If you put them next to each other, the iPhone 3G has much deeper and purer blacks and whites, a sharper, crisper, and move vivid display, and a much brighter backlight (at least 25% brighter compared to a new first-gen iPhone, and a bit brighter compared to one that's been used). Text is also noticeably amount easier to read. On the first-gen iPhone, some movies looked washed out, the iPhone 3G is much better with movies, especially compared side-by-side.

Submitted by iswenson on July 14, 2008 - 12:04am.
@ michaelsd
thats pretty interesting, the picture up does make it look pretty bad.

i was going to say that the temperature of the colors on the screen should be user adjustable, rather than fixed.

its a good thing

Submitted by dark_coupon on July 14, 2008 - 9:54am.
When comparing images on my 1st gen iPhone to the same images on my color calibrated iMac, I've noticed the iPhone screen actually has more blue than it should. Its a little annoying, but not enough to make a fuss over. Blue is the opposite of Yellow, so I can see why they upped the yellow on the 3G display.

Now that I think about it, almost every apple monitor I've seen has too much blue in it from the factory other than the cinema displays and macbook pros.