Anyone noticing a little distortion?

[Big Dookie]

Originally Posted by tntsniper

i exchanged mine.. and got a new one.. this new one has a tiny and i do mean tiny red pixel thats stuck.. The ONLY place you can see it is on black.. I'm not sure what to do here.. What would u guys do? It seems like I can't win here.

I mean the pre before had blotches that were so bad that i had to take it back, b/c even in pictures they would show up. What would u guys think if you had a pre w/ a tiny red stuck pixel that only showed up on black?

On a side note.. I think palm dropped the ball in this aspect... they should really send out repair screens for everyone that has had these problems.

The logical side of me says it's no big deal, you should just live with it. However, being honest with myself, I know that if I were in the same situation it would drive me crazy and I'd have to exchange it again. I hate stuck pixels with a passion.

And this is really what I'm worried about in terms of exchanging it for a new unit. The new one could be just as bad (or worse!) than the one I have now. Although honestly, if it were just the screen that had issues on mine right now, I think I could live with it. However, it's the heat that's really bugging me. It should not get uncomfortably hot after five minutes of using it with one program open, and the fact that many are reporting that this doesn't happen on their Pres makes me think it's a defect.

Again, I just wish Palm or Sprint would address this in some kind of official matter so we could know what we're supposed to do about this.

[ScrapMaker]

My splotches are much worse that the pictures shown here, and Sprint refused to replace it. I was told that they all have this and that its simply the backlight. My phone is always extremely hot as well. Not a good combo. My battery life has been dreadful as well. Perhaps it is because I'm logged into AIM and GoogleTalk? Not even sure how to log out to be honest...

[jonathan likes the pre]

I have the touchstone...when I take it off of charging for a while, it's warm but it calms down. Using the Pre doesn't get to warm, I haven't noticed this.

I do have the light leakage, and if Palm addresses it or we learn new shipments don't have it, I'll switch. I can live with it if it remains in all the models.

If you're switching your Pre because of the light leak, don't just say it's because of that. Say it randomly freezes or some other nonsense that's not easy to reproduce. They're not likely to voluntarily lose a sale for such a small problem (the new Pre you get could have gone to a signup customer), especially in a high demand launch.

[pre1183]

Originally Posted by sethpcs

I got my Pre around 8:30AM. I was 9th out of over 30-40 people! I noticed the aforementioned distortion issue once I got home. I would actually call it more of a discoloration, than distortion, since the image quality seems unaffected.

I quickly went back to the Sprint store to show them, and to see what they would do. My Pre was passed around, and everyone concluded that it was a hardware issue. They immediately (no wating in line again) replaced that Pre with another. The second one showed no signs of discoloration in the store, but once I got home, I noticed a very small amount of discoloration, but in different areas. The replacement is MUCH better. The discoloration is very hard to see, unless you are looking for it, and even then, it is only detectable when viewing certain solid backgrounds.

I believe that this phenomenon is a result of physical stress on the display itself that may be exacerbated by heat. It just seems like it only becomes noticeable after you have been using the device for a while.

My 2 cents.

i agree 100% and i had the exact same experience with my purchase/return (my return has the same issue) except the Radiosharks gave me the run around for 5 minutes..."what? i dont see any discoloration!"

what do you guys think? should i go in for yet another return?? based on the #ppl reporting this - it looks like its widespread

all being said its very faint and not a huge bother, and plus its only noticeable on blue backgrounds.

i just wish there was an official word from palm/sprint but i dont think there will be one forthcoming

[pre1183]

Originally Posted by mosdl

Depends on what is causing the heat. If the cpu say is the source, they can optimize their code to reduce the cpu usage.

agree, but thanks to teiresias for a quick refresher on my ASIC design course...ah the golden days!

[digitalrio]

I've already exchanged mine yesterday early (good thing 'cause they sold out within an hour after that). What I've noticed is that the new one was fine until I let it charge on the Touchstone. Since the charging runs hot, the new one is starting to develop a yellow circle on the right bottom of the screen. This is only visible on white backgrounds like the web. Come to think of it, the one I exchanged had the same yellow circle on the top right of the screen but not from when I bought it. That leads me to believe that there might be a connection between certain Touchstone chargers and the phone since my wife's (which I charge through the charger) never showed such an issue! Hmmmm!!!

[JoshH37]

Well I exchanged my first Pre due to several stuck pixels and low and behold the new one has the discoloration issue.. Just like one of the pictures posted I can only see it when on a white background like the messaging app and its a yellow circle around the button on the right.. I am 35 miles away from my closest Sprint store and have already recieved one replacement. I am at a loss at what to do.

[atlanta]

Its not discoloration its part of the UI

[atlanta]

Originally Posted by ScrapMaker

My splotches are much worse that the pictures shown here, and Sprint refused to replace it. I was told that they all have this and that its simply the backlight. My phone is always extremely hot as well. Not a good combo. My battery life has been dreadful as well. Perhaps it is because I'm logged into AIM and GoogleTalk? Not even sure how to log out to be honest...

Theres a glitch in the AIM app.. and click the green available icon and click on offline.

[tntsniper]

Originally Posted by JoshH37

Well I exchanged my first Pre due to several stuck pixels and low and behold the new one has the discoloration issue.. Just like one of the pictures posted I can only see it when on a white background like the messaging app and its a yellow circle around the button on the right.. I am 35 miles away from my closest Sprint store and have already recieved one replacement. I am at a loss at what to do.

We're in the same boat my friend... My first one had TERRIBLE screen bleeding, to the point where it would show up on almost everything. I returned that... Now the new one I have has a dead pixel.. then I go and start looking to see if there are more, and lo-and behold theres one more towards the bottom.. THEN i rebooted the pre and the Palm logo came up.. I see at the very top a little red dot blinking.. every so often.. not all the time, but it would come and go.

Who the hell is manufacturing these phones? I honestly think if Palm doesn't make an official statement about this, or offer a way to fix this.. We should all write a letter to them as one group.. Get hundreds/thousands of signatures and see what happens.

[Big Dookie]

Originally Posted by atlanta

Its not discoloration its part of the UI

I have made some notes that this is in fact true in some cases. For example, when you first go into the Web App and it brings up your bookmarks page, there is a small area at the bottom that looks exactly like what people are discussing here. However, in this case it's actually part of the background... you can tell by going into card view, where you'll see the exact same artifact in the smaller thumbnail version.

That said, this isn't the case everywhere. For example, in Pandora, when my Pre gets hot I can definitely see the discoloration at the bottom of the screen, but when I go into card view it disappears on the thumbnail. It's definitely an issue and people aren't just imagining it, though in a very small number of cases people may be mistaking an intentional background design for the artifact.

On another note, my usage tests have continued today to try and nail down this issue, and I am somewhat sure now that the heat problem is stemming from Sprint Network coverage problems. When I'm at home, I run off of my house's WiFi, and the phone never gets hot at all. Very slightly warm possibly under extremely heavy usage, but nothing like what I experienced at work yesterday, and not enough to produce the white splotches in the screen everyone is seeing. However, after I got to work today where I don't get a very good signal, I opened one instance of the web browser and started using it, and my phone immediately began to heat up. It seems that when there isn't a very strong signal, and especially when the phone is often switching between EVDO and 1X, it uses much more power and produces more heat.

Can anyone else verify this behavior in similar circumstances?

[paint slanger]

I just heard about this and decided to check it out.

I fired up Pandora and saw the splotches.

I put a solid black wallpaper on my Pre that was made for an iPhone and no splotches. Same thing with while it is plugged into my pc under media sync or as a usb drive.

I have also looked at it under the original brightness settings, highest brightness and lowest brightness. I get the same results on every single one, only Pandora.

I also charge using a Touchstone and have been leaving it on there.

[paint slanger]

Originally Posted by Big Dookie

I have made some notes that this is in fact true in some cases. For example, when you first go into the Web App and it brings up your bookmarks page, there is a small area at the bottom that looks exactly like what people are discussing here. However, in this case it's actually part of the background... you can tell by going into card view, where you'll see the exact same artifact in the smaller thumbnail version.

That said, this isn't the case everywhere. For example, in Pandora, when my Pre gets hot I can definitely see the discoloration at the bottom of the screen, but when I go into card view it disappears on the thumbnail. It's definitely an issue and people aren't just imagining it, though in a very small number of cases people may be mistaking an intentional background design for the artifact.

On another note, my usage tests have continued today to try and nail down this issue, and I am somewhat sure now that the heat problem is stemming from Sprint Network coverage problems. When I'm at home, I run off of my house's WiFi, and the phone never gets hot at all. Very slightly warm possibly under extremely heavy usage, but nothing like what I experienced at work yesterday, and not enough to produce the white splotches in the screen everyone is seeing. However, after I got to work today where I don't get a very good signal, I opened one instance of the web browser and started using it, and my phone immediately began to heat up. It seems that when there isn't a very strong signal, and especially when the phone is often switching between EVDO and 1X, it uses much more power and produces more heat.

Can anyone else verify this behavior in similar circumstances?

I went to the same site where I downloaded the solid black wallpaper and zoomed in on it under an EVDO connection and I didn't see the splotches.

Could it be possible that this is a gradient that the Pandora landing page has? It would be an odd gradient but that's the only place I am seeing this.

[Sheekamoo]

Originally Posted by tntsniper

Who the hell is manufacturing these phones? I honestly think if Palm doesn't make an official statement about this, or offer a way to fix this.. We should all write a letter to them as one group.. Get hundreds/thousands of signatures and see what happens.

No... writing letters probably won't do much.

We need this story to become public. I already wrote a detailed account and sent the story to Engadget (along with a link to this forum topic). We need to start contacting major media sites and get them to report this information. Once the story goes public and people who don't visit hardcore phone sites like this one start hearing of this issue, Palm will need to act on it.

I love my Pre and I see no better phone for my needs on the market right now. But I will continue to return my phone until I see this specific hardware issue fixed. I won't be returning it now though, I'll wait 2 weeks and see if Palm corrects the issue or what sort of statement they make. It's a great phone and I'm very happy with what Palm has done, but this is not something they can get away with. And unless this problem becomes news on most of the major news/blogging sites, Palm may never say or fix anything.

Like I said in one of my previous posts, they knew about this issue before launching the phone. It was reported the low quantity of Pre's in stores was due to a manufacturing defect with the screen, and all units needed to be manually checked by a QC person. **They couldn't correct the issue in time so they shipped decent looking units just to meet their selling date (failure to due so would have had a terrible affect on their stocks).** (that last sentence is just my opinion. The other things I said have been reported as facts)

At this point, we need this hardware problem to be reported to as many places as possible. We need the general public to be aware of this hardware related issue. Once Palm knows that many users will not buy their Pre's until this issue is fixed, they will put forth all their effort to get this corrected ASAP. But unless this story is making news, what's to stop the average Joe from purchasing a Pre? And if people are still going to buy this phone, why would Palm make a public announcement and offer free replacements for everyone? Why would they take that cost when it has no positive affect on their revenue?

If you guys want to do something about this (besides venting on a forum), take some time and send an email to an editor at a tech magazine or blog site. Show them this forum thread. Email them pictures of the issue. Lets get this story out there and see what Palm has to say about it at that point.

[Big Dookie]

Originally Posted by paint slanger

I went to the same site where I downloaded the solid black wallpaper and zoomed in on it under an EVDO connection and I didn't see the splotches.

Could it be possible that this is a gradient that the Pandora landing page has? It would be an odd gradient but that's the only place I am seeing this.

I guess it's possible but I really don't think so. Most people are using Pandora as an example because it's one of the applications where you can see the problem most clearly. If the issue is bad on one phone, it will be obvious in several programs but really obvious in Pandora, and if it's not as bad on another phone, it might not even be visible in most programs but be only slightly visible in Pandora. Mine is closer to the latter case, though it can get pretty bad when the phone gets extremely hot.

The reason I don't think it's a gradient effect of the background or anything is that, when I minimize the app into card view, the "effect" doesn't transition up to the thumbnail like it does with the bookmarks page. It stays static on the screen, and only appears again as the app is maximized to fill up the screen. You can tell that it's independent from the max/min animation, and so it's not part of the background itself. Does that make sense?

[Sheekamoo]

Originally Posted by paint slanger

I went to the same site where I downloaded the solid black wallpaper and zoomed in on it under an EVDO connection and I didn't see the splotches.

Could it be possible that this is a gradient that the Pandora landing page has? It would be an odd gradient but that's the only place I am seeing this.

You'll notice it on mostly blue and gray color backgrounds. Even on white backgrounds my little circle blotch in the bottom left hand corner is yellowish.

Another tip for seeing this issue... tilt your phone. Load up Pandora as it has a blue screen that stays up for about 10 seconds. As Pandora is loading tilt your screen around at different angles and pay attention to the edges of your screen. Most people (including myself) see problems at the bottom of the screen. But many have reported problems on the sides and top of the screen as well.

Another tip is to do something like watch Youtube for 5-10 minutes. Let the phone really heat up. Or charge it on a touchstone. Once the device is hotter the screen problems are much more noticeable.

[Sheekamoo]

Originally Posted by jonathan likes the pre

I think you're right. I didn't think I had it until I changed my wallpaper to something that was less busy. I can see it now, and I definitely see it when I play videos, but in most apps I can't notice.

It doesn't make me too upset but I would like this to not happen, obviously. I'll be watching this thread to see what solution occurs. I'm not going to bother going down to Sprint this week because I predict they'll either be low/out on Pres or give me one with the same problem.

I'm in the same boat as you. It's not a deal breaker for now, but I know at some point in the future this will be fixed, and when that happens I'll be taking my phone in for an exchange. I'm in no rush to do that now though. With both a low supply and the fact that almost all the Pre's have this issue (some worse then others), I'd rather just wait it out and exchange it once I know the issue has been fixed.

[paint slanger]

Originally Posted by Big Dookie

I guess it's possible but I really don't think so. Most people are using Pandora as an example because it's one of the applications where you can see the problem most clearly. If the issue is bad on one phone, it will be obvious in several programs but really obvious in Pandora, and if it's not as bad on another phone, it might not even be visible in most programs but be only slightly visible in Pandora. Mine is closer to the latter case, though it can get pretty bad when the phone gets extremely hot.

The reason I don't think it's a gradient effect of the background or anything is that, when I minimize the app into card view, the "effect" doesn't transition up to the thumbnail like it does with the bookmarks page. It stays static on the screen, and only appears again as the app is maximized to fill up the screen. You can tell that it's independent from the max/min animation, and so it's not part of the background itself. Does that make sense?

Yeah, I noticed that when I was switching from Pandora to the background into card view.

Actually I just used both a blue and gray background and I noticed it. So yeah, it's not a gradient.

[Big Dookie]

It's really not a huge issue, and like I said before, if it were only a screen issue I don't think I'd even worry about it. It's the heat problem that has me worried, and that's what I think Palm really needs to address.

[ivealwaysgotmail]

Anyone Who thinks they have this problem go to device info, Then more info, Then hit the preferences menu (top left corner) and hit interactive tests, then hit "screen"

it will instruct you to tap the screen , each time you tap it changes the color of the whole screen White, Red, green, Blue. Making it OBVIOUS if you have a problem, if its part of the UI it WILL NOT SHOW UP IN THIS TEST. Report your results here

So far from the pictures ive seen those looks like they COULD be small distortions, but also could be a "glow" from the UI, Pictures of the test screens would be nice ;-), Most users wouldnt care about a small almost unnoticable flaw, but once you notice, i could see how it would be annoying.

My results? My screen is more amazing then i thought, The Colors capture me ;-), No dead pixels, no light leaks, And so far i have ONLY used the Touchstone to charge ;-) And i agree it gets quite warm, but the new backing makes it like Warm skin ;-) its never been uncomfortably hot for me.

Hope That helps