Database Users

Oil-like stain reflection on screen

After owning the Touch HD for a full month I just noticed that down the middle of the screen there is something which I can best describe as an oil stain. It looks as if there is a liquid in between the glass/plastic screen and the resistive layer that lays on top of it.
The screen works normally and this "stain" can only be observed if I look at how the light reflects of it.
Any idea what happened?

Hi,
I have a small idear. The TFT-Monitor ist touching your Touchscreen. Probeply you pressed something on your HD, that the two Monitor touch each other, that is why it looks like a Water or Oil spot.
This can happen for example, if you are carrying your HD in your trouser pocket.
If you want to try to remove this spot, you have to turn with your both hand the hd, like the right hand turn with the clock and the left hand turn to the other way.
Sorry, my english is not very good for such a discribing. What I mean is like "to contort" or "to skew (up)". But you have to be very carefully. Before you start, remove the Battery

(I'll be incorporating a clearer explanation along the lines of what Dude10 was trying to say)
The effect you're seeing is IDENTICAL to what causes the colours to appear on an oil film actually!
The way the Touch HD screen works is to have the hard glass (polycarbonate plastic actually as far as I'm aware, but that's not important here!) with a squashy resistive sensor layer on the top.
This resistive layer detects touch as an increase in resistance at the spot that's compressed - be that by a finger or a stylus. Because the upper layer can be compressed, it can also be malformed by stronger than normal pressure, such as an object in a pocket. The effect can be more pronounced if your body heat warms up the screen surface making the screen "set" in position rather than spring back as it should do...
The "oil" effect is cause by the reflections of light from the outermost plastic layer and the outermost surface of the hard screen. When the gap is small enough, these reflections can interfere with each other, cancelling and re-inforcing different wavelengths depending on the thickness - hence the tapering of the screen from thinnest to thickest results in a "rainbow"
Now, why explain all this you may ask? Partly because I like science and it fascinated me in school to learn what caused that effect so wanted to share this! (And this also explains why it only presents itself when you look at the light reflections)
Anyway, more importantly, the solution to your problem is to restore the thickness of that part of the touch layer to it's original uncompressed state.
I'd firstly start trying to hold your finger flat against the top of the phone screen (on flat surface, portraint orientation, finger "left to right") then pressing resonably hard (the hard screen should protect the device - if not you're pressing too hard!) slide your finger down the screen from top to bottom trying to keep an even pressure. This should hopefully even out the surface.
Failing this, as Dude10 suggests, take the battery out and use your thumbs (holding with fingers in the battery well) to press and "smear" around the problem area.
Unfortunately, other than this I don't think there's a particular way to remove the effect totally if it doesn't work...
Obviously it's speculation given that you didn't mention how it happened in the first place, but it does sound like it got knocked or pressed by something either in bag or pocket - maybe even a fold in the pouch
Hope you manage to smooth it out!

WhO_KnOwS said:
After owning the Touch HD for a full month I just noticed that down the middle of the screen there is something which I can best describe as an oil stain.
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Click to collapse
Just a long shot, but:
Sometimes a similar effect can be caused when some moisture has got between the layers of a display.
Have you used the phone anywhere damp or very humid ?
Keeping it somewhere warm and dry might be worth a try?
- Steve

Thanks for all the tips. The issue happened when I had the Touch HD in the pouch and in my pocket - so the idea that it was a fold in the pouch holds water.
The funny thing however is that before I saw all of your replies I was already out the door (with the Touch HD back in the pouch and pocket). 5 minutes later when I pulled it out the issue was gone. I am guessing that I reapplied the exact amount of pressure needed or something like that.
Thanks again for the tips and especially to chaosdefinesorder for the nice explanation.

Thx for helping explanation

5 minutes later when I pulled it out the issue was gone.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no, i don't think it was gone. check again under a fluorescent light....
i have this on my diamond. my HD is flawless (till now...)
i phoned to a technician and explain the phenomena and he invited me to replace the screen. when i got there, to my complete amazement and embarrassment the stain was gone. only later i discovered that the stain is visible under fluorescent light only.

chaosdefinesorder said:
Unfortunately, other than this I don't think there's a particular way to remove the effect totally if it doesn't work...
Hope you manage to smooth it out!
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Click to collapse
thanks m8, already tried this (on my diamond) and tried now again with both yr methods. no results. the stain is still there...i think only a replacement can solve it.
here u have the paralel thread in diamond forum:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=439410&highlight=oily+stain

you can not do it yourself. the best way will be to go to your seller or straight to HTC, because I think you HD still have warranty.
I repaired ones an Diamond and I can tell you, it wasn´t an easy way.

Just sent off a "faulty" Touch HD.

Hi,
I think I may have made a mistake, but was wondering if anyone else has / has not had a similar experience.
I got my Touch HD a couple of weeks ago, and although I was completely knocked out with its amazingness ( new word, patented by me! ), something bothered me about the amount of pressure I was having to use, particularly in the centre of the screen when touching.
I know there have been tweaks and hacks posted and the pressure required on the touchscreen is variable, so I fiddled and tweaked and carried on. It was only after I started using FingerKeyboard2 (which also warrants "amazingness" status.) that I noticed that when holding keys down and releasing for special characters and numbers, my HD was registering a second press upon release. So when holding for number "5" I got a letter "t" too when I released. This really annoyed me.
I've had a look from a varry shallow angle at the screen, with the device turned off and pressed in the middle and compared to the edges, and it seems as though the digitizer "domes" over the screen. There's a large void in the middle that's not present at the edges, which means that to register touches in the middle, I have to press the digitizer against the screen. I think this is causing the double presses, and having to apply extra pressure in the middle.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I've taken it to CPW today and they've sent off for a replacement, which will arrive on Monday
Has anyone else noticed this, is it normal and I've sent a perfectly good Touch HD away? Have a look for me please, and spare an old(ish) man his sanity!

I can only speak for myself but, specially after tweaking, the hd screen is VERY sensible to touch, no need for hard presses at all. I think you actually had a faulty machine...

My touch screen is very good, shame the wifi has died on it and it's doing strange things. Mine will be back to CPW as well

My touchscreen works very well, without tweaking I think it does the job and recognizes my presses easily and accurately. However, my problem is that I can see the touch sensors even when the screen is turned on... I see small green-coloured dots, in a regular grid, specially when I have a white background. Annoying, but I think I can live with it... Better than send it to the service and wait a long time, with the risk of getting a new screen which may have dead pixels (I don't have any now).

Thanks for your replies everyone, makes me feel better about not having my Touch HD over the weekend. I pick up my replacement tomorrow and I think I'm suffering from withdrawal already.

HTC Raider/Vivid/Velocity Digitizer

Hi guys - got a question re: potentially restoring full function to a glitchy digitizer panel I bought as a replacement for my original (broken) one. I know this isn't a Q&A forum but anyone in here is likely going to have more knowledge of the digitizer from a hardware aspect than anyone in the general Q&A forums..I hope.
I had no trouble installing the panel, physically - the design was identical to the original and I took care when shaping the ribbon cable so as not to damage it. My problem is this: My digitizer seems to "skip" one contact point on both the x and y axis so that there is a dead area on my panel which makes text input quite a hassle. I can get it to read input from the area if I touch VERY gently and very accurately, but other than that it takes input from the sensors around the actual point I'm touching, like its getting more capacitive feedback from those areas than from where I'm actually touching.
I hope thats not too confusing. Basically there's a nonresponsive vertical line down the right side of my screen 1" from the edge, and another one 1" up from the bottom going horizontally. At the point where these lines intersect I have a hell of a time getting it to recognize where I'm touching accurately. I've tried the HTC screen calibration tool to no avail.
I'm wondering if anyone has any tricks I can try to get this sucker working properly.. Its slowly driving me crazy. I saw one guy on youtube take a much larger digitizer from another device and take a lighter to the glass side for a few seconds, then apply pressure to the heated areas on both sides of the glass, sandwiching it together and (I assume) reattaching or more firmly attaching the plastic film to the inside of the glass. I don't want to try this without first asking if its wise here, and see what more experienced people have to say on the subject. I may be way off here and there's a simple fix, I just haven't been able to find one.
Help!? LOL..*someone* in here must have some experience with this, no??
Thanks in advance for any replies. Helpful or otherwise.

Part of display nonresponsive to touch

I've had my Nexus 4 for a couple years I believe now, and overall it's been a nice device. I've had occasional issues now and then with software (Camera not available message, random powerdowns) but no hardware issues. A couple weeks ago, part of my display stopped responding. The LCD itself shows everything, there's no bars, no visible cracks in the screen. but the left hand side of the screen, I'd estimate about 1/5 the screen in width, no longer responded to touch. The far far left edge, along the very edge of the display, registered, and on the other side of that 1/5 worked fine. The area that was giving me issues was right about where the 'a' key on the keyboard is in portrait mode -- the only location I could press to get an 'a' registered an 's' as well.
This is all being tested with the developers Show Screen Touches and Show Pointer Information turned on.
Then, the end of this past week, it got worse. The entire left half of the display still shows fine, but almost never responds to touches -- maybe 1 in 100 times it will. Thankfully, I was able to get in one of those times and disable my screen lock. It seems to be able to register as far left as an x value ~418. This means the back button in portrait mode, for example, no longer works. To make me even more confused, it seems to register phantom presses. The device can be lying, powered on on my desk, no touching it, and the display starts showing screen touches -- the most common one I see is right about where the word Google is in portrait on the stock main screen. These will continue indefinitely.
All this to say, I suspect my digitizer has had a mechanical failure. Does that seem a reasonable conclusion to you? I like the four inch form factor of the device, and with most new smartphones getting larger and larger, I'm shying away from changing to another device. I've looked briefly at replacing the digitizer -- it seems you can purchase either the digitizer alone or with the LCD, and that when replacing just the digitizer it's easy to accidentally create problems with the existing LCD. Is that true?
Also, the part about having to use a hair dryer to pull the components apart makes me a little nervous. Screws and cables I can handle, but a hair dryer?

Rainshine said:
I've had my Nexus 4 for a couple years I believe now, and overall it's been a nice device. I've had occasional issues now and then with software (Camera not available message, random powerdowns) but no hardware issues. A couple weeks ago, part of my display stopped responding. The LCD itself shows everything, there's no bars, no visible cracks in the screen. but the left hand side of the screen, I'd estimate about 1/5 the screen in width, no longer responded to touch. The far far left edge, along the very edge of the display, registered, and on the other side of that 1/5 worked fine. The area that was giving me issues was right about where the 'a' key on the keyboard is in portrait mode -- the only location I could press to get an 'a' registered an 's' as well.
This is all being tested with the developers Show Screen Touches and Show Pointer Information turned on.
Then, the end of this past week, it got worse. The entire left half of the display still shows fine, but almost never responds to touches -- maybe 1 in 100 times it will. Thankfully, I was able to get in one of those times and disable my screen lock. It seems to be able to register as far left as an x value ~418. This means the back button in portrait mode, for example, no longer works. To make me even more confused, it seems to register phantom presses. The device can be lying, powered on on my desk, no touching it, and the display starts showing screen touches -- the most common one I see is right about where the word Google is in portrait on the stock main screen. These will continue indefinitely.
All this to say, I suspect my digitizer has had a mechanical failure. Does that seem a reasonable conclusion to you? I like the four inch form factor of the device, and with most new smartphones getting larger and larger, I'm shying away from changing to another device. I've looked briefly at replacing the digitizer -- it seems you can purchase either the digitizer alone or with the LCD, and that when replacing just the digitizer it's easy to accidentally create problems with the existing LCD. Is that true?
Also, the part about having to use a hair dryer to pull the components apart makes me a little nervous. Screws and cables I can handle, but a hair dryer?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I would say it's most likely a hardware problem with the digitizer. The lcd/digitizer assembly is glued together so it's very difficult to separate the two without damaging the lcd.
Unless you have the tools to separate them properly, it's alot less headache to get the entire assembly already glued together.

Defective drawing board

Hello
I have just noticed that the a little area in the upper left corner around the ESC and 1 key, has very poor sensitivity. I almost can't draw there, it's like the sensitivity drops in that small area. Has anyone else experienced this?

ClausG76 said:
Hello
I have just noticed that the a little area in the upper left corner around the ESC and 1 key, has very poor sensitivity. I almost can't draw there, it's like the sensitivity drops in that small area. Has anyone else experienced this?
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Click to collapse
Hi,
I have never noticed it before; but when I specifically searched for it, it is indeed there as you described. Sensitivity drops and cursor jiggles a bit.
I don't think this is much of an issue thou. Every drawing tablet I had had some kind of issues around edges. And, honestly, when you ever need to draw around edges? You simply move the canvas

Thanks
I suspected that this was a design flaw rather than a defect

I have the same problem and also there is a complete line with some important jitter when you draw slowly on it. I reproduced it on two different Windows Yoga Book, I did not have the opportunity to test it on Android.

Just went to the store where it's bought. I tested 2 Android versions, that was on display. And they acted in exactly the same way. So I think it's the way it's designed

Here is a picture of what happened if you draw lines with a rule. We can see a lot of jitter... Like if there is a line area that completely interfere with the pen. I also tried to follow the keyboard keys frames with the pen : it is obviously problematic in the corner we talked about.
Code:
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B1Qu-HXdIAp0U0tvVWpRT016Tm8

This is a frigging design and hardware flaw. I had this issue with my previous YB as well. What were they thinking? It kills me. I want my money back. There are other areas with iesuse. pretty much upper %15 is full of issues, your lines might get wiggly!
It sounds like noone from Wacom or Lenovo tested these devices for real.