Database Users

Is there a way to make the screen less bright?

I know we have the auto setting, and can adjust the brightness through the notification bar. But at night, watching TV I find the screen far too bright. Is there an app or setting where I can make the screen dimmer than the low setting in the default range?

Lower than the lowest setting in Settings > Sound & Display > brightness?
That's pretty low. hmmm?

yeap. In a dark room with just the TV on the low setting is still pretty bright.

I have actually had this same thought. We were at the movies and I really wanted to play around with my phone but even on the lowest setting it was too bright.

Pneumatic said:
I have actually had this same thought. We were at the movies and I really wanted to play around with my phone but even on the lowest setting it was too bright.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
that must have been one boring movie

Nah I was just a geek with a new toy.

Maybe editing the init.rc?

Blueman101 said:
that must have been one boring movie
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Holy hell my first thought too. LOL
Sent from my PC36100 using XDA App

delete double post

for me
new toy > all else.
Movies will be fun again in a few weeks

I was also wondering if there was a way to reduce the brightness more than the allotted minimum. I spend much of my time in a pretty dim environment and even the lowest brightness is slightly uncomfortable.
Magicked from my Vibrant by tube traversing XDA elves.

I agree the screen while it looks amazing is way too bright in the dark. I checked my messages in the morning before sun-up and was nearly blinded by the screen.

There has to be a way to make the screen less bright. I know the app "Dimmer" from the market can make the brightness go down to 10 (out of 255), but I've read that with a rooted phone you're able to get your brightness down to 2. I don't have my phone rooted personally, so would someone else care to check?
And yes, 10 is still too bright for my tastes. It's a lot brighter than my laptop screen at its lowest brightness, and makes it a pain to use at night.

I have rooted mine and with Dimmer can take it down to 2. However, it doesn't change much - it is still VERY bright in a dark room.
Here's the deal: The screen is super AMOLED. That means that unlike 99% of the phones out there it is NOT back-lit. Every dot on the screen is a super organic LED. Think about those super-bright (annoying) blue LEDs on your PC that hurt your eyes at night. Now think 800 x 480....
Here's the fix: The only way I have been able to make the screen less bright is to use less active pixels - that means using a black wallpaper (all pixels off), less icons on the screen and a black background with light or gray text in apps. I haven't yet figured out how to make the default web background black - instead of white. If someone knows how, let me know.
To get a quick black wallpaper, take a picture of nothing in a dark room and set it as wallpaper.

Amoled screen question...

Hey, I saw an app around that uses a pixel or whatever on the screen ad an led notification. Apparently it was stated that no energy is consumed when the pixels are black but upon viewing a pitch black image on my Vibrant in total darkness , I can clearly see some sort of ambient back lighting that makes the screen visible. Maybe I'm just picky but.... What gives?
Also, the faint screen appears to have inconsistent areas where one spot would be brighter than others.
Sent from my sexy Vibrant using XDA App

could that "backlight" be coming from the capacitive buttons?

Dude, maybe its all the drugs you did in the 60's. I am looking hard at the screen of mine and the black is black best looking screen i have seen

The room has to be pitch black in order for you to see what I'm talking about. The capacitive buttons are not on so I dont think its that leaking onto the display. The display is very good, no doubt, but I was just questioning whether it really uses no energy for displaying black on the screen.

Screen contrast weird thing going on.

Hi
I just noticed something weird going on, the more black I have in the screen the brighter the whites get. Asif the more oleds are turned on its draining more power and making the other oleds loose overall power.
sent from I9100 using Omega

CONTRAST.
jje
Sent from my GT-I9100 using xda premium

To expand, the more black there is around the white, the more white the black seems in comparison, that is contrast.
And as the AMOLED pixel is its own light source the contract is already very high, as a black pixel is an off pixel not giving out any light.

veyka said:
To expand, the more black there is around the white, the more white the black seems in comparison, that is contrast.
And as the AMOLED pixel is its own light source the contract is already very high, as a black pixel is an off pixel not giving out any light.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hence why having a black background saves power and also lessens the chance of screen burn on amoled displays.
Sent from the valley of the shadows....

For me it is the "Auto adjust screen power" on display settings menu.

RE
Yeah i got a bit different. always when i drag the statusbar the screen gets brighter or get flickering someone got this too?

blizzari said:
Yeah i got a bit different. always when i drag the statusbar the screen gets brighter or get flickering someone got this too?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah exactly the notification menu dragging makes it really obvious.
sent from I9100 using Omega

goTouch said:
For me it is the "Auto adjust screen power" on display settings menu.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, definitely that. This function is on by default and limits the maximum power drain of the screen, so if there's a lot of white (or bright colors) on screen it will limit the overall brightness in order to save power.
I think it's very irritating and disabled this feature about 1 hour after buying the phone and never turned it back on.

Thanks guys. Auto screen power definitely the culprit. The screen is allot more uniform and "normal" now. Nicer to use.
sent from I9100 using Omega

[Q] Screen burnin?

I think I have a problem with my phone, but not too sure if it's normal. I got my phone last Friday. Whenever the screen's on a grey or white background I get discoloured faint thick lines going down it. It is like a hologram.
Just wondering if anyone has the same and how are your display's like
Thanks

your screen is defective, or your gray page isn't actually solid gray. go into a drawing app and make a solid black or white or gray page and confirm it's actually the screen and not the apps you're using.
there's no burn in on amoled. only defective screens
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using xda app-developers app

shinzomask said:
Whenever the screen's on a grey or white background I get discoloured faint thick lines going down it. It is like a hologram.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can also test your display dialing the code *#0*# and checking the 3 solid color screens (red, green, blue).

soraxd said:
your screen is defective, or your gray page isn't actually solid gray. go into a drawing app and make a solid black or white or gray page and confirm it's actually the screen and not the apps you're using.
there's no burn in on amoled. only defective screens
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I337 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As far as i know Amoled suffers in burn in. My friend's S1 and my S2 has it. Noticeable especially in low brightness. When backgrounds are gradient of black to gray, the screen looks dirty on low brightness. I saw an S3 on Samsung shop had a very visible burn in of a clock widget even on max brightness.

soraxd said:
there's no burn in on amoled. only defective screens
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Due to the different aging characteristics of the individual subpixels you will get a burn-in like screen after a while, especially where content is frequently shown. Like the clock in the notification bar. After a while/few months that spot will be seen when watching a solid colored background for example. Is the case on EVERY amoled screen there is.

Thanks for the replies.
I have tested it using a lcd test app and it is noticeable on a solid grey or white background. It's patches of faded pixels.
Was wondering if anyone with a S4 has the same problem and where would I stand with getting it replaced.
I can understand that amoleds suffer from screen burnin after sometime but not when it's brand new. My old s3 is perfect and I've had that for nearly a year.
Thanks

IMHO get it replaced.

My S4 also does this. Black and white are very good, but grey isn't very good. Check te picture below. I have also added the picture I tested it with.
Should I return it?

JoeyLe said:
My S4 also does this. Black and white are very good, but grey isn't very good. Check te picture below. I have also added the picture I tested it with.
Should I return it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
i wouldnt put up with that. I had the same thing on my first s4, had it for an hour and said im not living with that, took it back to att and got a new one. now its perfect!
swap that out

Bottom half of alarm app screen not pure black?

In all other cases where pure black is present, the color really is black thanks to the amoled screen. However, I noticed that in the stock alarm app, if you look at the bottom half below the list of alarms, the black that's there is like a hazy LCD-like black. I noticed this when I was half asleep at night setting my alarm in a dark room. Most noticeable when you look at the screen with the lights shut off in the room. Contrast that to the deep blacks found when pulling down the notification shade. Can anyone else confirm? Thanks.

s2kdriver80 said:
In all other cases where pure black is present, the color really is black thanks to the amoled screen. However, I noticed that in the stock alarm app, if you look at the bottom half below the list of alarms, the black that's there is like a hazy LCD-like black. I noticed this when I was half asleep at night setting my alarm in a dark room. Most noticeable when you look at the screen with the lights shut off in the room. Contrast that to the deep blacks found when pulling down the notification shade. Can anyone else confirm? Thanks.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was thinking that maybe since it's totally dark in your room, you're seeing glare/reflection from the menu and back button LED's... but then I guess they wouldn't be lit unless you have them set to always on. I just watched Insidious 2 so I am not going to try the dark room test :3 maybe someone else will lol

brildenlanch said:
I was thinking that maybe since it's totally dark in your room, you're seeing glare/reflection from the menu and back button LED's... but then I guess they wouldn't be lit unless you have them set to always on. I just watched Insidious 2 so I am not going to try the dark room test :3 maybe someone else will lol
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yea it's pretty obvious once you look at it. If you compare something you know is real black (like the bottom half of the notification shade, assuming you don't have much notifications at the time) to the empty bottom part of the alarm app (LCD-like hazy "black"). I'm pretty sure it's just the alarm app doing something funky by design, but just want to make sure heh. Pretty sure I have an authentic amoled panel anyway as I do see deep blacks in other situations.

s2kdriver80 said:
Yea it's pretty obvious once you look at it. If you compare something you know is real black (like the bottom half of the notification shade, assuming you don't have much notifications at the time) to the empty bottom part of the alarm app (LCD-like hazy "black"). I'm pretty sure it's just the alarm app doing something funky by design, but just want to make sure heh. Pretty sure I have an authentic amoled panel anyway as I do see deep blacks in other situations.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I couldn't resist giving you some peace of mind so I just tried it out in the bathroom. The alarm screen does have a weird black'blue hue thing going on. Especially when you compare it to the notification pull down.

brildenlanch said:
I couldn't resist giving you some peace of mind so I just tried it out in the bathroom. The alarm screen does have a weird black'blue hue thing going on. Especially when you compare it to the notification pull down.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Lol thanks... yea looks like uneven LCD-ish off-black.