I am still using an iPhone 4. Out of five iPhone 4/4s I bought only two are usable. The three other ones triggered eye strain in just a few seconds. However, the iPhone is getting slower, and the screen size is not really what you use nowadays. Do you have a Smartphone with current technology that is perfectly usable throughout the day?

I use a Note 3 SM-N900W8 (purchased Oct 24th 2013, was having issues with PWM then, got a migraine from being in the store too long :() I never bothered to check for PWM as it was less of an issue in phone displays back then but I never had problems with the display. Recently checked with Canon T5i and it shows up as higher frequency than usual >300hz which is a safe zone normally. And I cannot detect PWM using pen test (insert S-Pen joke here) However Samsung phones made in 2014 and after have terrible PWM worse than this. Friend got a headache from trying the S5 in store, think later batches of the Galaxy S4 may be affected, etc.

I am iPhone 4s with iOS 7.1.2, and it's smooth enough because I don't usually use apps on it. (I surf the web on computer) I think iOS 6 is better on iPhone 4. :>

@"JTL"#p236 I hate Samsung mostly because of the screen. The same feeling as yours.

I've got a LG LGL34C for about a year now and haven't had any issues with it. Dunno if it's fast or not but it's usable... so that's good enough for me!

@"Slacor"#p251 Heh. I had a LG-C55 about four years ago running Android 2.2. Think was laggy as crap but it didn't use PWM, took 10 seconds to open the dialer, etc.

Did anyone try the BlackBerry Leap?

I use an iPhone 4s and I hate it :( It gives me instant eye strain + headaches. Its original OS (I don't remember which one it was) seemed a lot better than the new updated ones. I wish I could revert it back to how it was.. but oh well.

Yes, that is true. I had to downgrade my iPhone 4 to iOS 6 because on iOS 7.1.2 I got severe eye strain and headaches. I switched back and forth several times to be sure. I think there is a newer hack tool that allows you to downgrade iPad 2 and iPhone 4s to iOS 6.1.3. I read about it in reddit's jailbreak section. I believe it is called something like Odysseus. But I can not guarantee that it is safe to use and free of malware. I think iOS 5 was the original OS.

Also I might be able to go to a phone store soon with my fast shutter speed DSLR to test for flickering in newer smartphones. Also people on my family also own, alongside the Samsung's I mentioned. - LG Nexus 5 - iPhone 6s (I don't like iPhone's :P) will test those later.

I tried the BlackBerry Leap now. It is not the worst LED device I ever used, but it still starts to hurt a little after 1-2 minutes. At night the minimum brightness is a little too bright for me.

Usable Smartphones?

Sfrix

Hi! I use Sony e5 from march, and I don't have any eye strain. 3 times something change and I feel strain, but after hard reset it is fully comfortable.
Previous I used iPhone 4 - no strain, 4s - horrible strain, 6 - permanent strain after one hour, Samsung S5600 - permanent small strain, Moto e4 2017 - permanent small strain.

Does anyone use Sony XZ1? this phone have PWM, but in store after 5 minutes use, it's fully comfortable.
New iPhones and iPads doesn't have PNW, but I still have hard strain.

martin

Sfrix Its not clear if they do not have it. Apple only claims they dont. They use many different display suppliers. Unless you test for it yourself with proper oscilloscope, you do not know and I would not trust them on their claims.

ryans

Sfrix So Sounds like PWM is not your problem. Have you found a phone that works for you?

degen

martin Did Apple really make any claims regarding PWM? Doesn't seem in keeping with how they operate. Claiming a device as PWM free would mean previous devices PWM driven devices as faulty and Apple never admits its hardware as faulty unless forced by safety recall.

martin

degen you are right, they actually never did. People claim they do not use it anymore, but never apple. I still wonder whether my iphone 4s is a lucky unit that doesnt use pwm. Need to get proper gear to finally test it.

JTL

martin @TechSensitive I interviewed the head of Apple display engineering back in 2015 and he says the majority of Apple products with LED backlit displays made after late 2009 use PWM around 120Khz below 50% brightness, otherwise there is no PWM.

Sadly he is very busy and the person who connected me with him has retired from AAPL.

Notebookcheck has upgraded their oscilloscope and are able to detect it now.

kammerer

ensete I'm using Redmi 3s with "Reading Mode" enabled without any problems. As i know Xiaomi provides two types of screen for this model (BOE и EBBG), my device has BOE one.

KM

I tried Android 8.0 (OxygenOS) on my OnePlus 3, but it's extremely unusable, like 7.1. Burning eyes and feeling exhausted just by looking at the screen for an extended period of time. I installed the firmware files (proprietary blobs by OnePlus), modem firmware excluded, from the usable Android 7.0 OxygenOS release over the 8.0 installation: The OS still works, but no relief. I installed LineageOS 7.1x (current) with the 7.0 firmware files: no relief. So it looks like the device firmware might not be responsible for this problem.

degen

JTL Very cool that you got this spot on years ago. That inside connection was super legit.

martin

JTL I see! Its very weird to think my nervous system would notice 120khz, but I feel how I feel when I try to use these.
Cant they just stop making this shitty tech? PWM, shitty light spectrum, and expensive anyways. I wonder if it also affects other people who dont notice it and we are actually the lucky ones to avoid it long term.

Im building an oscope from my external sound card and some cable and soldered photodiode using freeware scope software. Ill post if I get any results. The amplitude of the flicker is very important as well for us I believe.

ensete

martin Cant they just stop making this shitty tech? PWM, shitty light spectrum, and expensive anyways. I wonder if it also affects other people who dont notice it and we are actually the lucky ones to avoid it long term.

Remember, we are the tiny minority. The truth is unless something impacts them directly, most people just don't care.

I agree that we are ahead of the curve, all we can hope if that the public and science will catch up with us. Keep spreading awareness wherever you can

JTL

martin

martin I see! Its very weird to think my nervous system would notice 120khz, but I feel how I feel when I try to use these.

I highly doubt it's your nervous system noticing 120Khz PWM. A good way to check would be to find a "known good" LED light that doesn't cause any symptoms when constantly DC driven and run it at 120Khz PWM with an Arduino.

martin Cant they just stop making this shitty tech? PWM, shitty light spectrum, and expensive anyways. I wonder if it also affects other people who dont notice it and we are actually the lucky ones to avoid it long term.

Apple balanced the aspect of making a flicker-free display with preserving color accuracy. I say we "won the war" with PWM now that more flicker free laptops and such are available now.

TechSensitive

martin You're probably not affected by that flicker at 120 kHz. That's an incredible frequency way beyond even the most conservative recommendations.

reaganry

JTL thats a good idea with the 'known good' and arduino. it does seem like there are some leds out there that i can handle. maybe certain colors like a yellow-green.

martin

JTL if that is the case, why are thr devices still unusable? Dithering, LED color?
Im taking macushield supplements that should make me as indifferent to blue light from LEDs as 90% of the people who have no issues, but so far not much difference.
Are you covinced its dithering then?

Im not an engineer to be easily able to build the arduino test device. Would have to study it and it doesnt seem like a fast task. Thank you for the tip though, goes on my list.

ensete

martin Im taking macushield supplements that should make me as indifferent to blue light from LEDs as 90% of the people who have no issues, but so far not much difference.

Careful buying into those claims. Non of that shit has been through extensive testing. I took every eye suppliment on the market, non of them made a lick of difference.

Jerry

I recently purchased an iphone 8 plus for my wife. I tried it for about half hour with 100% brightness and night shift constantly on. Did not get harsh headaches, but still feel uncomfortable. I will try to find another time to test it for a longer period of time and report back.

degen

Jerry iPhone at 100 is reaaaaaallly bright.

Sometimes personally I have it on 0 brightness, Night Shift set to max, and Reduct white point set to 65%, in a dark room.

JTL

degen iPhone at 100 is reaaaaaallly bright

Ow 😛

Jerry

degen Thanks. Will try it again with the new settings.

vince

iPhone 8 plus works for me. True tone on, brightness at a lower setting.

ensete

Another data point: my buddy has a Samsung Galaxy S5 (older phone) and I was able to use it with zero eye strain

ryans

ensete Me too, have you tried any more modern phones that don't give you eye strain? Google Pixel and Galaxy S8 both do!

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