My story - 2017 27” 5K iMac [SOLVED]

Eerwin · Sep 20, 2018

Hello,

I bought my first Apple product some time ago and I was really looking forward to being blown away by it. Too bad that the 2017 iMac makes me sick instead. After months of light usage mainly in the evening, last week I attempted to use it for an entire day as I was at home and my eyes felt completely dry and very strained, I started to have headache and a feeling of warmth, like motion sickness. Ouch. I decided to limit the usage drastically and now I spend max 15 minutes at the time in front of it with night mode, brightness almost at the minimum, reduced resolution, glasses and low light in the room. With these workarounds I do not have headache and motion sickness but still something doesn’t feel right, my eyes are tired, and I feel a “disoriented” after using it. At night, with soft warm light in the room, it’s a bit better but far from what I consider normal, the screen still feels extremely tiring.

Surely the reflective glass and the “aggressive” colours with high contrast don’t help with my sensitivity for too much light and glare, but I don’t think that it can explain motion sickness. Never had this kind of issue before with other screens despite having spent many many hours in front of them in the last 25 years in all sort of conditions. I’ve been in contact with Apple and to be honest the lady I talked to was extremely kind. She told me seek some medical advice first and then we’ll take it from there. We’ll see what happens on that front, but I don’t expect much to be honest.

This is a list of laptops, desktops, external screens and smartphone that have never given me any issue (only the expected blurry vision in the case of overuse):

Laptop
Dell Inspiron 1720
17" 1920 x 1200
TrueLife TFT LCD / CCFL
Intel Core2 Duo T7700 @ 2.40GHz
NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT
Windows 7 32-bit

also connected to
LG Flatron L1915S
19" 1280 x 1024 at 75 Hz
TFT active-matrix LCD (matte) / CCFL
250 cd/m²

Desktop
HP Pro 3515
AMD A4-5300 APU
AMD Radeon HD 7480D
Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit SP1 / Windows 10 (build 1803)

connected to
Acer AL1717
17" 1280 x 1024
TFT active-matrix LCD (matte) / CCFL
300 cd/m²

Laptop
HP EliteBook 840
14” 1366 x 768
i5-4300 CPU @ 1.90 GHz
Intel HD Graphics 4400
Windows 7

connected to
HP EliteDisplay E201
20" 1600 x 900 at 60Hz
TN (matte) / LED
250 cd/m²

Smarthphone LG G2
Android v4.2.2 (Jelly Bean)
True HD-IPS, 16M colors
1080x1920 pixels
Gorilla Glass 2

The screen of the Dell Inspiron was the best I have ever used, it looked fantastic from every angle, resolution was great especially for that time, colours were so alive with the glossy finish (the name TrueLife was fully justified IMO) and most importantly it was usable.

In this one week of research I’ve noticed other users trying to summarise some possible root causes behind the headaches:

Blu light
LED backlight
IPS panel
PWM
Dithering
Software shenanigans (Intel drivers, etc)

I think that in my personal case I can disregard points from 1. to 4. Initially I had some hope that just connecting an external screen would do (I’m going to do that test anyway) but I don’t expect much reading other people’s experiences. As I type this text the letters on the screen don’t seem steady, maybe you know what I mean.

Is there anything else you can infer for my specific case looking at the list of devices I have been able to use without issues?

Aandc · Sep 20, 2018

The Mac situation you described is exactly the same as mine - even symptoms are the same - feeling of disorientation, nausea, etc. as if someone tortured me a little bit
There are probably more possible root causes like FRC which is some kind of dithering, just made on subpixel level, but none of them have been confirmed yet. Maybe if we could switch them on/off it would lead us to some results.
I've been also thinking about colors on modern displays. LED might somehow affect the way that colors are represented - solid colors seem to be often oversaturated, unnatural (like watching neon vs. fire). Maybe it can also be a root cause - people's or animals brains / eyes are used to natural gamut of colors visible in the nature and LEDs adds something different that we cannot adjust to.

GGurm · Sep 20, 2018

I'm going to note that all the "good" devices that you describe fall well within the range of "devices that work for any of us because they are prior to 2011 release". GeForce 8600, Radeon 7480, Intel 4400 are all older, known-good devices. Your LG G2 is also fine (up through G3 was ok), and JellyBean is known good for Android as was Lollipop.

We don't know for sure why your Mac is bad, but we suspect dithering/color or some software rendering shenanigans as you put it.

I wish we had a better recommendation or news or even a definitive idea of what causes the issue but we simply don't.

Hhpst · Sep 20, 2018

erwin Same for me...same timeline of devices and I've seen that mentioned often by others. Something changed in the last 5 or so years and even hardware that used to be ok now isn't (for example I used a 2011 MBP fine for a few years up to Mountain Lion...tried the same model year recently in a shop (one they used behind the counter) on whatever is current MacOS and had bad strain. Linux on a 2006 Toshiba Satellite CCFL is mostly ok....same distro/settings etc on anything modern isn't. 2012 Ipad 2 on iOS9 is ok....anything newer in IOS or Android isn't. I consdiered that I developed the problem more recently, but since some of the same old hardware doesn't work now on a current OS, I cannot help but think it's either software (dithering etc) or psychosomatic. No clue at this point. I ruled out 1-4 as well.

Eerwin · Sep 21, 2018

andc hpst Considering that we have gone through similar experiences and similar symptoms, I was wondering if you have tried connecting an old monitor to your MBP/iMac? Did you have any relief from that?
I throw my old monitor away because "hey why do I need a monitor from 2005 when I've just received a brand new 5K iMac" so I need some time to buy everything needed for that experiment.

Eerwin · Sep 21, 2018

Gurm Yes I know that unfortunately no definitive root cause and fix is available at the moment and I was not expecting that. Even if I've added nothing new in terms of technical understanding of the issue and possible solutions, I still think that everyone experiencing this issue should come forward to say they are affected in order to build up to critical mass and try to get some attention from media/medical community/manufacturers.

Aandc · Sep 21, 2018

erwin
Unfortunately I don’t have an old monitor at hand, only Dell p2417h which started giving me strain recently, so it wouldn’t be a meaningful test. I’ll try it out when my eyes feel better, it might be a workaroundif it’s not a software issue.

Ddiop · Sep 21, 2018

Hi there - sounds like a similar situation to me too - any hardware/software combination was fine until I bought an iMac in 2015 (albeit the late 2013 version). Within 30 minutes it was uncomfortable and within 1-2 hours unbearable to use.

All windows versions up to 8.1 were fine, Windows 10 is uncomfortable for me, however I am more and more convinced it is due to the drivers being used rather than the OS.

I'm really interested to know if anybody here was a regular Mac user prior to 2011 and did you encounter any issues?

Hhpst · Sep 21, 2018

diop Used 2009 and 2011 Macbook Pros up to Mountain Lion without a problem. left for Linux and had no problems there until 1.5 years ago or so but was using old, old hardware. Any OS on anything modern hurts. It stands to reason something has changed in the software because even today a 2009-2013 era MBP with current MacOS....or any new device in a shop with Windows 10 on it, hurts. I don't have any MBPs anymore but would love to see if Mountain Lion on a 2011 would be ok or not as that would add evidence.

Aandc · Sep 21, 2018

I bet it has something to do with current ways of achieving high bit-depth of color gamut and graphic card companies may already know what it is, but exposing it will be a risk to them so they won't take first step. Think of it - somehow multiple graphic cards started to produce eye issues at the same time. It must be a common innovation introduced in drivers or hardware itself, something so important that all manufacturers had to include it. The list of such features can't be very long, but it requires insiders knowledge.
On the other hand I think - maybe we're looking in the wrong place. Maybe it manifests as eye/sight issues, but it's caused by something else and that's why it's so hard to find a common thing in all the situations. I'm not sure what it could be - some kind of high pitch sound coming from a part of computer, inaudible to human ear, frequency of wifi signal, or some other strange feature of modern computers that no one even is aware of.

JJTL · Sep 21, 2018

andc I doubt it's the latter. Several people here that have issues with newer Nvidia graphics card have "downgraded" to older Nvidia graphics cards and mostly "problem solved".

Aandc · Sep 22, 2018

I know, I've put too much fantasy in my last post It would be great if there were some generic Intel / Nvidia / Radeon drivers from 6-7 years ago which could be applied to any model so we could test this way. Unfortunately it looks like new machnines will be stuck with newest drivers and W10 / MacOS versions which is the worst combination.

Eerwin · Sep 22, 2018

I just had an idea: running an old version of macOS from an external drive on my brand new iMac just to see if I can see any improvement. Has anyone already tried this?

Hhpst · Sep 22, 2018

erwin I can't as I don't have an Apple laptop anymore but I'd be interested to see if it matters since I was fine on 2009-2011 MBPs up to Mountain Lion...at which point I switched to Linux. When my strain begain I quickly realized it happened on any modern OS even on a similar 2011 MBP to mine that I tried in a shop with Mojave on it. So it seems to rule out that the hardware is the problem...but just to complicate it I use Xubuntu 16.04 on an old ccfl laptop ok...but Xubuntu 16.04 on any modern laptops hurts...so that seems to point to hardware. I'd love to try Mountain Lion on old and new Macs both to see but cannot easily.

Aandc · Sep 23, 2018

How can I get an older Mac OS version to test it this way? All I could install from cloud resources on Apple servers was El Capitan - High Sierra range when I tried it for the last time.

Eerwin · Sep 23, 2018

andc I found this guide:
https://www.macworld.co.uk/how-to/mac-software/download-old-os-x-3629363/#macappstore

As far as I understand you can buy Snow Leopard (in DVD), Lion and Mountain Lion directly from Apple:
https://www.apple.com/uk/shop/product/MC573Z/A/mac-os-x-106-snow-leopard
https://www.apple.com/uk/shop/product/D6106ZM/A/os-x-lion
https://www.apple.com/uk/shop/product/D6377ZM/A/os-x-mountain-lion

For most recent releases either you already downloaded before or you will not be able to find them in the Mac App Store.

This guide is also useful to run the OS from an external drive:
https://www.macworld.co.uk/how-to/mac-software/macos-external-hard-drive-3659666/

JJTL · Sep 24, 2018

andc I might be able to retrive some older OS X versions from my collection. But not that old unfortunately.

Aandc · Sep 24, 2018

JTL
Thanks, no worries, I doubt that installing older MacOS would solve it. This computer gave me strain on every MacOS from ElCap onwards, and on W10 after screen replacement. Maybe my old ElCap installation had older drivers and everything I installed included some newer version.

Hhpst · Sep 24, 2018

andc If you can try Mountain Lion please do so...that was the last OSX I used and had zero issues. The same age of device with anything newer has caused me strain quickly. So either I have some bizarrely rare eye isues that developed since I last used Mountain Lion...or something has changed. I can also use an iPad 2 from 2012 that's stuck on iOS9 but any of the newer devices hurt. The timing is very suspicious.

Eerwin · Oct 26, 2018

I know in advance that posts like this are not the most useful to the community as there are not actionable recommendations in them, but I’m going to share this with you nevertheless as I think it’s important.
So my issue has gone away: it appeared all of a sudden, it stayed for around three weeks, and it disappeared all of a sudden. I can now use the iMac with no issue at all: no more nausea, no more headache, no more eye strain.
What I think has happened is that the eye issue was one of the side effects that appeared with the treatment that I was given for my inflammatory autoimmune disease. I’ve been taking an immune system suppressor since July and I had a few side effects that appeared at different points in time, stayed for some time, and then disappeared.
While I was having issues using the iMac, I also had issues focusing on my direct-LED VA panel TV, but now that problem has gone away too.
It was hell during those three weeks and this experience has made me much more sensitive to eye issues caused by changes of technology, because while I was having issues with the iMac I had no problem at all with old computers.
For your info, the discussion with Apple went literally nowhere as the “kind lady” didn’t call me back as agreed and stopped replying to my emails. For some reasons I thought that Apple may have been as customer oriented as Amazon, but this is certainly not the case.
I wish all of you all the best and please let me know if you have questions.