Dim T60 Flexview Panel - Questions

[DarkScythe]

Hello,

I'm trying to wrap my head around this issue right now, and could use some help. Since my T42 died, I decided to go for a cheaply priced T60 from this forum. I intiially thought it was a pretty good deal, but I'm stumbling across some problems with it.

First off, the warranty was advertised as expired, but checking the serial number shows that it is in fact, still in warranty. I checked this after stumbling onto the next issue.

The T60 came with an IPS Flexview screen by LG (LP150E05-A2.) However, when I went to calibrate it, the software was telling me the screen was incredibly dim - and it looked kind of dim as well. I compared it with a friend's T42 which has a Flexview (I believe it's an IDTech, IBM1A5E) and his screen was considerably brighter. I checked the ThinkWiki and it said these screens were supposed to have a brightness of about 200 nits. The software was reporting my screen had about 110 nits. This is probably just a backlight going or something, so I went to see what I could do about it, maybe ask IBM to replace it. My friend also noted that the colors were very different on my panel. However, this could be due to either the backlight going or just a different panel, but the colors look very different - almost oversaturated.

So, I went to look up warranty information and found that discrepancy. Then I did a parts lookup on the machine, and oddly enough, it says the T60 originally shipped with a 15" XGA screen - not a Flexview. It also says my unit came with a 9-cell battery and a 90w AC adapter, but the seller gave me a 6-cell and a 65w adapter saying that's what it came with. I wonder if IBM would replace these..

My main issue is the LCD. I'm trying to figure out what's the best course of action for this thing. The backlight probably needs to be replaced/repaired, but then the color difference is also disconcerting. From the sticky in this forum, there are only 2 models of Felxview - SXGA+ and UXGA. However, it doesn't state what manufacturers there are.

As I understand it, LG-Philips and Boe-Hydis made the SXGA+ ones, although Boe-Hydis eventually dropped out of that and made the UXGA ones. It also appears the common concensus is that the Boe-Hydis screens are superior to that of the LG-Philips. What happened to IDTech? They never made any Flexviews for the T60? Should I bother trying to replace the LCD with a Boe-Hydis?

All in all, this is somewhat aggravating, as I thought it was a nice deal, but all these problems are cropping up as I inspect it more throughly.

For those that skipped the long post (I'm sorry for the length) here's a digest of my questions:

1. Will IBM service my machine if the LCD panel has been replaced (but didn't break anything?)

2. Will IBM replace the 9-cell battery and 90w AC adpater that originally came with the unit, since I got a 6-cell and 65w adapter instead?

3. Is a dim LCD screen and possibly oversaturated colors caused by a dying CCFL, or something else?

4. Is the LG-Philips panel very bad, and should I replace it with an SXGA+ Boe-Hydis or IDTech?

Again, sorry for the long post and all the questions, I'm just getting very frustrated right now.

Thanks in advance!

[Harryc]

1. Will IBM service my machine if the LCD panel has been replaced (but didn't break anything?)

Ans. - Most likely not if it is not the original LCD.

2. Will IBM replace the 9-cell battery and 90w AC adpater that originally came with the unit, since I got a 6-cell and 65w adapter instead?

Ans. - The battery is well past warranty, and they'd only replace the original AC adapter if it were bad. You don't even have the original.

3. Is a dim LCD screen and possibly oversaturated colors caused by a dying CCFL, or something else?

Ans. - Since it's a replacement I'd check the part numbers used for the LCD cable and inverter. Also, is the LCD set on maximum brightness in BIOS?

4. Is the LG-Philips panel very bad, and should I replace it with an SXGA+ Boe-Hydis or IDTech?

Ans. - I'd find out why it is dim before worrying about replacement.,

Please PM me the machine type/model and serial number from this Thinkpad.

[EricRC]

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Flexview# ... _.28IPS.29

Pls have a look at the link above,maybe there's some useful info about your LCD.
It seems that Flexview LCD on T60's are only provided by LG-Philips.

For the CCFL backlight problem,pls check out here http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... fl+ill+fix
Since I don't think Lenovo would serve your thinkpad if you have replaced your LCD panel unofficially.

[Johan]

@ DarkScythe:

My comments: Your T60 (15” SXGA+) should/has to comply with the LCD specifications as given by Lenovo in the Personal Systems Reference - Lenovo ThinkPad Notebooks, 2005 to present - withdrawn, June 2008 - Version 341. There, both the SXGA+ and the UXGA panels are shown to be 200 nits luminance.

As to which manufacturers have been delivering FlexView/IPS panels on T60’s, I suggest you see the sticky LCDs on T60/T60p - types, availability and other discussions, where this issue has been extensively discussed. Additional information is available in (many) other threads, incl. Another IPS question. In the 15 inch LCD service parts - ThinkPad T60, T60p (many models) you will see the currently specified LCD manufacturers of SXGA+ and UXGA FlexView/IPS panels.

About your friends T42 Flexview panel – was it SXGA+ or UXGA? (if a regular ”non-p” T42 it would have been SXGA+); that would have one of the panels e.g. seen at the list in the ThinkWiki LCD list being either the IDTech N150P3 or the LG-Philips LP150E05. Both would be 200 nits – you may find data/data sheets at one or more of these sites: e.g. LCD Datasheet & LCD specification. or IDTech datasheets or BECK GmbH & Co. Elektronik Bauelemente or LCD panels in laptops.

In your T60, have you tried to go into the BIOS and check if LCD brightness is set to ”Normal” og ”High”? If set to ”Normal” and if running on battery, it will appear more ”low” than ”Normal”! If you want to play safely with the BIOS settings, you may see/try how/where you can alter this setting in the BIOS simulator - ThinkPad T42/p with fingerprint reader (go to Config --> Display --> Brightness). This emulator is for T42's, but as far as I recall, the T60 BIOS is very similar.

A friend of mine has a 15” FlexView/IPS T60 (a 2007-QPG), and it is nice and clear – with no signs of the dimm behaviour you describe. This T60 has the 42T0324 LCD discussed in the thread Manufacturer of 42T0324? (15" T60 SXGA+ FlexView LCD).

PS: A suggestion: The title you have chosen for this thread is not at all saying what the thread is about?! Consider updating the title to reflect the issue/thread contents - oherwise we may up with a lot of threads with titles such as: "Help!" or "Answer this question" or "Having problem with a computer"...

Johan

[Troels]

As I understand it, LG-Philips and Boe-Hydis made the SXGA+ ones, although Boe-Hydis eventually dropped out of that and made the UXGA ones. It also appears the common concensus is that the Boe-Hydis screens are superior to that of the LG-Philips. What happened to IDTech? They never made any Flexviews for the T60? Should I bother trying to replace the LCD with a Boe-Hydis?

The SXGA+ Viewiz/Flexview LCD from Boe-Hydis is, like the ultra-rare 13N7194, operating in "sRGB mode". But like the 13N7194 UXGA, it was never really possible to order it with this LCD, so either it was too expensive, or there was not enough demand to set up a production of the SXGA+. The production of the 13N7194 might be as low as 400 units. I have number 320, and i recently saw no. 256 offered in an auction on a Chinese site with a stock of 98 units.

IDtech was a joint venture between Chi-Mei and IBM. The original "Idtech" LCDs are actually from Japan, and all starts with an IAUX14N is an IPS UXGA LCD - but it looks slightly different than the flexviews we know - the backlighting is not as bright, but otherwise it is the same. Chi Mei took over the production of the flexviews (onlu UXGA and SXGA+), which changed name to N150U3 for example. They are brighter, and a few mm thinner.
When IBM sold all their PC assets in late 2004, they also dropped out of the LCD manufacture businness, so Idtech was shut down and sold to Sony. Chi-Mei stopped production of the IPS flexviews around the end of 2005.
This joint venture probably costed an awful lot of money, considering the market share.
Lenovo actually sold some batches of the T60p with an overstock of N150U3-L01 in April 2007, but that was it. But that's probably why there is no SXGA+ from IDtech on the T60/p.

[DarkScythe]

Thank you for all the helpful posts. To respond-

Harryc
I figured since it was not a CRU it may void the warranty, however I have read that some people have successfully swapped out non-CRU's such as the CPU and still receiving warranty because it didn't damage anything. I was wondering if it might be the same for this case, since the Thinkpad still works fine, it's just dim.

I didn't expect to be able to replace the battery or AC adapter through them, but wouldn't hurt to try..

Is there a way I can check the part numbers for everything without opening up the Thinkpad? It is set to "Normal" brightness in BIOS.

As far as why the LCD is dim, the only reason I can think of is the backlight, but I'm not very knowledgeable about LCDs so this is only my educated guess.

EricRC
I have checked that already, thank you. I also know about Jamiphar's business as it's been recommended to me before, but I was trying to see if I could get IBM to do it before spending another $150.

Johan
Thank you for the confirmation - yes it is supposed to be 200 nits according to the twbook, but mine is only around 110 nits. My friend's T42 OTOH is right around, or slightly above 200 nits.

I have checked that sticky already and know that there are possibly 3 manufacturers for the panels - IDTech, Boe-Hydis and LG-Philips. It seems the IDTech panels are long since gone, and since I want to stay with SXGA+, Boe-Hydis appears to not be an option either, as they only made SXGA+ panels for a very limited amount of time.

My friend's T42 was an SXGA+ 1400x1050 panel (same as my old T42.) He firmly believes his is an IDTech, but PC Wizard is giving him a weird serial number for it (IBM1A5E instead of N150P3.) All of our panels should be 200nits, but mine is clearly not, and put side-by-side, the difference is very clear. My panel at maximum brightness is about his at near the lowest brightness.

My T60 is set to "Normal" brightness in BIOS, however I have run these comparisons with AC power plugged in on both units. I thoguht maybe my 65W AC adapter wasn't providing enough power to fully power the display since it was supposed to come with a 90W adapter, so I turned it up to "high" in BIOS, turned every other setting I could think of to "high" also, and pulled the plug to go into battery (which should be able to provide full power) and... it still got (slightly) dimmer!

I have no idea what I should title this thread though.. I'll try to think of a better one.

Troels
I thought the Boe-Hydis sRGB panel was never put into production from reading one of the threads linked by Johan. If I were to change my LCD, the only other SXGA+ offering besides the LG-Philips panel is the older SXGA+ Boe-Hydis panel (I assume does not run in sRGB.) The IDTech panels weren't available for the T60's except for a few units with NOS units, so I don't think I can feasibly find that one. Actually, if the panel doesn't run in sRGB mode, what does it run in? I thought sRGB was the standard mode for most LCDs (at least that was the impression I got after doing research into wide-gamut LCDs.)

Still, is the quality vastly better than the LG-Philips, or would that one be fine if it were brighter? At the moment the colors are VERY different from my friend's T42.

[Troels]

Troels
I thought the Boe-Hydis sRGB panel was never put into production from reading one of the threads linked by Johan. If I were to change my LCD, the only other SXGA+ offering besides the LG-Philips panel is the older SXGA+ Boe-Hydis panel (I assume does not run in sRGB.) The IDTech panels weren't available for the T60's except for a few units with NOS units, so I don't think I can feasibly find that one. Actually, if the panel doesn't run in sRGB mode, what does it run in? I thought sRGB was the standard mode for most LCDs (at least that was the impression I got after doing research into wide-gamut LCDs.)

Still, is the quality vastly better than the LG-Philips, or would that one be fine if it were brighter? At the moment the colors are VERY different from my friend's T42.

Hmm, what is the part number for the "older" SXGA+ Boe-Hydis panel?
The reason why i said sRGB mode, is because it is what B-H calls it, but it means that it is following the "triangle" of the gamut for sRGB, but still is at a 45% gamut like 99% other notebook displays. Normal notebook displays don't follow the triangle as well. sRGB is 72% of NTSC. The problem is that notebook panels are all 6 bit due to power and size considerations. A higher color gamut is pretty useless here, since banding would be much more apparent when the 6 bit values are stretched over larger nuances of color. For wide gamuts, minimum 8 bit is needed. 10 bit is better.

I think the quality is very similar to the LG-philips. From what i've "heard" through the years, the LG Philips is the most vibrant LCD. If it is as accurate as the IDtechs i don't know. 110 nits sounds like something is very wrong... Maybe the inverter does not put out the right voltage. Maybe it wasn't changed when the LCD was replaced to the LG-Philips from the XGA? There could be a voltage requirement difference. The part numbers for XGA and SXGA+ inverters are different. Just a thought

[DarkScythe]

I'm not sure what the part number for that one was.
The one listed on the IBM page is 13N7196.. I don't know if that's the mysterious sRGB one that was never in production or something though. In the thread Another IPS question it's said that Boe-Hydis made an SXGA+ screen for a very limited amount of time.

I assume the vast color difference between our Thinkpads could be attributed to the fact that his is an IDTech and mine is an LG? I don't think I can get an IDTech panel anymore, and I've no idea about the Boe-Hydis ones.

I'm not sure how to check the parts without opening it up though - is that the only way?

[Troels]

The 13N7196 is the SXGA+ only flexview B-H lcd, and is still rare to see. It's part number is HV150P01-100, and it is advertised, unlike the 13N7076 as: "High Color Gamut / Color Management Function" in the B-H 2004 product calatologue.
The normally seen HV150UX1-100 a.k.a 13N7076 is not marked as such. The HV150UX1-102 a.k.a. 13N7194 is described in the datasheet just as the HV150P01-100, just with UXGA resolution - the color gamut is the same.

Yes, there is likely a large difference between the Idtech and LG-philips.
If you want an Idtech in your T60, it will not work without reprogramming the on-board EEPROM with a new EDID. You'll also need a simple I2C programmer.
You can probably still order the Idtech as replacement part, or search on ebay. Keep in mind that it is easier to generate pressure marks on these Lcds than the ones from B-H. So shipping can be a problem, if the sender isn't careful.
There's no way to check the inverter part no. without removing the screen bezel unfortunately. Or perhaps ask the seller what the deal about the LCD is, if it was upgraded from the XGA and what he did about the inverter - or if it's just an error in the parts lookup

[DarkScythe]

Sorry for the delay in updating this thread, got busy with work, but managed to get in touch with the seller for a little bit.

I'm not entirely sure if it's really worth the hassle of changing the LCDs, I'm just going by what I hear.. I can't really find any good proof for these claims either (ie; pictures) it's just people saying Boe-Hydis is superior, LG is meh, etc. And I was used to the IDTech screen on my old T42, so I'm not sure how different this LG is since it's so dim.

Anyway, the seller mentioned that the unit did originally come with an XGA LCD and that he bought a Flexview panel off of eBay, and sent it to a thrid party company to install it for him. He didn't mention (or know of) buying another inverter or backlight, so it might very well be that the backlight is fine and it's simply the inverter not supplying the proper voltage. I was going to ask some more questions but he had to leave suddenly. I hope he's not going to disappear on me.

Anyway, I've no idea what inverter to get.. and I'm not very confident of my ability to replace one either. The furthest I've gone is to re-seat my CPU heatsink with some fresh thermal paste, but I hear the LCD area is much more delicate. If this is the case, the only person I've been recommended to turn to around here is Jamiphar, but $150 to replace an inverter sounds a bit much.. I'm not even completely sure it's the inverter either. There are just too many unknowns.

[Troels]

Heh, well regardless of how great others are saying a specific LCD is, only you can tell what you think is the best. If it's not bright enough, it isn't.
You're actually not the only who is saying this, so there may be something about it. Judging from an old edition of LG-Philps' webpage it is supposed to be identical in brightness to all other flexviews, i.e. 200 nits.
Just for the fun of it, could you take a picture of the LCD showing a white background at full brightness, and post a link to it here, or PM? I can do the same with an Boe-hydis UXGA and a T42 Idtech SXGA+ Flexviews with the same camera settings.
I don't have any from LG Philips though... that would have been cool, but if the difference is large, i'd say either the inverter wasn't changed, or the backlight is performance is off spec.

The inverter is an external component, which is actually sitauated at the same board as the power, hdd, wlan etc. lights. It is fixed by the screw you see next to the wlan light. I thought $150 was for backlight replament which is an extremely hard task. He will probably charge less for an inverter swap - just a guess.

[qviri]

So, I went to look up warranty information and found that discrepancy. Then I did a parts lookup on the machine, and oddly enough, it says the T60 originally shipped with a 15" XGA screen - not a Flexview. It also says my unit came with a 9-cell battery and a 90w AC adapter, but the seller gave me a 6-cell and a 65w adapter saying that's what it came with.

Anyway, the seller mentioned that the unit did originally come with an XGA LCD and that he bought a Flexview panel off of eBay, and sent it to a thrid party company to install it for him.

Was the Thinkpad that you bought this 2613-CTO? If so, that's even more bizarre, since that product number is a T60p Configure-To-Order, and as far as I know, configuring an 15" XGA was never an option for the T60p. Nor did the T60p come with X1300 graphics - you may have gotten a machine assembled from several parts.

Do the product and serial numbers in the BIOS agree with the sticker at the bottom of the laptop?

[DarkScythe]

Thanks for the quick reply.

I could take a picture, but I'm not sure how representative it would be as besides camera settings, ambient lighting conditions can also affect it. I would compare it with my desktop LCD, but since it is a TN, it obviously destroys it in brightness. (It's a few years old, I'm saving up to replace it with a good IPS LCD.) Anyway, tell me how to proceed with this picture stuff as I'm not sure how best to reflect its dimness.

I thought the inverter was in the LCD assembly, but if it's on the motherboard, I may be able to get at it.. unless there's something that requires opening the LCD assembly to get to.

I thought I could find out the part in the parts lookup page, but apparently, it's not listed.. or at least I don't think it's listed.. According to the T60/p 15" LCD replacement parts table, the 15" XGA inverter card is 42T0077, but I can't find this listed in my parts lookup table.

Yes, it would be nice if it was cheaper than $150, but I somehow doubt it would be, pessimistic thinking and all, lol.

Edit:
Yes, that is the one I purchased. Im not sure of the deal with the CTO series, I never knew it even existed until I looked it up. I'm in BIOS right now and have confirmed that the System-unit serial number listed does match with the sticker on the bottom.

[Troels]

Humn, if you can make the room completely dark, that would be the best.. but otherwise the less light the better.
Make sure the camera is focusing near the middle of the LCD, at an 90 degree angle (i.e. strictly outwards)
If you're able to, set it to between iso50 and iso400, and let it determine everything else automatically... i'll set my camera to reflect your settings afterwards.

The inverter is in the LCD assembly, but is not part of the LCD itself. Something like this: http://www.laptoprepair101.com/wp-image ... rter-6.jpg

The parts list is not very complete really, it's normally not listed.
Then you can only be positivily surprised if it's below $150... win-win

[DarkScythe]

I'll have to wait a few hours to get it completely dark then. I have a very old consumer camera though (Canon S400), so even with a tripod, I'm not sure if it will stay in focus at ISO-100. Anything above that, the picture starts becoming very grainy. I'll try something though. I assume you don't need my desktop LCD on for the picture.

I'm not sure what to say about the rest though.. That still looks like I'd need to go through all the hassle of separating the halves of the laptop in order to open up that LCD panel to get to the card.

[Troels]

Don't worry, i'm on a Canon A80 that is even older (i think), anything over iso100 becomes grainy here too. Desktop LCD is not needed.

Ahh ok.. You will not need to follow the hardware maintenance manual which says that you must remove nearly everything from the bottom part of the laptop so you can remove the hinges in order to service the lcd. In that case, you must also remove the lcd cable, wwan, wlan cable from the mainboard. But it is much easier to leave the hinges and bottom part as it should be, remove the screw covers on the LCD part, remove the screws on the top, gently twist a large but thin/sharp flat head screwdriver, near the lcd cable entrance to seperate the lcd bezel from the frame.

It will be pretty light here again in just an hour or so (it doesn't get all dark here this time of the year)... would it be ok if i grab a picture tomorrow night instead?

[DarkScythe]

That's fine by me, although my friend is advising me that taking pictures isn't a very good way of comparing brightness because

"there's variations in sensor sensitivity, shutter speed, apeture, etc. the only proper way is a light meter colorimeter or spectro"

I can see some point to that, and I'll state again that the colorimeter (Gretag Macbeth EyeOne Display2) is measuring about 110nits on my LCD at maximum brightness hooked up to AC power, so if you have a similr colorimeter, that would be an even easier way to compare. However, I'll still attempt to take a picture later tonight.

As for how to crack the thing open, I've seen horror stories about screwing up around there, and I don't want to make a bad situation worse, which is really the biggest reason I'm hesitant in opening it up to peek around. The base is pretty easy as it's basically a really short motherboard, and I've seen plenty of those. An LCD's innards are a whole different story.

[Troels]

I'll use the same shutter speed and aperture as you... but i didn't know there were differences with sensor sensitivity. That could probably make it very hard to compare it then, but it's worth a try at least

I had forgotten about your brightness measurement. I don't have a colorimeter unfortunally, no one here locally knows anyone who has one.

[DarkScythe]

Okay, just took a picture, I'll PM you with the details in a minute.

I just spoke with the seller again, and even though it's been 2 weeks since the sale, he's willing to do a refund and take the laptop back. I'm not entirely sure if that's what I want to do though..

If I could get IBM to service the machine (doubtful) or maybe see if I can ask Jamiphar about his pricing for something like this (I have yet to PM him..) and get this issue resolved cheaply it would be the best course of action. Does anyone know him to be flexible when it comes to this stuff?

The battery also has an oddly high number of cycles.. 243, but still has a decent percentage of its capacity remaining. I'll probably need to replace that eventually though. It only carries about 1.5 hours of charge. A 90W AC adapter seems fairly cheap on eBay, although he claims he received the 65W adapter from IBM and didn't know there was a difference.

[ajkula66]

Do yourself a favour and return that mutt...

You don't haggle with perfection, and James' work is just that. Take it from someone who had several backlights replaced by him over the last year.

Get your money back and get a proper T60 with IPS or whatever your heart desires.

My $0.02 only.

[DarkScythe]

Well, my friend insisted I bring it over again to test it with a different/better colorimeter, so I did that today. It was odd because every time we did it, it was giving us different brightness numbers.

We figured maybe changes in external lighting were throwing it off as it's quite sensitive, so this time we put the 2 laptops side by side, made the room as dark as possible, then placed a cardboard box on top of the laptop before beginning the calibration. After a few runs with this, it seems that both our laptops are roughly in the 160nits range, +/- 5 or so between the two. My LCD, however, does have a warmer color temperature, so everything looks a little bit more yellow than his. Still, that's a very large difference from the 107nits we measured before, so I'm not sure what to do anymore - or if there's even anything wrong with it.

[ajkula66]

Yellow is NOT a good sign on any FlexView...

[DarkScythe]

Well, I know yellow is bad, it was very severe on my old T42 LCD, but the color temperature measured with the colorimeter was I think 5500K vs something like 5800K. Are they all supposed to have a higher color temperature?

[ajkula66]

I measure with my eyes and am rarely wrong...

LCDs get yellowish tint from prolonged exposure to a dying backlight, smoking environment or both, this covers about 95% of the cases that I've known of.

FlexViews kill backlights much faster than standard TN panels, so my assumption would be that the yellow tint and the lack of brightness are related on your T60.

[DarkScythe]

Well, this laptop has 2 years of EZserv warranty left, so I decided to give IBM a call today. I just got off the phone with them.

The representative told me that although the LCD panel was replaced, they would still service the machine - which was a bit surprising. I told her it was a bit yellow and she immediately said that was a bad thing and started opening up a case for me.

I said the seller might not have swapped out the inverter, but she says if the LCD panel was changd, so was the inverter because they're part of the same assembly. I'm not sure if she meant this is how it comes from IBM as I didn't mention the seller bought the panel off eBay.

Either way, I asked to have the backlight changed, and she said the techs would replace the whole LCD assembly. I doublechecked to make sure they wouldn't downgrade me back down to a 15" XGA since that's what is listed as originally coming with this machine. She claims the techs will not downgrade anything on the laptop.. I hope this is true.

She also says that the 65W AC adapter shouldn't cause any problems, stating the only issue will probably be slower battery charging speeds. Unfortunately the battery is far out of warranty, so I'm out of luck there.. I might have to put up a WTB thread some time for a T60 battery then.

I forgot to mention the heatsink noise though.. would it be OK if I included a note with the laptop to have them change out the heatsink as well? Problem is I also upgraded the machine with a fingerprint reader, and it came with an NMB keyboard, niether of which I want to lose. I'll take out the HD, and can swap in a non-fingerprint reader palmrest, but I don't have any other T60 keyboards.

All in all, let's hope this works out well.

[DarkScythe]

Okay, well just an update. Surprisingly, the laptop managed to get back to me yesterday, so it seems to have gone through the 'repair' process and shipped out the same day it arrived at the EZserv center. Anyway, according to the report that came back with it, the technician completely ignored the backlight, and instead decided to change the inverter.

I went back to my friend's place today to use his colorimeter, and went through the same steps as last time, including the cardboard box. And the results say.... it's exactly the same as before I sent it out. 5500K color temperature and about 160nits brightness. I'm not sure if I want to send it in again to replace the backlight.. my friend says it's probably fine and I'm just being paranoid after the death of my T42's Flexview, but I'm not sure anymore. For the moment, at least I'm not struggling to see the screen, so I suppose I can maybe live with it for a while longer.

[wild_bill]

DarkSkythe - I have the LG Philips SXGA+ screen in two of my T60's and both are quite dim and with a yellowish tint, I am going to replace with a Boe Hydis UXGA screen, did anyone ever determine whether the sRGB rare model is actually better than the common version (13N7076)?

Does anyone know a bargain source for new Boe-Hydis UXGA screens?

[DarkScythe]

Whoa, old thread is old.

Sorry for the late reply, I've been very busy with work lately.

Anyway, wild_bill, I can't help you there because I never actually got around to replacing my T60's LCD screen.
All I remember was when I tried looking for Boe-Hydis screens back then, they were rare and expensive, so I didn't go for it.
Are you certain the screens themselves are outputting much lower luminance than normal, or is it because of contrast with a really brightly lit room? Even with a colorimeter, I kept getting varied readings until I decided to place a cardboard box over it to completely rule out external lighting.

Do let us know how the Boe-Hydis screen goes, though, I'm still curious about it.

[macklow]

I have two t60p laptops, one with the 13N7194 screen and the other with the 13N7076.

The 13N7076 is brand-new so it's a bit brighter. Let me know if anyone would like side-by-side comparisons... the t60p with the 13N7076 is going on ebay real soon.

[dr_st]

I have two t60p laptops, one with the 13N7194 screen and the other with the 13N7076.

The 13N7076 is brand-new so it's a bit brighter. Let me know if anyone would like side-by-side comparisons... the t60p with the 13N7076 is going on ebay real soon.

Side-by-side comparison would be much welcome. I briefly had two T60 SXGA+ IPS computers in my possession, before I sold one. One had a 1.5-yr old LCD, one had a 2-months old one. The difference was glaring. I can't believe it slipped my mind to take pictures.