Screen dims, becomes darker in fullscreen mode

[Kyle Drake]

Is there a way to turn this off? My monitor is not very bright. I
can't use fullscreen mode until I figure out how to disable this.

Thanks!

[George Nachman]

Can you take a before and after screenshot to demonstrate the problem?

[Kyle Drake]

Believe it or not, I can't. When I try to screenshot they both have
the same brightness.

So when I go to fullscreen, it slowly fades (for a few seconds) into a
darker mode. When I go out of fullscreen mode, it slowly goes to
regular brightness (again, a few seconds).

Whatever is going on it's something on the hardware level. And it dims
everything, not just the terminal app. When I go out of fullscreen the
other apps are also dimmed for a few seconds.

I'm using a MacBookPro5,5, via an external monitor attached to the
video out (and the lid's closed). OSX 10.6.7.

[Kyle Drake]

It does not do this when I use it on my macbook pro's built-in display
(with the external display disconnected). Just tested.

-Kyle

[George Nachman]

Have you tried searching to see if this is a common problem with the
external display that you have?

[Tim Gray]

On Apr 19, 2011 at 07:19 PM -0700, George Nachman wrote:
>Have you tried searching to see if this is a common problem with the
>external display that you have?

I was going to suggest something similar. What monitor are you using?
I know a lot of the new LCD TVs have a contrast boosting setting where
the backlight itself is lowered in dark scenes, i.e. scenes with a lot
of black. Assuming you are using a dark background and your monitor has
some dynamic contrast enhancement, when you flip to full screen mode,
the monitor might drop the backlight setting to make the dark background
seem darker.

Of course, I might just be making all of this up :) It's just a
thought.

[Kyle Drake]

I have two different monitors at home, I'll test this hypothesis. It
could certainly be a monitor specific thing. I will report what I
discover.

Thanks for the suggestion!

-Kyle

[Joe]

Hi,
I have a MacBook Pro6,2 also running OSX 10.6.7, and I also use an
external monitor in the same way as Kyle.
I tried to confirm this, but I cannot duplicate the problem with my
setup.
My external monitor is a SyncMaster P2770 by Samsung.
As others have suggested, it seems most likely that it is something
to do with the external monitor. Alternatively, is it possible that
it could have something to do with the 'Energy Saver' settings in
System Preferences?
-Joe

[Joe]

Hi again,
I just fiddled a bit with my monitor and was able to duplicate the
behavior Kyle is seeing.
In particular, my Samsung P2770 has a display setting in the
'picture' submenu that is labeled as 'MagicBright'. If I select the
'dynamic contrast' setting for MagicBright, then when I switch iTerm
to 'fullscreen' mode it immediately dims the picture a considerable
amount. Exiting fullscreen returns the brightness to normal levels.
Turning off the 'dynamic contrast' and selecting one of the other
options or user defined settings fixes the problem.
This sounds exactly like what Tim mentioned, so I'm guessing it is
the root of the problem and can (hopefully!) be controlled on Kyle's
monitor too.
-Joe

[Tim Gray]

On Apr 19, 2011 at 08:33 PM -0700, Joe wrote:
> I tried to confirm this, but I cannot duplicate the problem with my
>setup.

I also wasn't able to duplicate this on either my monitor at work or at
home, both run off my macbook.

[BigBadBenny]

With my P2770 I'm using either a DVI to VGA cable or DVI to DVI cable.
It works very well compared to DVI to HDMI (which exhibits darker
screen and imperfect scaling)

I've calibrated the P2770 using a Spyder 3 Elite which is great, but
I'm wondering if Contrast at 100% is a good idea.
Can anyone comment on contrast settings in DVI mode?

I'll do some tests at 50% and 75% and report back.

[orta]

This might be related to how MacBooks can dim the screen when it feels
that you're in a darker room:
http://osxdaily.com/2010/05/15/stop-the-macbook-pro-and-macbook-screen-from-dimming/

( To test that idea try doing it with a white theme )

[sies rok]

I have my pc connected to the xbox one via hdmi and had the same or similar problem on the dim on full screen, I right clicked on the desktop, clicked  on graphics options>profiles>video profiles> their you get options such as darken video, brighten, or default, clicked on default and fixed the problem.

On Tuesday, April 19, 2011 10:17:10 AM UTC-7, Kyle Drake wrote:

Is there a way to turn this off? My monitor is not very bright. I

can't use full screen mode until I figure out how to disable this.

Thanks!