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Screen color on MK2i?

DMJ747
over 3 years ago

So in all the website photos and on the reviews the colors on the watch face seem crisp and bright. But no matter what level of screen brightness I put it on all the colors are flat and desaturated.

Heck one watch face I use shows reds and oranges as bright distinct in the demo photos but on my watch there is very little difference between the two and they both look kind of pinkish.

Is there a setting I'm missing that kicks up the contrast and makes the colors pop?

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Transflective displays always have low color saturation. That's the nature of the technology and it's how the device is able to have a long battery life with good readability in bright sunlight. Most other Garmin devices are the same. If you want brighter colors you can get a device with an AMOLED display like a Venu, but the battery life will be worse.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Sadly no, I have to admit I was less than happy when I got my Mk2i, but have slowly realized I can live with it as it looks good in sunlight, so my wife's suggestion was simply stop being indoors and get out.

    But on a more serious note, a setting allowing user to sacrifice battery life in order to improve brightness and contrast would be great, 90% of the time we are all near a charger so having to charge every 2-4 days would likely not inconvenience anyone. If we could toggle it when we know we need battery it would work well, something like the power management settings.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Peter.Bomberg

    Are there polarised screen protectors you could put on the watch face? Presumably that would at least sharpen the contrast by removing any ambient glare

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Peter.Bomberg

    You can go into System settings and configure the backlight to be always on with 100% brightness.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to nradov

    the backlight is actually what causes the washout, reducing it helps with the color saturation 

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    Ok, a lot more testing, but the colors seem best if the backight is set to 20% or less and yes the screen looks amazing in bright sunlight, everything else not soo much. I am annoyed none of the reviews showed this issue as it's glaring but I would still have bought the watch as it's the best sports/diving watch out there.

  • 0 over 3 years ago in reply to Peter.Bomberg

    I actually think this is the best transflective Garmin display I've ever had, but I've been using them for years. The backlight at 100% actually looks pretty darn good. The blacks are actually black! But yeah, it's definitely a bit jarring the first time you use one. While I do feel the marketing photos are misleading, so are the photos of every competitor using similar tech, so they almost have to. Not defending the practice or anything, I just think it's reality.

  • 0 over 3 years ago

    I have now spent more time with my watch and here are my observations. The color is great when the ambient light is strong (outside they are really nice, indoors good and as soon as the backlighting is over 40% not good at all.

    But I have also dialed back the backlight to 20% and have no issues reading the screens at all, I have not tried diving yet so no clue what it's like at depth but I suspect it will be really easy to read as I don't want color at depth anyways (big bold numbers please, so I can read at a glance)