"False claims" land Apple in Hot Soup

Nearly a month after dealing with battery problems in its MacBook and MacBook Pro notebook computers, Apple Inc. has been slapped with a class-action lawsuit, accusing the computer maker of making "false claims" about the above said models’ displays.

The lawsuit, filed in California Superior Court in San Diego by private citizens Fred Greaves and Dave Gatley, claims that the advertising around Macbook displays are deceptive.

In their 22-page suit, the plaintiffs accused company of lying about the quality and capabilities of the displays used in the notebooks. The plaintiffs said Apple’s advertising claims the laptops are capable of displaying "millions of colors" while an old technique "dithering" is actually required to display un-reproduceable colours by mixing up colours that can be shown by the monitor.

They also said that instead of the superior experience as promised by the computer maker, the screens are prone to flaws such as "grainy" or "sparkly" image quality, banding in gradients, and other visual flaws.

"Citations in the suit imply that the Apple notebooks may employ sub-par displays only capable of 6 bits per channel (18-bit color), rather than 8 bits per channel, making them capable of displaying only 262,144 colors without dithering, as opposed to millions. That would explain why within weeks of purchase, a flood of customers reported that their MacBook and MacBook Pro displays appeared 'grainy' or 'sparkly,' according to the complaint," Prince McLean reports for AppleInsider.

According to lawyers of the two named plaintiffs and others unnamed, the display problems were not present when Intel-based MacBook users used Windows XP, rather than Mac OSX.

In addition to multiple forms of relief and reimbursement, the plaintiffs are also seeking an injunction that would prevent Apple from continuing to market its existing notebook displays alongside claims that they support 'millions of colors' and offer views 'simply unavailable on other portables'.

Seeking class-action status, the lawsuit claims Apple responded badly to the complaints, saying such technical glitches were imagined by owners. The suit notes that a large number of customers have contacted Apple for relief, but all their queries were in vain.

"Many such dissatisfied purchasers were chastised by Apple agents and employees for being too picky about their assessment of the quality of the display," the suit alleges. "Other dissatisfied purchasers were told that they were imagining the complained about defects."

Besides the false advertising and misrepresentation, Apple is also charged with violating the Unfair Competition Law and the Consumer Legal Remedies Act with its failure to address and settle the situation.

Despite various issues, the MacBook range of laptops has been very successful for Apple, and the strong sales of the machines recently helped Apple sales soar to $5.2bn in the first three months of 2007.