Tuesday, December 14, 2021

iPad Needs a Better Oleophobic Coating

Rado Minkov (via Meek Geek):

But a day or two after using it, a ray of sunshine hits the iPad’s display and you realize a horrifying fact about it – under light it looks disgusting, smudged up – it’s somehow collected all the fingerprints in the world… Ew!

Nobody told you that this was a thing that would happen, even if you’ve read all the reviews and prepared carefully for your iPad purchase, the tragic state of your iPad’s display wasn’t something you expected at all. You knew fingerprints were a thing, but not like this!

[…]

For some reason the majority of Apple users don’t seem to be bothered by the fact that Apple claims the iPad Pro has “fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating”, yet its display collects seemingly way more fingerprints and smudges than the iPhone, which too has “fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating” listed under its display specs.

I upgraded from an iPad mini 2, which didn’t have Apple Pencil support, to an iPad Air (4th generation). In nearly every respect it’s better, but the fingerprints on the display are a huge regression. It reminds me of the original iPhone display when there was no oleophobic coating. I would gladly forego Apple Pencil support to get a better coating.

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You can buy the oleophobic coating liquid and apply it yourself. Look for Crystal Armor Fusso on Amazon, that's what I used on my iPhone 6s when I rubbed all the coating off by too much gaming. I don't think I'd try it on my brand new M1 iPad Pro 12.9".


Very intersting observation. I use my iPad Pro 2018 extensivley in the evening for reading and have to clean it with cloth at least every other day. I never thought about this small annoyance and just took it for granted. After reading this article it is quite obvious though, that another much older iPad Air and my iPhone do not collect grease nearly as much as the iPad Pro.

I bought the second gen pen to play around with it, but hardly use it. I think I would choose a better coating even if it meant slightly less accuracy when using the pen.

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