Color changes when a DXGI Independent Flip swap chain from NVIDIA GPU switches to composed mode

[dantmnf]

Category	Questions	Answers (N/A if not applicable)
Description	Provide a detailed description of the issue	Color changes when a DXGI Independent Flip mode swap chain from NVIDIA GPU fallbacks to composed mode.
	Please place an X to the right of the option showing how often you see this issue using specific steps. (Ex: 'Every few times a game is started it flickers.' <- This would be "Often")	Always
Hardware (HW)	Brand and Model of the system.	Dell XPS 15 9570
	Hybrid or switchable graphics system? ie Does it have AMD or NV graphics too?	Yes w/ NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050
	Make and model any Displays that are used to see the issue (see note2 below). LFP = Local Flat Panel (Laptop panel)EFP = External Flat Panel (Monitor you plug in)	LFP (additionally with an EFP to run PresentMon)
	How much memory [RAM] in the system (see note2 below).	32GB
	Provide any other hardware needed to replicate the issue. ie: Cables&brand, cable type [vga, hdmi, DP, etc], dock, dongles/adapters, etc
	Hardware Stepping (see note1 below).
Software (SW)	Operating System version (see note2 below).	Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.19042.685]
	VBIOS (video BIOS) version. This can be found in “information page” of CUI (right click on Desktop and select “Graphics Properties”.
	Graphics Driver version; for both integrated Intel and 3rd party vendors (see note2 below).	Intel: 27.20.100.9126 NVIDIA: 27.21.14.6079 (460.79)
	SW or Apps version used to replicate the issue.	Blender 2.90.0
Configurations	Single display, clone, or extended (see note2 below).	Single display and extended
	Display resolution & refresh rate setting of each display (see note2 below).	1920x1080@60Hz
	AC or DC mode, i.e. is power cable plugged in or not?
How to repro	Please provide steps to replicate the issue. These steps are very crucial to finding the root cause and fix. A screenshot to illustrate the issue is a huge plus. A video of the failure is even better! Attach to the post or provide the YouTube link.	1. Launch Blender with default gray theme. (color changes on the gray background is easily noticeable) 2. Make sure Blender is running on NVIDIA GPU and no window is above Blender. 3. Move the mouse to toggle some hover effect. 4. The gray background changes slightly when graphics updated, or not updated for a while. PresentMon shows the swap chain is on Independent Flip mode when updating and Composed Flip mode when not updating. 5. There will be no glitch if the Blender window is composed (e.g., part of the window behind taskbar with blur effect), which blocks usage of Independent Flip mode.

Additional notes:

1. The issue also occurs with (some) older drivers.
2. The issue also occurs with other applications. (e.g. VMware)

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @dantmnf

Thank you for posting on the Intel® communities and for all the information provided.

This could be related to hybrid graphics and we could not know which of both graphics cards the software would use.

Some laptops that come with hybrid graphics have the possibility to disable the hybrid graphics feature. Could you please check this with your laptop manufacturer (OEM) and trying disabling the discrete-third party video card (NVIDIA*) and test only with Intel® Graphics to see if the behavior is the same? Please let us know the outcome of the test.

In the meanwhile, we will try to check this behavior internally in our lab.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[dantmnf]

Hello @AndrewG_Intel,

This also happens (on VMware Windows 10 VM) with NVIDIA GPU disabled in device manager. (checked by creating a dark gray picture in Windows Paint)

Blender does not use Independent Flip mode when running on Intel GPU and therefore the issue "disappeared".

If necessary, I could try to reproduce this issue with a trivial demo if I get some spare time.

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @dantmnf

Thank you for your response. We are trying to replicate this behavior; however, we may be missing specific details on how to replicate this.

Could you please provide us with a demo/testing file (ideally one that you are also using) and a video showing the step-by-step sequence/instructions so we can properly test this using Intel® Graphics and provide the most accurate support?

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[dantmnf]

Hello @AndrewG_Intel 

Here are the demo application, its source code, and a video showing its behavior.

The gray background will become slightly brighter when switched to composed mode. There are many ways to trigger composed mode. In addition to toggling the action center in the video, moving the window also works.

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @dantmnf

Thank you very much for the files that you have provided us. Please allow us to check them and we will be posting back in the thread as soon as possible.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello @dantmnf

Thank you for your patience in this matter.

We would like to inform you that we tested this and we could not replicate the issue at our lab using Windows* 10 and graphics driver 27.20.100.9168; however, we tested only on systems with Integrated Graphics. This issue seems to be specific to hybrid graphics then our recommendation is to report this to the computer manufacturer (OEM) as the hybrid implementation is owned by the OEM alongside Microsoft*.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[AndrewG_Intel]

Hello dantmnf

We have not heard back from you so we will proceed to close this thread now. If you need any additional information, please submit a new question as this thread will no longer be monitored.

Best regards,

Andrew G.

Intel Customer Support Technician