Is 8 bit supported on my laptop or not?

[ECDave]

I have spent hours wrestling with drivers and settings, but still get only 6 bit color on my brand new HP Laptop PC 17-by4000 (18B36AV). I returned another new HP laptop last week because I could not overcome this problem, and so hoped that a better machine would resolve the issue. Everything is absolutely up to date--latest drivers, Windows 11 completely updated--so I would just like to ask the simple question at this point: Does my laptop support 8 bit color or not? In all the hours I have spent talking to support and having them work on my laptop by remote, no one has even approached the issue, let alone provide an answer. Basic capability question, I'll listen to yet more ideas for fixes if this display even supports it.

[megan3000]

"Does my laptop support 8 bit color or not?"

Sorry but only HP can answer that question accurately...

You said that you "have spent hours talking to support and having them work on my laptop by remote", did you mean HP support? If so, it would surprise me that they didn't answer this.... and if they didn't, they should have asked you for time to confirm the information, because only HP will know this... no one else will know because HP is who manufactured the computer...

[megan3000]

Let me add this, I checked online, using what you provided HP Laptop PC 17-by4000 (18B36AV). But it seems to me this is just a "reference model" and not the specific model...

It took me to this website, and when I click on Product Information, it shows a long list of laptop models as if they are variants of this "reference model 17-by4000"... Even though, I checked some of them and the information is very poor, lacking so many details in IMHO

https://support.hp.com/ca-en/product/hp-laptop-pc-17-by4000/35911555/model/38752977/product-info

when you said "up to date--latest driver", I hope you meant "latest HP driver"... using the one from Intel website instead of the HP one, may cause your system to lose graphics customizations, perhaps it may be affecting this behavior.

At the end, only HP can confirm if you display is 8-bit or 6-bit with dithering

[ECDave]

Hi Megan--

Thanks for the info! I finally learned just today that my display does NOT support 8 bit color, only 6. I learned this from back-and-forth with an HP Support person over Messenger, over the course of hours. So that mystery is solved...however:

Yes, I spent between 6 and 8 hours with live HP Support over the phone, during which they tried things by remote on my machine and even watched via a separate video feed from my phone. I spent additional hours by myself, scrounging forums and trying every "fix" I could find. Finally they sent me a box to ship the laptop to their repair center, after I'd spent approximately 20 hours (!!) trying to resolve this issue. While waiting for the box, I talked to Microsoft Support, since it was unclear where the problem originated--HP, Intel, or Windows. The Microsoft guy said I was missing needed graphics hardware--but it turns out he was just looking for a setting that wasn't going to be available on the installed UHD graphics card. Anyway, repair center found nothing and had no suggestions to offer, so I did more research on laptop displays and decided it was "my bad" for buying a model with poor display specs, and I returned it. Bought a different, better HP--the one I'm talking about in this thread--but alas, it had the same problem, display stuck at 6 bits. So I finally thought I'd better ask whether anything more was possible, and now I know it is not.

Here's the thing. I was telling support people from the very start that my display was stuck at 6 bits and I couldn't bump it up to 8. No one, not one person, looked at my model number and delivered the obvious information. They each went through a generic troubleshooting list and wasted hours and hours of my time--and theirs. And let me ship it in for repairs, and took it back as a return. As I said in a review on the HP site, the support was garbage, but gee whiz, there was plenty of it! Because I read article after article talking about my exact issue, I found all sorts of validation that there WAS a problem to be fixed. It was very late in this bumpy path that I finally found someone talking about the display itself actually being limited. 

This was truly the worst tech experience of my life. I'm really appalled that I wasn't set straight by the very people who are engaged to resolve these issues. Live and learn...but it was a very painful lesson.

[megan3000 · Accepted solution]

I agree with you, it looks like the worst tech experience... unbelievable they didn't confirm first display capabilities before going through a replacement process 😑

I mean, it is ok if support staff doesn't know what is supported (let's be fair, they may be dealing with a lot of products and info), but one would expect they going to check this before replacing the device...

I think manufacturers fail a lot in providing clear information to us customers, information that is easy to access and includes detailed information about the system... I think this is just purely a marketing strategy, so users don't have much info (especially about lacking features or poor features) to make a smart purchase...

Next time, if you don't find clear info, I recommend contacting them (whether it's going to be HP or other vendors) and requesting an official document with full specifications (aka datasheet)... The more information the better the purchase decision.

PS: Do you have the option to return it, request a refund, and find another one with an 8-bit display (making sure it is not using "dithering techniques")? I mean, if their support team was not even able to quickly find out that 8-bit was not supported and no public info is available, how could you know it was not supported?