eye strain

[CNeub]

hello,

I have a Notebook with Intel Core i7 4710 - Intel Graphics 4600 and external Nvidia Gforce GTX 850M for about 2 weeks now. I connect the Notebook on two different places per HDMI with nearly three year old lg monitors. With my old Notebook (Intel Core2Duo and Nvidia Gforce 9500GT) I had not any problems with this two monitors. However when I connect one of the two monitors with my new Notebook I get eye strain and headache. Of course I use the right resolution FullHD and tried out different brigthness and contrast adjustments in intel graphic properties. OS is Windows 7 Prof x64 and the newest drivers are installed. Version:15.33.22.64.3621

Nearly two months ago I purchased an other Notebook with Intel Core i7 4700MQ - Intel Graphics 4600 and Nvidia Gforce GT755 M. I had the same problem there and so I sent it back, because I thought that the Notebook has an defect. I tried out Windows 7 and Windows 8 and had the same eye problems in the two different OS.Now I do not really know what the problem exactly is, because I have these problems with two different Notebooks on two different external LG Monitors and the integrated Displays of the Notebooks. But I thinkt the problem is the Intel HD 4600. Maybe that there is something wrong with the driver.Do you have any ideas about this? Couse I can't purchase and send back new Notebooks all the time.

Sorry for my bad english

[MJärv]

Yes, I know the test pages. Those are not of any help with PWM. PWM is detectable with a DSLR quite easily. Also most of the time with just a mobile phone camera, depending on the phone. Temporal dithering is not detectable at least with my eyes on those test pages.

Now if it would be the colors, then blue blocker or sunglasses would at least offer some relief, but they do not. Also, if it would be about the colors, then lowering the brightness extremely, would also provide some relief, but it does not. Even if I try to look a screen that is so dim that it is almost impossible to see anything on it, it still produces eye strain if there is PWM or if there is some other sort of flickering like Temporal Dithering.

It is the flickering for me. Maybe it is something else for somebody else, but for me it is the flickering. Temporal dithering is also a sort of flickering. Maybe there is some additional sort of flickering happening in the new drivers, display adapters or display panels.

[GCh]

You mean, it hurts all the same even on very dim PWM-free display?

[MJärv]

I also find it interesting that in these forums there are always people who do not have this problem, who keep suggesting things to try and alternatives to the real problem source. Why? if you do not have the problem, and do not have expertise on the problem from previous 25 years, why try to suggest possible alternative sources like color? If it was a wide color range or something related to color, then just nature would produce eye strain. There are several situations where color range is wider than a computer display. There are also several situations where a color range is much more narrow than a computer screen. E.g. look at the blue sky. On a bright day, it is just mostly blue, in comparison to a computer screen that is showing only green color. But the sky does not produce eye strain, where the green monitor will produce, if there is PWM.

[MJärv]

Yes, this Surface Laptop is still producing eye strain, even though it does not have PWM and I'm having the brightness as low as possible. Maybe it is producing just slightly less eye strain when the brightness is lower, that's why I'm having it on low brightness. But nevertheless, it is still producing eye strain, exactly like any screen that has PWM. Even if I do set a PWM screen to the lowest brightness setting, it will produce eye strain. Whereas the same screen at 100% does not produce ANY eye strain, if at 100% brightness there is no PWM.

[GCh]

Flickering (like PWM) and light both could get eye strain independently. I myself sensitive to displays with PWM, but also to bright light. Taking the bright sky, for example, I couldn't look at it for long. Also reducing blue on monitors (like Low Blue Light on Benq) makes my eyes feel better, so it's all still relevant independent factors.

I myself have ASUS n750jv laptop (Intel HD4600 + 6bpp panel + PWM), which feels bad for my eyes. 100% brightness + software dimming seems to do the trick, but not for 100%, so I use external HDMI-connected display Benq GW2765 with true 8bit panel and without PWM + its low blue mode, which does the trick for 100%.

So I'd like to understand, is it the same issue that discussed here.

[GCh]

So, if I understood correctly, the difference is that for me turning laptop screen to 100% brigtness(to remove PWM) and then dimming it down programmatically does work to some extent, but for you such trick doesn't work at all?

[MJärv]

I think you misunderstood: A screen without PWM at 100 % and no other type of flicker does not irritate my eyes at all. So no irritation if there is no PWM or any other type of flicker. I don't get any eye strain even from very bright screen, nor do I get any irritation from bright sunlight. (of course with some common sense - if I'm at the equator whole day without sunglasses, my eyes will get sunburned, thus irritated)

But if there is PWM, or any other type of flicker, lowering the brightness does not help. The brain or optic nerve will see the flickering even at low brightness, thus causing the bloodshot eyes.

[GCh]

It's the same for me then? - the less brightness on PWM-driven driven screen, the more low-freqency flickering, the harder eyes hurt. The workaround is use 100% hardware brightness + software dimming, but in case of my 6bit panel in laptop it works only about 70% for me - probably due to temporal dithering from 6 to 8 bits. So I ended up using proper external display, whenever possible.

[MBurl2]

Hi,

I tried reduced blue and got a new glasses with a blue filter. It seemed to be still bad for me. However, I will experiment with the colors again when I have some next device to test. It will be soon because I really have to find a new machine! My old good laptop has done a lot of work for the last almost 7 years... really deserves a retirement

[Bryce__Intel]

Thank you all for your continued assistance in reporting your config and failure details; all data helps in our ongoing investigation into this and we're working with several select users offline to troubleshoot and understand this further.

As stated prior, this issue is only seen by a small portion of people which makes it more difficult to investigate. Any breakthroughs or updates will be posted to this monitored thread.

.:Bryce:.

[Bryce__Intel]

If you're willing, the instructions of providing additional config/failure details is captured in this sticky. Please copy paste the template and fill it in. Thanks!

[MJärv]

Thanks for taking this issue seriously. I'm at the moment testing so that I connect my Surface Laptop to HP monitor that has not ever produced any eye strain. Thus far, after a couple of hours, I cannot yet say for sure. So there is also the possibility still, that it is in fact the panel in the laptops that is producing the eye strain. What makes me doubt this though, is the fact that 3 years ago I was able to use a HP laptop without problems with Windows 8 and 2014 drivers. In a way it would be a relief if it was not the display adapter or the drivers, as then there would still be hope in finding a laptop that has a panel that does not irritate. Also, then at least the laptop could be used with an external display.

Category

Questions

Answers (N/A if not applicable)

Description

Provide a detailed description of the issue

Display causes severe eye strain and bloodshot eyes after only 1 hour of usage.

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")<p> 

Always (100%):Yes

Often (51-99%):

Sporadic (20-50%):

Very Sporadic (<20%):

Hardware (HW)

Brand and Model of the system.Surface Laptop i5 2017

Hybrid or switchable graphics system? No

ie Does it have AMD or NV graphics too?

Make and model of any Displays that are used to see the issue (see note2 below). 

LFP = Local Flat Panel (Laptop panel) LFPEFP = External Flat Panel (Monitor you plug in)

How much memory [RAM] in the system (see note2 below).

8 gb

<span style="font-weight: in...

[PSobc2]

Guys

Has anybody except me and Kray tested this fatal Intel eye strain causing driver without AC power connected ? (without changing any other options). We noticed it helped us a lot (as we mentioned in previous posts).

@Intel Team

If you are working on root causing and creating well drivers, will you do it for Linux distributions aswell? (Not only Windows).

Best regards

[MJärv]

Since these are digital devices, I would think if there is a difference between AC connected and not connected, then it should be easy to find the setting that is applied within the display driver, when the AC is connected. I would doubt that there is any difference that the AC cord can make if it is not a setting in the power options or something similar.

[PSobc2]

I am 100% sure that AC power connection makes things worse in my case.

I've tried to find option to set graphic functions to work on AC Power like without AC Power, but no effect... (on Linux and Windows aswell).

[RDruk]

Hi,

I just joined this community because I found this thread after making the mistake of updating the graphics driver on my personal Lenovo Ideapad Y580 latop, which I've had for several years. It has HD 4000 graphics.

The built-in monitor had always been fine, but after updating the driver two days ago it instantly became harsh and uncomfortable to look at.

I'm sorry to see that this seems to be a common problem.

At work, they gave me a new HP laptop several months ago with HD 5000 graphics, which was instantly unbearable, so I got them to give me my old laptop back, thankfully.

I'm very sorry now that I mucked with my personal laptop.

I did find a one-level back graphics driver on the Intel site, but only one level was available. I have not yet tried rolling back. I'm not sure if that's the one I had before or it's a later version.

I have not read through this entire thread as it's a bit long and goes back years. Do you have any general suggestions/advice, things to try?

Thanks,

Ross

[useno]

I am one of the early followers of this thread. Still there is no solution. some intel guys get involved to the thread with high promises, but for the last 6 months there is no any update. At last I find a temporary solution which gives a relief. here it is: turn up the brightness to the max, then use pangobright tool which is a dimmer to reduce the screen brightness. this helped me a lot on my case. hope it works

[PSobc2]

For me solution which gives really big relief is disconnect AC power...but for obvious reason it can not be main solutution...

[RonaldM_Intel]

Hello Everyone,

I do apologize for not posting here in a while. All this time Intel has been actively working on this issue, that also included reaching out to some of the users in this thread (e.g. Kray_62 thanks for all the help you have provided us so far) to collect more specific data, however not all of the participants were able to reply to our Private Messages.

Now I would like to reach out to more of you experiencing this issue for additional assistance in our investigation. If you experience eye strain on systems with 6th Generation Graphics controllers or newer please post your https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/support/articles/000022556/graphics-drivers.html DxDiag.txt report here, and we'll be providing you further details soon.

Thank you for your assistance and cooperation.

Best Regards,

Ronald M.

[MJärv]

Update: I have no eye strain when connecting my Surface Laptop to external screens via USB. (When those screens do noe have PWM). I do not know the device that is used in the USB connection, as it is hidden under the table in a box. But I've been eye strain free for weeks when I do not use the Surface Laptop screen at all, when I have only the external monitors connected.

Surface Laptop screen is PWM free, so I really do not know that is happening here, but what I'm sure of is that I can work for days with the external monitors, but even a couple of hours meeting using the Surface Laptop screen only, causes red irritated eyes.

I hope this brings some value to the investigation.

[SMohd2]

Yes, I have been working with Intel and their dev team for the last few months. Hope my inputs will help them to identify the root cause and come up with a solution for this eye strain that we are all having.

Anyway, some updated on my side. I have a new laptop that I can use (almost) eye strain free. It is a Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon, 5th generation (2017), with the following specs:

- Core i5-7200

- FHD display 1920x1080

- Intel HD Graphics 620 (Driver Date: 8/29/2017, Driver Version: 22.20.16.4785)

- 8GB RAM

- 512GB SSD HDD

- Windows 10 Pro (version 1511, auto-update blocked)

This laptop has no PWM, as also verified by notebookchek.net:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X1-Carbon-2017-Core-i5-Full-HD-Laptop-Review.229966.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/Lenovo-ThinkPad-X1-Carbon-2017-Core-i5-Full-HD-Laptop-Review.229966.0.html

Finally I have a laptop that I can increase and decrease the brightness of the screen (in my old Lenovo T420s laptop, I had to set the brightness at 100% all the time to eliminate the PWM). So with this laptop, one major source of eye strain (PWM) is already eliminated.

Next, is the eye strain caused by Intel graphics driver. I purposedly asked my company's IT department to install version 1511 of Windows 10, as users have reported that newer versions after this version, especially the Anniversary version and onwards, causes eye strain.

https://ledstrain.org/d/169-windows-10-anniversary-edition https://ledstrain.org/d/169-windows-10-anniversary-edition

Even with Windows 10 version 1511, I still get some eye strain - mild eye strain when using the laptop for long periods of time while connected to AC power. Fortunately there is a workaround (as suggested by fellow forumer kracjar20, that is, if I use the laptop on battery, the eye strain would disappear almost completely. It is still not 100% eye strain free, but it is very close to eye strain free, and I am fine with that. At least I can use this laptop to do my office work from 9am to 6pm every day, that is the most important part. Thank you to kracjar20 for your idea and suggestion. It made a huge difference to me, and I am able to finally rest my 5 year old Lenovo T420s laptop, and use a brand new Lenovo X1 Carbon laptop because of it. Thank you!

I have been using the X1 Carbon for a week now as my daily work laptop in the office. So far so good. The way I use it, is with the workaround, I would use the laptop on battery from 9am to 1pm. During lunch break, I would connect the AC power to charge it, and when I am back from my lunch break, I would unplug the AC charger and use it on battery until 6pm. Its a good thing that this laptop's battery can last for 8-11 hours.

Anyway, the eye strain is still there, especially when connected to AC power. But I believe this is caused by software (unlike PWM which is hardware), and I hope intel dev team can work on a solution for this.