• OS

  • Win10 finally caught up to me, and I might be losing my career because of it

ryans

I actually tried one of those USB video cards in the past and it didn't do anything unfortunately

However, I did try something suggested here and got a "result", I put an eyepatch over my right eye, and have been using my setup, and so far (it's only been 30 min or so) I haven't had symptoms. I have been hypothesizing recently based on my experience that my issue seems to be binocular focusing related. The muscle pain I am feeling feels like the pain I get when I have an improper prescription contact lens or glasses, and it feels like the muscles in my head are trying to "move" my eye to compensate, resulting in those muscles tightening up which then impinges nerves and causes migraine (according to my nuerologist)

I'm going to continue wearing an eyepatch when using that system for a couple hours, and if it holds up, that would seem to at least indicate a root cause to the problem: Somehow the way the Windows 10 desktop compositor is rendering the image, regardless of video card or monitor, is causing my eyes to struggle to maintain a binocular balance between the two eyes, and the compensation of that is what is causing my pain. I have no idea how that would be fixed, but at least it is a plausible hypothesis to start from.

I'm going to start a new thread to see if other folks have had the same issue

    ensete So I bought a Dasung e-ink monitor, the 13.3 inch one, off Amazon and hooked it up. It took some fiddling but I got the display working. It isn't helping and I am still getting eye strain and facial muscle pain

    So that rules out backlight (since the screen has no backlight), refresh rate (since the screen has no refresh rate)

    I have the little Dasung Not eReader that I sometimes use as an external monitor- with my work 2015 MacBook Air that has an unusable screen. The Dasung screen is sometimes OK for me and sometimes is as bad or worse than the LED screen. The Dasung has a 45 Hz refresh rate and sometimes the flicker introduced by the software/operating system is quite visible on the Dasung and bothers my head. I haven’t used it with Windows yet, but with the Mac, Word and Excel are OK as long as I don’t highlight things too much - the highlighting shimmers on the Dasung - I assume Apple uses temporal dithering to create the highlight effect. Having a night mode filter on also creates flickering shimmer all over the screen. Some websites are OK, some are very irritating. Videos can be very bad. Scrolling a lot is bad for me regardless of the program - I think because of the flicker effect as the scrolling happens. The Dasung screen modes that have less fine grayscale detail seem a bit more tolerable than the more nuanced mode. So I use the Dasung most of the time now to do text-based tasks and am limiting how much graphics, web, and editing work I do. I’m glad I have the Dasung overall, but it definitely doesn’t eliminate screen flicker in many circumstances and sometimes it amplifies the visibility of the flicker.

        jen

        A video of the flickering (temporal dithering) on your Mac could be a useful investigation for us.

        • jen replied to this.

            Big (bad) news also for me.. my company was acquired by Accenture today so I will not more able to use W10 1809 and probably they will also change my old computer!
            I am really sad, I will try to buy an OLED notebook and let's see if I can use it with the last version of W10!

            @"ensete"

            Sorry to hear about your situation. If all else fails, you might want to try buying a portable analogue projector, and use that as your main display. Get a small portable white screen (if your office desk is not facing a blank wall), connect the projector via vga on your work pc/laptop, and look at the white screen as your main display. Whatever flickering, dithering and that elusive unknown cause of eye strain will likely stay on the LED display, but you are not looking at the LED display, you are looking at a blank wall or a small white screen that the projector is projecting the desktop from your pc/laptop. Might be worth a try. Unfortunately, people in our situation need to invest (to try out new laptop, parts etc) and do many trial and errors to see what works. Hope this works for you.

              ryans

              Here’s a couple videos of the Dasung Not eReader- filmed at normal speed. Hopefully the video is ok enough quality - it’s filmed with just sunlight illuminating the screen and the video itself isn’t the sharpest because of the moderate light level, but maybe you can get the idea. There’s a close up in the last video that shows the issue most clearly. There can be flicker that tracks with the cursor - I’d guess that’s a Dasung thing rather than a Mac thing, but I’m not sure. Notice the extra flicker when I copy a selected area in Excel- the pixels visibly dance no matter what the screen settings are. In other applications like Photoshop or Preview, just selecting part of an image makes the pixels dance, both inside and near the selected area. If I keep Nightshift off, the pixels look stable in most applications if I don’t start selecting and copying things. Nightshift adds extra flicker on the Dasung.

              Image mode III, Nightshift off

              Image mode III, Nightshift on

              Image mode II, Nightshift off

                  jen

                  Thanks for posting these. Especially in the sharp video in the last video you posted, I do see a "shimmering".

                  With your Dasung -- wondering if you've tried Windows with ditherig (to disable dithering)? Or any Linux distro?

                  • jen replied to this.

                      ryans

                      No, I haven’t tried anything with Windows yet. I did recently get a PC gaming laptop and a CCFL monitor that I’m very slowly working on optimizing. When I have time to try things with the Dasung and Windows, I’ll definitely report back 🙂

                        Kray Sorry to hear about your situation. If all else fails, you might want to try buying a portable analogue projector, and use that as your main display. Get a small portable white screen (if your office desk is not facing a blank wall), connect the projector via vga on your work pc/laptop, and look at the white screen as your main display. Whatever flickering, dithering and that elusive unknown cause of eye strain will likely stay on the LED display, but you are not looking at the LED display, you are looking at a blank wall or a small white screen that the projector is projecting the desktop from your pc/laptop. Might be worth a try. Unfortunately, people in our situation need to invest (to try out new laptop, parts etc) and do many trial and errors to see what works. Hope this works for you.

                        I've tried projectors in the past, I still get symptoms.

                        It seems patching my dominant eye is helpful across more than just the eInk monitor. I saw my eye doctor and he tested me extensively and recommended I get some glasses made with a mild amount of proscription change in them and a 2 diopter prism (1 in each eye). I dropped those off to get made today and should have them in a week or so.

                        I also may go see a nuerolens place just so they can use thier testing machine on me and try to remove my subjective interpretation of what different things are doing while I am testing lenses and changes in strength and prism.

                            ensete I've tried projectors in the past, I still get symptoms.

                            Interesting… I've been curious about the projector angle for quite some time now. Sadly I sold my old DLP project a few years back (was ok but I could see rainbows and fringing) so don't have anything to test. And ensete's suggestion got me wondering/intrigued.

                            Does anyone else have experience with projector tech? Maybe LCD based ones are problematic vs say DLP? Or Maybe DLP have their own issues (wheel speed, rainbows)?

                                AgentX20

                                I cant remember the one I used, it was a little mini projector from Amazon. I suppose I could try a more advanced projector setup, but my latest theory (that it is Windows 10 DWM causing the issue) means the display technology used is irrelevant, the picture is being rendered in a way that screws with binocular focus.

                                    ensete

                                    Has patching made Windows 10 usable enough that you can keep your job?

                                        ryans Has patching made Windows 10 usable enough that you can keep your job?

                                        In the short term, it has. I am hoping progress continues and it leads to even more tolerance. As it is now I can use Windows 10 patched for a few hours a day and be OK as long as I limit exposure to about 30 minutes or less at a time and keep total length of exposure less than 3 or so hours, and with careful enough planing around meeting schedules and scheduling screen intensive tasks I can manage that in the short term

                                        The real goal is to get a non Windows 10 machine for work, but patching seems to have at least stabilized the short term issue to give me time to try and find that non Win10 solution

                                          Sorry to hear of your situation!

                                          I was fortunate in the Dell Latitude 5280 Laptop that I use for work (with the night light on 100% and adjusted for brightness) did not cause me significant eye strain (except from the monitor being very small -- that's a different issue) until Windows 10 recently underwent a "re-image" with a message that the old graphics driver was no longer supported and thus removed. The funny thing is I don't see much of a change to the screen. However, I do feel it quite immediately when I'm using.

                                          As such, I will see if I can use it with a projector as another poster suggested. I'm hoping by not facing the monitor, I can avoid the light from the monitor shining directly into my eyes although it's not bright at all -- I probably could use it at a higher setting for better visibility. Also, I hope by having a larger image, I can sit farther away, not needing to use close-up vision as much. (The small screen is rather hard to see, which causes regular eye strain, but that doesn't have anything to do with the light emitted from it or the issue we're talking about here).

                                          Beyond that, I might spend the money ($1,000) for some Neurolenses. I hesitate, though, because in natural light, I don't need a prescription. Also, I don't think it's just an eye issue, although I do have severe dry eye.

                                          How I wish I could go back to the original setting! However, I am prohibited from doing so because of my work.

                                          Good luck in your search for an answer! Please keep us posted!

                                          --

                                          Other Ideas:

                                          FL-41 Filter Added to Rx Glasses or Alone (If no coating on existing lenses, can be added for about ~$40).

                                          F.Lux or IRIS for computer.

                                          MSM Eye Drops.

                                          Check if overhead lighting makes your symptoms worse. I can only use incandescent with a shaded desk lamp (and natural sunlight).

                                            Flicker-Free Have you tried patching? A few of us (Gurm and myself at least) have lately found some relief with an eyepatch covering an eye when using Windows 10

                                              I installed Windows 10 LTSB 2015 on an old computer, that has an Intel graphics card from like 2006. Everything was fine, until Windows 10 auto-installed a graphics driver it had downloaded from the Internet automatically. The screen flashed, the resolution went up to native resolution, you could see the desktop's animations had become smooth. And the eye strain kicked in immediately. My left eye hurts so bad now. I will try setting up an RDP connection from a safe machine. It has already worked with Linux + VNC. I think for us the only way to keep using operating systems that employ this eye-straining mechanism (whatever it is) is to connect via LAN from a safe machine over some remote protocol. Finding a safe device/OS(/GPU) + safe remote software combination is another challenge though. I think if in doubt, an old XP computer would work that you know is safe for you (and has Internet access disabled for security reasons).

                                                KM

                                                For me even remote connections to Windows 10 from a good host trigger my symptoms

                                                • diop replied to this.

                                                    Flicker-Free FL-41 Filter Added to Rx Glasses or Alone (If no coating on existing lenses, can be added for about ~$40).

                                                    F.Lux or IRIS for computer.

                                                    MSM Eye Drops.

                                                    Check if overhead lighting makes your symptoms worse. I can only use incandescent with a shaded desk lamp (and natural sunlight).

                                                    Tried all those things (and many may more) to no relief

                                                        ensete For me even remote connections to Windows 10 from a good host trigger my symptoms

                                                        Have you tried Teamviewer? In my experience with it (Bad W10/Mac Host Machine/Good Client Machine) I haven't noticed any issues. You can set it to LAN only and just connect to the host IP. I was using a W10 PC and a Mac Mini as a media/file server for some time and relied on Teamviewer to connect to it and bulk rename files, edit text documents etc.

                                                          dev