Hi Guys, I am getting severe headaches if I use any laptop or Desktop based on Intel HD graphics 4600 and above.

Till last week, I was using Desktop with Intel HD Graphics 2500 (i5 3470T). I have not faced any issues in last 8 years. I upgraded to HP Victus Gaming laptop last week and within few minutes of usage I got sever headaches. I extended to external FHD monitors, adjusted so many different combinations of brightness, contrast and settings. But no luck. Then I came across this blog and I totally agree to the problems faced by many. I got another laptop from my friend which is based on Intel HD Graphics 4600 and tested there. I got the same headache. So my assumption is, I can tolerate only up to HD Graphics 2500.

So now I am planning to build a desktop with old processor. Can you suggest what best configuration I can go and still wont get any problem of these. My plan is to make the latest laptop virtual host and access that laptop from the old computer. So that display will be of old computer but applications can run in my latest laptop config. Is there any better way to solve than this?

Can someone give what changed after HD Graphics 2500?

Update: My tolerance level after testing different combinations.

ConfigurationIssues
Intel Core i5 3440T with Dual BenQ gw2480 monitors. Intel HD Graphics 2500 Drivers used.100% comfortable. No issues. Able to use the system 8-10 hours comfortably.
Intel core i3 2350M. This processor has Intel HD graphics 3000. Driver installed in the laptop is Intel HD Graphics version 8.15.10.2622100% comfortable. No issues at all.
HP Victus Gaming laptop ( AMD Ryzen 7 5800H )- Connected Monitors through type C port. Here the Integrated AMD Radeon Graphics adaptor by default used0% comfortable. Can't able to see the screen more than 30 minutes.
HP Victus - Connected a single monitor through its HDMI port. Here NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050Ti Graphics adaptor by default used80% comfortable. Able to work the entire day, but end of they day little tired and sometime getting sore eyes and tears.
Mini PC based on Intel atom x5 z8350. Connected dual monitors from its HDMI ports. Here Intel HD graphics adaptor is used by default.95% comfortable. Able to work the entire day. But occasionally getting headaches. But better than the above one.
Desktop based on Intel i5- 4670 with Benq dual monitors. Intel HD graphics 4600 Adaptor is used.80% comfortable. Getting headaches but bearable.

I will keep update this based on my various testing.

Unfortunately my HP Victus Gaming Laptop is using the AMD Radon adaptors for type C ports and I am not able to disable that and switch to Nvidia for Type C port connection.

Overall the conclusion is the integrated Graphics of both Intel and AMD sucks.

13 days later

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  • Post #3

I’m using an HP laptop with Intel UHD 620 and have to uninstall it and use the basic driver. It has been a while and I haven’t checked again, has the Intel driver got any better now?

And btw it is strange that you got uncomfortable even when using external display with your HP laptop.

    [deleted]

    Yes. I'm getting this with external monitor. Now I'm thinking it might be due to my extern monitor is 6bit display. I'm planning to upgrade to some HDR UHD monitors and test my eyes

      4 days later

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      • Post #6

      karthi3219

      Besides my HP laptop, I'm using an Asus VG1R external monitor with nVIDIA GTX 1660, this is a setup for gaming but reading texts on this setup seems fine to me. Earlier I had an LG monitor, no problems also. You should look for monitors with flicker-free, non-PWM as those are good for your eyes. Colors/HDR I think not much as mine is quite average in colors.

        [deleted]

        If you have Nvidia only-installed (no Intel) and you disable it. Will it definitely default to Windows basic graphics? Any downsides to that?

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            • Post #8

            Quad43

            I haven't tried disabling the nVIDIA, but I think it will return to the basic graphics driver because the computer will try to find a usable one. The important thing is to prevent the Intel UHD driver to be installed instead of the basic driver.

            The downsides are worse performance and less functions. The graphic (like scrolling, moving mouse) is less responsive, watching movies is a bit stuttering, not able to adjust brightness (for laptop). So you should only go that way if you use it for basic tasks (office stuff, reading news…).

              17 days later

              Hello . . How are the issues now . . I see that you have recently purchased HP Victus laptop which incidentally has flicker free display ( advertised that way ). . It is one of the rarest laptops with such feature , I do not know if you considered that while buying it . . Please let me know the current situation with your display

                Nav22

                Hi, I'm not able to use the HP victus laptop continuously more than 30 minutes. Not only laptop screen, if I connect the laptop to external monitor ( Benq monitor ) that's also giving eye strain.

                  Nav22

                  I'm planning to buy new external monitor and test the laptop. As of now I have only Benq gw2480.

                    9 months later

                    From my new company, I have got MacBook Pro M1 2021 16 inch 32GB laptop for work. With default display settings, I could not use the laptop for even 30 minutes. I started playing around the display settings and found a 90% working solution which is able to work 3-4 hours straight which is more than enough for my work.

                    My 90% working Settings for the Built-In liquid Retina:

                    Presets : Internet & Web (sRGB), refresh Rate: 47.95 Hertz.

                    Settings for external Benq monitors:

                    Persets: sRGB IEC61966-2.1 Refresh rate: 60 Hz

                    The default settings of the laptop is Presets: Apple XDR display (P3-1600 nits) and refresh rate : Promotion. This setting is absolutely unbearable for me. Within 30 minutes of laptop usage, I encounters symtoms like neck pain, weird chest pain, little elevated heart beats, Pain over shoulders, headaches & feeling weight on my eyes, difficult to getting sleeps on night, difficult to think during speech (sometimes I stuck what I have to speak next in meeting, kind of brain fog)etc. Thankfully I have found some settings which is bearable. Otherwise my technologist career might have come to an end.

                    With all these experiences, I assume this LED strain is related to colour spectrum. Usually Blue colour is only hyped as evil. But in my opinion every colour at certain extended frequencies causes strain on human eyes. Companies need to do more research on this.

                      karthi3219 Great that you found a solution. We need more of these stories on here 🙂.

                      See this Reddit here, in which turning off the P3 color gamut and using sRGB instead, has given relief. I've seen this story at least 5 times now. If you have Mac eye strain, always try switching to sRGB.

                      You might also check out these apps that @martin uses.

                      From that thread:

                      As to why this made a difference - my crackpot theory is that the shitty LG panels that Apple uses need to use dithering to approximate the P3 gamut, and changing to sRGB disables said dithering.

                      karthi3219 I assume this LED strain is related to colour spectrum.

                      That is plausible but I would not rule out temporal dithering either. Have you been checked for binocular vision dysfunction?

                            ryans That is plausible but I would not rule out temporal dithering either. Have you been checked for binocular vision dysfunction?

                            No, I have not. I am living in a small town in South India. Recently I have visited eye hospital and did complete eye check-ups. Doctors told my eyes are completely fine and they were clueless why I am having issues while using LED screens. I am not sure they have checked this Binocular VD. Next time, I will specifically ask for them to test for this illness.

                            So far 3 setups working for me.

                            My previous organisation have provided me virtual desktops based on Citrix. So I can connect to this virtual remote desktop using any of my personal devices from anywhere. In this setup, Graphics for screen rendering - whatever hardware+os the source is- only the client system which is used to connect to the remote system was used. So I tried many different personal setups to connect to VDI and finalised the working setup.

                            Working setup 1: (100% working setup. This is like reading news papers)

                            Custom build desktop - Intel Core i5 3440T with Dual BenQ gw2480 monitors. Intel HD Graphics 2500 Drivers used.

                            Os is: Windows 10, version 2004

                            Intel driver version is: 10.18.10.4242

                            Citrix receiver to connect to Virtual desktop: 4.12

                            Working Setup 2🙁90% working setup. Need to take 10 mins break every hours. Till at the end of the day, slight headache will be there. But this is manageable )

                            Apple MAC MINI Early 2009 - 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo ( I have bought this device from Ebay. It is shipped from USA to India 😆 )

                            OS : OS X El Capitan

                            Citrix receiver to connect to Virtual desktop: 12.9.1

                            Working setup 3: (90% working setup. Need to take 10 mins break every hours)

                            Recently I changed my company and they don;t have this virtual desktop option for their employees. They provided Macbook M1 Pro. For this device, working setup is Internet & Web (sRGB) color for inbuilt display and sRGB IEC61966-2.1 for external display.

                            Based on many stories in this forum, my theory is everyone is different. Setup which is working for me, may not completely works for you. Unfortunately no one knows what is the real issue here. If you have this issue, then you need to try out many different options and find out setup works for you. Once you find it, fix the system intact with 3 combo (hardware+os+graphics driver) including all the softwares. Don't update the OS ever. Take backups of the system for future restore.

                              dev