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Staycalmsyndrome I will try! Thanks 🙂

TrantaLocked You are right, i am switching too many devices and it's useless.

But now i am writing from an asus vivobook of a friend and connected to my BENQ CCFL is perfectly fine, so i played some hours to magic. Unfortunately is a bad PC i3 1115G4 so i can't keep it like main PC.
So it's the second notebook with intel 11gen that i can use. I am thinking to sell the custom rig with 13700K and buy a good notebook with intel 11gen like an XPS or something similar.

Or i can try the arc 750 with the 13700K before giving up.. but i think that the problem is the motherboard/bios not the GPU!

      8 months later

      degen

      Thanks @degen for the recommendation. I bought a 28" 4k 60hz Acer monitor, it's an Innolux panel like the rest, and I have not suffered from the same eye strain I was getting from 27" panels I tried earlier in the year.

      Now, the monitor like apparently every single 28" 4k monitor on the market hilariously, does have some issues with horizontal pixel stretching as the ratio is not true 16:9 but I am not using it for any design or measurement accurate work so not a big deal for me.

        3 months later

        I finally found a modern monitor that works for me by looking for ultra low-flicker monitors using a professional photodetector. I tested about 100 monitors and found only three that have virtually no flicker.

        I bought 11 (one for myself and 10 to resell at cost to see if it works for others). I created an eBay listing if anybody is interested in giving it a shot. I offer 60 day returns, so worst case scenario you have to pay for shipping both ways.

        https://www.ebay.com/itm/145603787681

        You can read more about my process here: https://ledstrain.org/d/2598-help-wanted-to-measure-flicker-andor-test-a-flicker-free-monitor

          4 months later

          Clokwork May I ask which monitor you had for your listing?

          I've been using two that are working really well for me:
          Lenovo Q27h-10. 27"
          LG 27MQ450-B 27"

          Here's the full list of monitors that had reasonably low flicker (I tested over 100, so these are the best 20%)

          ManufacturerModel #RefreshColor depthResolutionScreen sizeResponse time
          SamsungU28R5560Hz8-bit + FRC3840 x 2160284 ms
          HPM27h FHD75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080275 ms
          LG27UP60060Hz8-bit + FRC3840 x 2160275 ms
          SamsungS27BG40240Hz8-bit1920 x 1080271 ms
          HPM27h75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080275 ms
          HPM24h75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080245 ms
          Dells2422hz75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080244 ms
          LG24mq450-B75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080245 ms
          LG27mq450-B75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080275 ms
          LG29wp50s75Hz6 bit+ FRC2560 x 1080295 ms
          LG32up83a60Hz8-bit + FRC3840 x 2160325 ms
          Philips45b1u6900ch75Hz8-Bit5120 x 144045 (curved)4 ms
          MSIg271cp165Hz8-Bit1920 x 1080271 ms
          MSIg321cu144Hz8-bit + FRC3840 x 216032 (curved)4 ms
          Lenovog32qc-30165Hz8-Bit2560 x 1440321 ms
          Lenovoq27h-1075Hz8-Bit2560 x 1440274 ms
          AcerEI322QUR sbmiipphx165Hz8-Bit2560 x 1440321 ms
          AOCCq32g3su165Hz8-Bit2560 x 1440321 ms
          DellSE2422H75Hz6 bit+ FRC1920 x 1080245 ms
            5 days later

            It's interesting that some of the models you listed have 8-bit + FRC. These are typically the panels I struggle with the most. I try to set everything to sRGB when possible. I do wonder if some panels still use FRC to attempt to make sRGB look better. That's why I tend to look for 8 bit native monitors. Thanks for the list! I can seem to use my BenQ entry level 8 bit monitor, but it's not as comfortable as I'd like. I can't game on it for long without feeling fatigued and a bit overwhelmed which is weird as I'm certain it does not have FRC and supposedly uses DC dimming within certain brightness ranges.

              Clokwork It's interesting that some of the models you listed have 8-bit + FRC. These are typically the panels I struggle with the most.

              I don't think I've ever actually tried 8-bit + FRC, but for whatever reason, 6-bit + FRC doesn't seem to bother me. It might depend on the graphics card, though, because I'm not a gamer so I generally just use integrated graphics. I'm a programmer, so it's mostly just text on a white background for me.

              The LG 27MQ450-B 27" is 6-bit + FRC and I love it...

                  GregAtkinson

                  Are all of these tested with the thorlabs pda100a2? Thanks to you, I also acquired one but still might need to upgrade the oscilloscope.

                      photon78s Are all of these tested with the thorlabs pda100a2

                      Yep! It might be overkill for what we need, but I'm really happy with it.

                      photon78s might need to upgrade the oscilloscope

                      I have the base model Picoscope (2204A) and it works great.

                          GregAtkinson Huh, I'm also a programmer but I can't stand any monitors with 6bit+FRC for programming. Even with an old CCFL TN at 100% backlight to avoid PWM and a safe old Windows 8.1 laptop connected I can still notice the FRC (especially when moving my head). It feels like the background of the code editor is distracting me away from the text.

                          6bit on Windows laptops is a lot more manageable because usually on Intel graphics laptops you can disable FRC entirely with ditherig.exe which will reduce it to true 6 bit with tons of banding.

                          6bit on laptops vs. monitors:

                          Since I don't care about seeing banding, a panel on a laptop that only claims to be 6bit on Panelook is sometimes even a good sign, because it reduces the chance that a claimed "8bit" panel is actually doing FRC anyway through its TCON chip etc.

                          On the other hand, when I get around to finding a good external monitor though, I instead prefer to actually seek out "true 8-bit" - - because contrary to laptops where the GPU often does the FRC, on external monitors it's almost always "built into" the panels themselves.

                          I basically have the opposite situation because playing games (e.g. connecting a Nintendo Switch) is actually fine on that same CCFL TN monitor! This is mostly because games are usually in constant motion anyway and most of my FRC problems happen on still or mostly text-based content.

                          However, regardless of panel, any Windows version after 1809 is unusable for me (at least on laptops) for some reason on many devices, seemingly due to a strange subpixel rendering technique where I can notice some red and blue subpixels emphasized when I look very closely at the screen. See my T480 thread where I actually confirmed this on two separate laptops.

                          This is only semi-related, but I figured I'd drop this general word of advice here:

                          • Win10 1809
                          • Windows and driver updates disabled (with Winaero Tweaker)
                          • oldest Intel integrated graphics driver possible
                          • all available Intel video enhancement settings disabled or set to lowest value
                          • ditherig.exe (dithering will disable immediately after launching)
                          • (if it's a laptop) DPST disabled in addition to whichever ones of these show up for your device: Panel Self Refresh, Dynamic Refresh Rate, Enhanced Battery Life for Gaming also all disabled

                          is a great "safe" test combo for displays that is really effective for nailing down which issues are truly the panel's fault instead the software's fault.

                          It helped me narrow down my Lenovo T480's issues to simply "the Innolux panel has very intense and noticeable PWM that shows up on camera, even at max brightness" instead of all of the even worse disorientation/tiredness/nausea/depth perception issues I was having on "current" Win10 and Win11.

                          Downgrading to 1809 and applying the steps above, shockingly, basically fixed or at least significantly reduced all of those deeper issues.

                          Now, only the "really annoying eyestrain and pressure" symptom remains, which from my consistent experience, I can tell is directly associated with that laptop panel's PWM.

                              DisplaysShouldNotBeTVs I can't stand any monitors with 6bit+FRC for programming

                              Recently I've been thinking that there are probably lots of screen-related triggers that affect some people but not others. Backlight PWM dimming seems to affect a lot of people, but FRC seems to affect a smaller percentage. For me, I seem to be affected by even very small amounts of flicker that comes from the pixels or the backlight. The amount of flickering is so small (for me) that it's only measurable with a very sensitive photodetector + oscilloscope combo.

                              I seem to be lucky regarding Windows - I can use any version of Windows without issues (as long as the monitor is good).

                                  GregAtkinson For me, I seem to be affected by even very small amounts of flicker that comes from the pixels or the backlight.

                                  This definitely applies to me too. I can usually even "see it"! And then, I'm pretty sure what's happening is that causes my eyes to want to automatically and subconsciously want to focus more to try to "see this very subtle thing more clearly" which of course causes strain or blurry/double vision.

                                  The "more subtle or trying to be hidden it is" it's actually worse for me for the most part. Because on the opposite end, I'm totally fine with extreme flashing strobe lights at concerts, I do not have epilepsy, and have only only experienced one migraine many years ago in my entire life. But the moment it gets into """invisible""" flicker territory such as on most LED lightbulbs is when I start experiencing all the issues.

                                  I'm glad you can use all versions of Windows! I have a suspicion that some of the issues with more modern Windows versions are only present on laptop LCDs and not external monitors, and/or possibly only occur on integrated graphics.

                                    I think their are basic principles but no one size fits all solution. It's useful to see both the personal experiences and the "objective" measurement data. What's interesting is when the subjective experience does not seem match the measurements.

                                    FWIW, I'm not a professional programmer but prior to more severe eyestrain and discovering this site I was doing a moderate amount of graphics related programming (VSCode with default white and darker material theme in the evening, windows 11 using both mix of both integrated and discrete gpu modes). I attribute eyestrain to switching from 240hz to 60hz refresh rate on a laptop screen and increased "stress". I do not remember ever having significant eyes issue during the windows 7,8,10 and using laptops with wide gamut support and/or PWM like the thinkpad w520, t500, etc. which I not longer have for testing.

                                    GregAtkinson

                                    How do you define "reasonably low flicker" in your oscilloscope measurements? I have been using 20dB gain on the detector but have tried higher gain settings but that makes it even harder to find a device with a "flat" waveform.

                                        photon78s How do you define "reasonably low flicker" in your oscilloscope measurements? I have been using 20dB gain on the detector but have tried higher gain settings but that makes it even harder to find a device with a "flat" waveform.

                                        Before I answer that, let me refer to this chart. I pulled these numbers from the Thorlabs site:
                                        10dB = 3.3x
                                        20dB = 10x
                                        30dB = 33x
                                        40dB = 100x

                                        Here's my favorite (now dead...) laptop. Barely any flicker at 40dB/100x magnification:

                                        Here's the same model, but with a different panel. This is unusable for me. I assume the flicker is what makes it unusable, but I can't say that for 100% certainty - maybe something else that can't be picked up by the photodetector (like FRC or pixel inversion) is causing the problem.

                                        Here's the LG 27MQ450-B at 100x magnification:

                                        I have the waveforms for all the monitors in the table a few posts above in case you want me to post a few of the waveforms. I'm too lazy to post all 20 of them though. :-)

                                        If you want more details, you might be interested in this thread:
                                        https://ledstrain.org/d/2598-help-wanted-to-measure-flicker-andor-test-a-flicker-free-monitor

                                            GregAtkinson

                                            Thanks! Similarily, I can tolerate this (lenovo legion 7i 2023 at max brightness measured with the thorlabs detector but using only the Miniware DS213):

                                            But not this (samsung s10+ at max brightness). Both at 20dB.

                                            The lenovo screen at max brightness, detector at 40dB, and oscilloscope window at 10mS.

                                              3 months later

                                              Sunspark I am wondering, does it apply to laptops and integrated graphics?

                                              For instance, if after Windows 11 installation, all other non-problematic os became bad, will it help to unplug the CMOS battery for an hour?

                                                a month later

                                                I finally figured out why the position of my main monitor on my dual monitor stand determines whether or not I will have a dizzy feeling at my desktop. It's because when I have my main monitor on the left, and I'm positioned more to the left of my desk and facing straight - now positioned closer to and facing a room corner - there is less air flow and my exhalation doesn't circulate out as well, leading to higher CO2 concentration levels. With the main monitor to my right, I'm sitting slightly more to the right and facing diagonally to the open part of the room where there is better air flow. The better air flow in the center of the room is in part due to how air works in a room but also due to the channel of air circulation I create with my tower fan that moves air coming in from one vent then out the door on the other side of the room.

                                                This dizzy feeling is the same feeling I get when I've either kept my doors closed for too long or had inadequate fan circulation channels (Where air may be moving a lot due to different fan sources but chaotically, making it hard for air to efficiently enter one side of a room and exit the other. This can be caused by air purifiers or poor fan setup).

                                                It's always been CO2. So what I can do now is either move my monitor to the right position of my dual monitor stand, which I've done, or move my desk which is hard to do with my current room layout. I recommend people experiencing dizziness to consider air circulation in the position they use their computer.

                                                  You guys can write such a long text, what a patience.

                                                  TrantaLocked I keep as far as I can. I even recommend getting 2x of the same desk, so you could place monitor far away and increase scaling. Also, disable all sensors, install ditherig.exe and pick explicitly sRGB color profile on monitor. Also set wifi transmit power to lowest. All these remove all dizziness. Also, do not use windows 10, use windows 11.

                                                      dev