si_edgey I'm also concerned that persisting with a Macbook for 2 years has permanently damaged my eyes and this is why I am so sensitive now when only 8 years ago I used to do games development working on screens all day long before playing games all night and never get a headache.

I know its impossible not to worry and I do it too...but I really think this particular fear isn't very likely. If you have physical eye health issues they will impact every part of your life and will be discovered in eye exams...they wouldn't just manifest on certain displays. No rationalization for that makes sense without extreme reaching. I don't know about you but if I avoid displays for a while the strain and headaches go away so that's even more proof there is nothing wrong with me physically.

Things like "rodents lost retinal cells with blue light" sort of studies just fuel this fear and nothing helpful ever comes out of those anyway. If you've seen an eye doctor and don't have vision problems in every part of your life I think you can put that to bed as much as humanly possible.

      hpst If you've seen an eye doctor and don't have vision problems in every part of your life I think you can put that to bed.

      Thanks for this, I have had a few eye tests and none have found anything - my eyes are pretty much perfect. They probably thought I was weird for being a little disappointed.. :]

          si_edgey Yeah it's disappointing not having an answer...even if that answer is not something we want to be true. I left my last eye doctor's visit sweaty and depressed from all the anxiety. My barrier now is deciding if this is technological or psychological....it's definitely amplified by the fear. Ruling out dithering as a global cause will help me here since that's the only technological theory left with any reasonable probability to it.

          I've learned with other pains and symptoms that often if there is no discernable physical cause with thorough testing it's because there is no physical cause. A lot of people who had flourescent light problems back in the day didn't have them until someone mentioned the flickering etc...or it only bothered them at work in a job they hated but they were fine out having fun. But once you KNOW about a problem you can't let it go even subconsciously. I never had a problem with LEDs in general until I learned about PWM and got a newer laptop already primed for a problem...used to be big into LED flashlights etc but now am afraid to pick one up. When I see a big LED sign or billboard on the road...even whe its far away...I get instant eye pain/headache jabs just looking at it for 1-2 seconds....that's just doesn't really make sense and feels more conditioning than some actual problem.

          Once we see and decide something it's hard to let go of that and the suggesting any pain can be psychosomatic feels like an insult. I am hoping ultimately this IS just psychosomatic since that means we are not just allergic to modern tech or to some setting we cannot really change....but its not easy to get to that point of acceptance and generally requires exhausting reasonable physical causes for our minds to believe it so don't know if I even can get there if nothing physical is proven.

          • diop replied to this.

              si_edgey Maybe the monitors differ somehow. I have two "flicker-free" BenQ EW2740L, and one of them is worse for my eyes. I measured them with my oscilloscope at the same brightness and found they both flicker pretty identically at both 60 Hz (probably the pixel refresh flicker) and 25 kHz. But there is also a third frequency: ~450 Hz on the worse one and ~800 Hz on the better one. Those monitors are not really flicker-free and flicker differently.

              • hpst replied to this.

                  KM KM can you test other displays and see if there is any correlation between these spikes and your strain? This is a simple test that would give us good data...if all straining displays have a 450hz spike etc then we have a lead...if it doesn't correlate then it's not the issue. This is a USB oscilloscope with software right? Could you take it to a Best Buy or Media Markt or whatever is in your country and get some broad data? We are seriously lacking in any reproducable data and every good and bad thing anyone has seems random and unexplainable.

                    a month later

                    hpst

                    With regards to anxiety, the fact I am (right now) on a comfortable PC with no symptoms doesn't mean I am anxious about being on a computer, it's the fear that potentially all tech will be unusable for me within the next 5 years (yet is a compulsory part of modern life) that keeps me awake at night.

                    We can all stockpile old tech, and there are still some stellar W7 builds that can still be made and we can still utilise 2000-early 2010's specs extremely well - but (if you want to stay online at least), it's not going to last forever.

                    I'm in a bit of a moral quandry at the moment; unemployed but want to get back into work, but will computer work in an office become increasingly difficult due to everything being on W10 now and everything flickering/dithering? All medical professionals and optometrists boil it down to eye strain, nobody in a professional capacity is actually acknowledging the link between the modern output and our symptoms.

                    Can more be done to push this issue in the public eye (facebook groups, online petitions, spamming support forums🙂). Are there direct insider contacts we can get hold of? Will an open source driver for Windows ever work? All these questions and unfortunately no solid answers yet.

                      AGI and please don't update to 10.13.5 or higher. It seems that Apple has changed graphics drivers and rendering. Reverting my machine to 10.13.4 solved a lot of issues for me.

                        si_edgey Could you please share how do you use the dell 9560 with the windows 10? How do you keep it from updating, is there a crack, or is it a cracked version? I had one before with old version of win and it was good, but I foolishly returned it.
                        Also was installing the older version on it easy?
                        I am considering getting one and trying it, but if it doesnt work id still need to return it as its quite expensive, so I must not mess it up.

                          2 months later

                          Samsung SA850 27' PLS, 0 brightness. It has pwm but a soft one. Gtx 670 Windows 10 latest updates. No issues.

                          On work everybody uses 23 HP monitors. I am with old 19 Inches. The new ones kill my eyes.

                          Phone: HTC one (Android 5) used to work. Now is not working the phone. No audio.

                          Bought a Xperia XZ 2 only usable few minutes a day. If I use it more I have eye pain, and twitches all over the body, especially legs.

                          • AGI replied to this.
                            19 days later

                            tfouto Maybe it does. I wish we had some easy method of testing this.

                              a month later

                              The more I read the more confused I get about this issue. At work there is a large laboratory with 16 dell p5050 PC`s and Dell p2217 monitors. I can use these with only minimal headache/eyestrain but if I bring one down to my office I get an instant long lasting headache. In the lab using one I am aware of the large surrounding airy space in my peripheral vision but in the office there is a filing cabinet on my immediate left, a wall on my immediate right and a room divider in front of me behind the monitor. Do all of these contribute to my eyestrain/headache?? Are your surroundings and the visual impact of these part of the problem? This might explain why its possible to use a device in a store yet find it gives major problems when you buy it and get it home?

                                tfouto witches all over the body, especially legs.

                                Have you reported this to a medical doctor? In case, any explanation? I thought twitching were limited to eyelids and at the maximum facial muscles...

                                    AGI Yes i had. They find it funny, but are clueless about it.

                                    Fasciculations.

                                    • AGI replied to this.

                                        AGI Sleep well, is the best thing to avoid it. And bad displays.

                                        • AGI replied to this.

                                            tfouto Sleep well

                                            I buy that. I indeed realize my sleeping pattern has been delirious for ages...

                                              MacBook Pro 2017 15" Radeon pro 560 connected via display port to Dell U2717D or Dell U2713H works well. MacOS Sierra to Mojave.

                                              Native screen of macbook feels offensive right away, I can't use it at all.
                                              (I've turned off touchbar, added matte screen protector, changed white point to warmer, lowered resolution and changed billion to million colors with SwitchResX, bought glasses, run on 100% brightness only with screen dimmer — and nothing helps.)

                                              iPhone 6S plus works just perfect for me.

                                              • AGI replied to this.

                                                poliakov MacBook Pro 2017 15" Radeon pro 560

                                                Is this a Mac which automatically switches between two graphic cards, and the other one is an Intel? Is the eyestrain independent of the card, assuming you can tell which one is being used? Sorry for the basic questions, I am quite ignorant on the topic.

                                                Interesting you get rid of the eyestrain by plugging the Mac into an external monitor. With my Dell laptop last year it was the other way around, I had more troubles on monitor. Maybe I should give it a go with my MacBook Air. I had understood dithering and whatever strains would be "transferred" onto the external screen...or maybe it is again subjective?

                                                  Hi. Yes, this model switches between graphic cards, but I see no difference with “switch graphic card” checkbox turned on or off.

                                                  I’m also very far from understanding nature of the problem, can only share my own experience. I literally see that the macbook screen (and all these modern windows screens) is not static. At some point I installed SwitchResX, lowered resolution and changed colors from billions to millions. And screen became almost static. As static as my external monitor. But “more static” mackbook screen keeps causing all symptoms just as fast. Since at 100% it should not have PWM, dithering/pwm strain theory falls apart.

                                                  • AGI replied to this.
                                                    dev