who can use Linux but not windows? Share your Linux setup

I have tried working for two days in Linux and Windows (one day in Windows and one day in Linux) with the A770.

In Windows 11, white isn't completely white; it has a sort of golden tint, which gives a 3D effect but quickly leads to eye strain when reading. Using the Basic Microsoft Driver offers slight improvements, but it doesn't fully solve the problem. However, when watching videos on YouTube, my eyes don't get tired.

Regarding Ubuntu Linux Desktop 24.04, my eyes feel less strained when reading because the golden tint effect is less pronounced. Watching videos on YouTube is also fine.

As I've been using macOS (with dithering disabled) as my daily driver for over 10 years, I have compared them. Linux is closer to macOS in terms of comfortable white color display and screen reading. However, there's still room for improvement; while I don't feel any strain with a macOS, I do feel slight tension with Linux, which currently prevents me from using Linux fully for 8 hours a day, five days a week.

In Windows 11, my eyes get very tired after 30-40 minutes of reading text, leading to brain fog. So, I can't work in Windows 11 fully yet. The standard A770 driver seemed slightly worse to me than the usual Intel UHD (which can be installed by force, even if the system warns about incompatibility, but it works). During experiments with "non-native" drivers, I noticed occasional flickering in YouTube videos, but it quickly passed.

I plan to try Windows 10, but probably only by the end of next week.

I was unable to switch the A770 to 6-bit mode in Windows. The standard registers don't work. I went through a couple of dozen port addresses from the driver code, but nothing helps. No progress here yet.

jordan

Do you think a Linux distro not using gnome could make it more comfortable?

I spent a lot of time with Linux in 2009-2013, but since then I returned to it a couple of months ago and have only tried Manjaro XFCE and Ubuntu Gnome. It's hard for me to compare them since it was on different hardware. But they feel roughly the same.

Something that is basic like x11 + openbox?

I haven't had the chance to try Openbox yet, but based on my experience, window managers typically don't manage rendering, and dithering usually isn't dependent on them. You need to check which library is used as the renderer, as it is responsible for turning everything into an 'image' and is usually where the chain of requests for enabling dithering begins. In Ubuntu Gnome, the renderer is Clutter.

jordan

I thought macos wasn't the greatest nowadays? Which version and which Mac/specs?

I have an MBP M1 (16 Gb RAM, 1 Tb SSD, Sonoma 14.1.2). I use it with a Benq GL2450 monitor (TN 6bit+FRC). So far, this is the best setup I have. I've tried other monitors, such as the GIGABYTE G27Q, BenQ BL2711U, etc. But I can't work with them for long. I also have my old Mac Mini 2018 (i5 8400) connected to a Sony KD-49XG8096 TV, and this setup is also very comfortable. But recently, I bought an MBP M1 Max and sold it almost immediately because I couldn't work with it.

Do you think a uhd driver would install on 1507/1511 win10?

I'll try next week.

jordan I use Intel integrated graphics. Most important for me is being well slept. If I am tired any screen will irritate my eyes. By the way, Lubuntu is supposed to be one of the best ones for eye comfort. Worth trying.

jordan

I'm shocked the mbp is fine. Do you use stillcolor app? The frc doesn't bother you on that monitor but GPU dithering does?

I use Stillcolor with my MBP M1 because, without it, I can't work for extended periods. In my case, the macOS interface has subdued colors and is rendered without harsh transitions and strong contrast. My hypothesis is that this makes the FRC on the monitor less active. However, when switching to Windows and Linux, I notice an increase in sharpness and contrast, and the image becomes more vibrant, which leads to more "active" FRC operation. I immediately notice this as eye strain.

How would I force 8bit with the AMD igpu in Linux?

I’m not sure off the top of my head, but you can run the command xrandr --verbose. This will print the available variables for modification in the terminal.

Or would that xrandr command you told me earlier also work on this?

Xrandr can work with any video driver. It receives a list of properties from the driver and simply sends the property along with its value to the driver when setting it.

I'm thinking this z390 board also is just no good

My motherboard is based on the Z390 chipset, and when I tried switching from A770 to UHD 630 in Windows 11, I noticed that it became less comfortable for my eyes.

It turns out that the minimum 8-bit limitation for HDMI on my Intel UHD Xe (12th gen CPU) is not a hardware issue

I have experimented with i9-9900K (UHD 630). I tried to enable 6-bit on Windows with this iGPU. However, Ditherig returned 0 as the pipeline state register value (the same situation occurred on Linux), which is strange. I attempted to write data to the register, but UHD 630 did not respond.

I also wonder if changing configuration files can be done on a live usb, and that way, its possible to try similar configuration changes on different distros, fast.

I looked into how the video stack works in the latest version of Ubuntu Desktop X11. It turns out that in the source code of the Mutter/Clutter rendering engine, there are no external settings for controlling dithering - it is enabled by default. In older versions of Mesa OpenGL, there used to be an environment variable called MESA_NO_DITHER, but in modern versions, it has been removed because the relevant code was taken out. When the data reaches the driver level, it's the drivers that decide whether to enable or disable dithering, regardless of what the lower layers request. Although theoretically possible to replace some components, I didn't find a straightforward way to change dithering settings through default configuration files.

I read in a few places here that LUbuntu 18.04 is best for eye strain.

Lubuntu does not use Mutter/Clutter. It definitely needs to be tried.

jordan

A Hackintosh built on my Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Master with i9-9900K has some issues (common with many Z390 and 9th gen CPUs setups). There is a challenge in configuring the graphics because the best profile for UHD 630 is the Mac Mini, but there is no Mac Mini based on 9th generation processors. By default, the integrated GPU doesn't work, and a discrete AMD graphics card is needed. I used the RX6600, but this setup has significant dithering issues and is not functional. I managed to get UHD 630 (i9-9900K) working (which is quite an adventure and can take at least half a day), it's not comfortable for the eyes. The bootloader option 'enableDither=0', which is supposed to disable dithering on the iGPU, doesn't work with that setup.

Therefore, for a comfortable experience, I would recommend using Apple Silicon M1. It's better to first find someone you know and try working on M1. The Mac Mini 2018 based on the i7-8700 is very noisy; the only option is the one based on the i5-8400, but that's not as powerful a machine. However, since you have i7-8700 like in the Mac Mini 2018, you might want to give it a try with Hackintosh and see if it works out.

WhisperingWind these guys(which i got to the through jordan's comments) are academic researchers in the field of vision. So they built a library to do vision experiments.

A part of this library is to verify What goes to the screen: http://psychtoolbox.org/docs/BitsPlusIdentityClutTest

They even fixed a bug in ubuntu, related to dithering: https://psychtoolbox.discourse.group/t/dithering-with-ubuntu-22-04-md-radeon-pro-wx-3200-viewpixx/4517

autobot but it seems only for their device. So not sure if this helps…