Newbie- Where do I start?

Jl1994

So much info here idk where to start. Have had extreme pain behind eyes for 10 years, light sensitivity, sensitive to screens etc.

Monitor: Asus proart pa278cgv(just bought, maybe a mistake, tell me if it sucks).

CPU: Intel Core i7 14700K.
Motherboard: MSI MAG Z790 Tomahawk WIFI
Graphics card: PowerColor Radeon RX 7800 XT 16GB Red Devil

Using windows 11, any settings I can try changing to see if it helps?

Donux

Jl1994 Welcome home son (or daughter). As for solutions - its a complex matter encompassing tech issues such as various types of flicker, actual LED light, then it relates to actual usage patterns, and then finally actual inherited medical conditions you might have (astigmatism or whatever)

autobot

Jl1994

First step: use an os that is is good for the eyes, that doesnt use the gpu, just to test if your display feels good to your eyes. Test it for a day or more. Share your results here.

The operating system is ubuntu 18.04. You can use it with a live usb, No need to install.

Also, connect the monitor using display port. Its better this way.

moonpie

Short: Move cable from dGPU to motherboard and disable VRR. Everything should feel fine.

Long:

Jl1994 Monitor: Asus proart pa278cgv(just bought, maybe a mistake, tell me if it sucks).

Disable VRR.
Trace Free Technology : OFF
ProArt Preset : Native or sRGB or DCI-P3
Lower brightness
Lower refresh to 60/70/75Hz (probably not needed)

CPU: Intel Core i7 14700K.

Skip the dGPU and use your intel iGPU i.e. unplug dp/hdmi cable from monitor and plug into motherboard. Turn off all advanced features you can find as it relates to graphics.

WhisperingWind

Jl1994

ASUS ProArt PA278CGV Monitor

The ASUS ProArt PA278CGV monitor, according to https://www.displayspecifications.com/en/model/53fc33b6, supports true 8-bit color, but uses FRC (temporal dithering) for 10-bit. You should ensure that the graphics card control panel is set to 8-bit to avoid engaging the FRC module.

PowerColor Radeon RX 7800 XT 16GB Red Devil

I'm sure the RX 7800 XT uses dithering when the AMD driver is loaded at any bit depth except the maximum value, which should be 12-bit, just like my former RX 6600. However, in Linux, starting from kernel v6.8-rc1, it should be 10-bit (?) according to this commit: https://github.com/torvalds/linux/commit/d5df648ec830cfd775bdacb3a3640c1e16de90f2. Try using ColorControl to disable dithering on the RX 7800 XT in Windows (https://github.com/Maassoft/ColorControl) and set the color depth to 8-bit in the graphics card control panel.

Jl1994

autobot Can I use my computer as normally without GPU? For example I play a lot of poker, is that possible still? Also I'm not really sure what you mean by "You can use it with a live usb" How does that work exactly

Zappano

Jl1994 Yes, the i7 14700K has an integrated GPU. It's obviously not as fast as a dedicated GPU but enough for light computer usage such as editing docs, surfing etc. It should also be possible to play Poker on a website.

Live USB just means that you can install Ubuntu on a USB Stick and run it from there as well without installing it on your PC.

autobot

Jl1994

In this they show how use a live usb.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=n-nS660EmYM

But it's for a different version.

For testing, What i and others tested with is lubuntu 18.04.

It's availble here: https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/lubuntu/releases/18.04.5/release/

You need this "64-bit PC (AMD64) desktop image".

simplex

moonpie Lower refresh to 60/70/75Hz (probably not needed)

I do not recommend to reduce refresh rate due to some inversion artifacts visibility in gaming monitors.

To mask such patterns, its very important to keep very high refresh rates

Jl1994

simplex Do you agree with the other suggestions? Disabling VRR and Trace free techcnology for example

Edit: Just did a quick search on VRR on the forum, seems like everyone agrees to turn it off. Didnt find much on trace free technology. Appreciate all the help guys.

moonpie

simplex artifacts visibility in gaming monitors.

"Monitor: Asus proart" OP does not have a gaming monitor.

Jl1994 Didnt find much on trace free technology.

VRR when active will adjust your refresh rate continuously. Turn it off in the monitor and your graphics settings.

https://blurbusters.com/faq/lcd-overdrive-artifacts/
Overdrive / ghosting affects motion blur and can be horrible. You shouldn't even need it given your monitor can do 144 Hz.

You want to turn off every single feature/gimmick in your hardware/software and then slowly turn them back on.

simplex

Jl1994 Disabling VRR and Trace free techcnology for example

I dont have experience with VRR feature and comfort impact of it

But I do have experience with high-frequency monitors, where decreasing refresh rate to 60/50hz lead to eye-strain

Jl1994

moonpie Thank you very much

Jl1994

moonpie Is "Freesync premium" similar to VRR? I didnt find VRR but I found freesync premium which was turned off. Turned trace free to 0. Do you suggest to use "blue light filter"? Got one of those.

Any other suggestions on features/gimmicks to turn off?

moonpie

Jl1994 VRR = freesync (AMD) = gsync (nvidia). Intel may turn on VRR because your monitor is over 120hz. That settings may be buried somewhere. For me I have 5 levels on my monitor for a "blue light" filter. Beyond level two, it doesn't look good so I use software to fix it (4000K temp with slight gamma reduction).

Don't use any kind of display scaling as that turns on your GPU.

Just moving the cable from your dGPU to your motherboard should turn off most of everything. As others have mentioned, use a linux live usb drive to test another OS.

https://fedoraproject.org/spins/xfce
https://www.debian.org/CD/live/ (live xfce)

Jl1994

Is it possible to send a video here somehow btw? Took a slow-mo video of my screen. Looks like its flickering. Just wanted to confirm

moonpie

simplex I dont have experience with VRR feature and comfort impact of it
But I do have experience with high-frequency monitors, where decreasing refresh rate to 60/50hz lead to eye-strain

OP's monitor with VRR active goes from 30Hz - 144Hz on demand. VRR is horrible.

moonpie

autobot For testing, What i and others tested with is lubuntu 18.04.
It's availble here: https://cdimage.ubuntu.com/lubuntu/releases/18.04.5/release/
You need this "64-bit PC (AMD64) desktop image".

Do NOT listen to the person above as they are telling you to run EOL software. If you choose (l)ubuntu use 22.04 or 24.04 only.

Jl1994

moonpie Okay thanks. Btw I bought this monitor like 5 days ago. First 2 days the difference was crazy, felt so much better, headache so much better etc. Then after that started feeling worse again. It coincides with my computer starting to freeze randomly 4 or 5 times now which never happens usually. I'm hopeful something's up with the graphics or the computer that's causing the increase in symptoms again. Does that sound reasonable?

autobot

moonpie ubuntu 22.04 won't disable the gpu.So it's not a good way for testing

moonpie

autobot So it's not a good way for testing

Stop telling people to use unsupported EOL software even for testing. You are doing more harm than good whether you understand that or not.

Jl1994

And thank you also aswell for your inputs @autobot

How do you guys know if the monitor is dithering or not? Any video of what it looks like or how to spot it?

moonpie

Jl1994 How do you guys know if the monitor is dithering or not?

https://ledstrain.org/d/2753-intel-confirmed-no-dithering-on-intel-arc-a770/54

# cat /sys/kernel/debug/dri/*/i915_display_info
# xrandr --verbose

Windows settings for similar model:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Monitors/comments/13jbzm6/asus_proart_pa279cv_change_resolution_to_4k_10bit/