andc I also used to sleep better in the past and now spend an hour laying before falling asleep

While I don't believe for a second blue light causes eyestrain based on the science...it DOES interfere with your sleep cycles being exposed to it after dark by confusing hormones etc. If you haven't explored glasses/screen protectors like Reticare etc for that particular issue..or altering your habits to stay off screens after dark (terribly inconvenient I know...esp in Winter and at high latitudes), then it's worth a go for the sleep issue. It's an open question as to whether software like F.lux and Redshift etc, or built in "low blue light" modes on some displays, actually reduce blue light at all or significantly, or are just playing tinting games.

    hpst Look at the spectrometer testing here: https://techsensitive.com/night-light-for-windows-10-review/

    But I think your point still stands. I don't remember anyone complaining about blue light from CRTs or early non LED backlit LCD monitors and I feel the color tinting is a "workaround" that distorts colors compared to a proper solution.

    hpst I too think blue light is not the worst guy out there. It is probably producing some long term effect, besides disturbing sleep, but it is not responsible for the immediate eyestrain that many of us feel in front of "bad" devices. However, I am bothered by some type of lightning as well, and that cannot be dithering. I suspect flickering rather than blue light.
    Are you struggling only with displays?

    On a different note, I withdraw my desperate speculation that acupuncture could have worsen my situation. I went in yesterday and I showed the osteopath the twitching of my eyes' muscles. Post-treatment I had relaxed and only around the left eye I could feel some tension. I stayed 16 hours without electronics and felt almost healed. Then I messed around for a couple of hours with a DELL Latitude E5570 mounting an Intel (R) HD Graphics 530 and on Windows 7, and to my surprise I survived very well without even adjusting the brightness and reducing the display resolution. Finally I turned my MacBook Air on, and muscle twitching / neck tension began within minutes :-(

    I read some of you felt eyestrain after updating their browser. Question: could you ascertain the strain came only from the app which you updated? I am considering uninstalling and reinstalling Office, which has been my only (undesired) recent update. I am also worried it could be the screen, as it went black a couple of times within seconds. How long are LED displays supposed to live for and what do they typically die of? Thanks.

      AGI How long are LED displays supposed to live for and what do they typically die of?

      I believe the data on LED backlit failure rates doesn't really exist because they are too new (Only came in the market about 2008-2010)

      I have an old Dell CCFL monitor from 2005, and other then but dim due to age it still works fine.

      • AGI likes this.

      Alexandre I agree that even if the monitor is flicker free I still get pain. I can't find a screen for the life of me that doesn't give me pain except my Yotaphone 2 that I use.

      I have a strange feeling that even if there's no PWM, there's some other sort of flicker that is problematic, or machines that we think have no PWM actually have it, but it's very high, not perceived by eyes, but still messing with us.
      I initially thought it would be dithering, but it doesn't make sense in my current case. I have a gut feeling that the white light from my current device is problematic, as if you were staring at ugly lamp light. It seems to happen instantly and, even from distance, so I think dithering wouldn't even be visible if I can't discrimine series of pixels from around a meter on a 12.5" device. And even then - dithering shouldn't be an instant shock, but something I have to focus on for a while.
      It looks to me that this problem is some sort of over-sensitivity, where we "feel" the original digital nature of the devices when it's expected to be perceived as analog, ie. something like series of images instead of fluid movie.

      • KM replied to this.
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        andc The few "flicker-free" monitors I tested at home don't have PWM but show a small DC ripple on the oscilloscope. So do all of the LED bulbs I have. It seems it is very difficult for manufacturers to produce a perfect constant light when a device is powered by AC.
        The most flicker-free LED bulb I have flickers at just 0.03%, 100 Hz, yet it hurts after while, and blocking the blue light, verified with a spectrometer, won't help. I'm out of ideas. But the flicker is there.

        • hpst replied to this.
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          KM Do you have any incandescents/halogens to test? Also Flourescents? All bulbs, even those old kind, flicker...so it would be interesting to see the frequency comparisons.

          • KM replied to this.

            hpst Incandescents, 100 Hz:
            Osram 60W bulb: ~20% flicker
            Osram 40W bulb: ~25% flicker
            Osram 25W bulb: ~40% flicker
            Unknown 40W candle bulb: ~40% flicker

            All independent of the type of lamp they're put into. But whether I get symptoms or not from incandescents depends on the lamp. I don't know why yet. Some lamps I have are not usable.
            Rough flicker estimates, because my PC died and I only have my handheld flicker meter currently.

            Some more precise IKEA LED bulb measurements here: https://ledstrain.org/d/106-flicker-free-led-lights/81

            I bought some flourescents, too, but can't test them currently without an x86 PC. The handheld flicker meter tells me there's lots of flicker going on with those at 100 Hz and also above 20 KHz. Also they are better for my eyes than the LED bulbs, but still not very comfortable.

            Edit: Flourescent results:
            Osram Dulux Stick 900lm: ~35% 100 Hz flicker + ~27% 60-80 kHz flicker

              KM It's all very confusing because in every possible class or factor I personally have an exception that prevents me from saying "LED is bad" or "CCFL is good" or "PWM is bad" etc. So I cannot accept ideas like "LED is 'harsher' and less smooth etc" as an explanation since some LED applicaitons are fine for me. I am desperately hoping that dithering is a solution on screens but that doesn't really apply to light bulbs so makes me less hopeful.

              • KM replied to this.

                hpst I agree it is very confusing. For the measurements I did a few minutes ago I got some eye strain symptoms from the 25W incandescent bulb. I looked into the light for only 10 seconds and now 20 minutes later still have strained eyes. When I put the same bulb into my ceiling lamp, no problems. There must be something I missed that has not been measured yet. But other than flicker or spectrum, I'm clueless. Matte or clear doesn't seem to matter here.
                My testing lamp is this: https://m.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/art/10394129/
                In fact all bulbs I ever tested in this lamp hurt more or less.
                Maybe for future measurements I should try to use the ceiling lamp, which I'd need to create a portable setup for.

                • AGI replied to this.

                  AGI read some of you felt eyestrain after updating their browser. Question: could you ascertain the strain came only from the app which you updated?

                  Yes absolutely - with the recent update to the Chrome browsers on PC. Gives me eye strain, as does the current Firefox. I rolled back Chrome to a previous version and everything feels "good" again.

                  • AGI replied to this.
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                    KM Maybe the lamp plays a role too?

                    • hpst replied to this.

                      AGI If I wasn't physically disabled to the point I couldn't survive there, I'd move to a cabin on a beach with fire and books. It seems technology is out to kill us when even a lamp is suspect.

                      AgentX20 Thanks. I actually just asked this question in another thread. Did you experience eyestrain only in the window of the browser? No problem using another program?

                        AGI Did you experience eyestrain only in the window of the browser? No problem using another program?

                        With the 'bad' Chrome/Firefox window on screen I got eye-strain. Close it, and everything was fine.

                          7 days later

                          tfouto The link doesnt work.

                          I had another meeting with my optometrist. He told me that basically with my kind of deviation from normal vision, hes suprised the new displays is the only thing causing me trouble, as it should show in all areas of my life. I have 20 points deviation out of possible 12. He said I should maybe be thankful that I started having these issues, as otherwise it would go unnoticed and develop into a lot worse case of possible visible strabismus or diplopia in couple years.
                          I explained to him the idea behind dithering and he said it makes a lot of sense for it to be really disturbing, and that the therapy should hopefully fix it. Hes also willing to dive more into research when hes more free and said that it would be amazing if we found a specific proof of it (dithering etc), as it could make a good article. Also different polarization than in the past could be the cause.
                          He also mentioned a lot of optometrists, even those he is schooling, do not believe in heterophoria (hidden strabismus), they think its psychological often and that it is really difficult to get proper care for it. He mentioned the best center in the USA being in New York, I think some people already posted a link to health thread.

                          Ive been given new exercises, which can now be done without a computer and are composed of a translucent board with images I try to connect by converging and diverging. I must say that the divergence, which is my problem, is really difficult, takes forever to fuse the images and then theyre not sharp, sharpness kicks in after another 10 seconds, if anything moves in the field, its lost again. This would explain how dithering/flicker/movement is giving me trouble on the displays. Even trying it with the board properly (no display involved) I soon got the very familiar stabbing pain in the temples and all over the head. I gave it to a person who has no issues with displays and he could connect all of the images effortlessly in an instant.

                          I really recommend, if you can, trying to find proper care, as it might be what we all have in common. Id love to beat the marketing and display manufacturers, but now even software employing weird rendering, I dont know how, as whenever I win, they come with more, so Id rather build resitance instead. Hopefully that will happen.

                            martin Blue filter amblyopia treatment protocol for strabismic amblyopia: a prospective comparative study of 50 cases.
                            Metzler U1, Ham O, Flores V, Claramunt M, Sepulveda C, Casanova D.
                            Author information
                            Abstract
                            PURPOSE:
                            Previous studies of monochromatic visual evoked potentials confirm the strong suppression of (the cortical representation of) paracentral retinal areas of functionally amblyopic eyes, by a flat response to a blue stimulus. A clinical trial stimulating these areas with blue light was encouraging, and justified a prospective comparison of this treatment with conventional classic treatment.

                            SUBJECTS AND METHODS:
                            In 50 strabismic children with amblyopia, the blue filter treatment protocol (flash stimulation with, and the wearing of, a blue filter during occlusion of the better eye for one hour daily) was compared with the classical treatment (full time total occlusion by patch) in a prospective matched and randomized study. Patients 3 to 7 years old without previous treatment and a visual acuity up to 0.3 were admitted to the study. Visual acuity and fixation behavior were used as the parameters of comparison. Visual Evoked Potentials by monochromatic flashes were also studied. Results of treatment were compared after 6 months.

                            RESULTS:
                            The visual acuity outcome for the blue filter treatment was "statistically significantly" better (p=0.005). The greatest improvement was seen in the subgroup of children with eccentric fixation (p=0.01). Fixation behavior also showed a better outcome from the blue filter treatment (p=0.05) favoring especially children between 3 and 5 years. In children of this age with a visual acuity better than 0.1 we found a very "statistically significant" difference between the two treatments (p=0.004). In children 3 to 5 years old with poorer visual acuity we also found a "statistically significant" difference in the two treatments (p=0.04). The interocular difference of amplitude on the Visual Evoked Potentials also demonstrated more improvement in children treated with the blue filter. This treatment improved especially the cortical response to blue flash stimulation, correlating to paracentral retinal areas.

                            CONCLUSIONS:
                            The blue filter treatment protocol provided better results for treating amblyopia than the conventional classic occlusion treatment method. We propose that stimulation of these paracentral retinal areas triggers a better disinhibition of a functionally amblyopic eye.

                            dev