Taking Action

JTL Know low level C and x86 assembly language, how to use a debugger, how memory management works on the given platform (Windows, OS X, Linux, etc.) how to use said debugger to modify driver code at runtime, etc. Run experiments from there.

As you've mentioned before, Linux is a good starting point as most of it is open to play around with. However checking out the AMD freedesktop link on the Linux thread, it seems there is no black and white solution, and lots of talk of register changes. It's well above my level of knowledge but it confounds me how even the developers themselves don't say if dithering is enabled or how to disable it. It didn't just appear by magic one day! Does enough documentation exist to build a 'dither-free' Intel driver on Linux, or develop a way to disable it?

Edward I had no problems until 2012 when I bought a Mac Mini and MacBook Air. I've tried many different solutions since. The differences between a good set up and a bad one are obvious. To the people who say that these symptoms are normal or I am a freak, I say that I have had tired eyes at many different points in my life before 2012. But the symptoms I talk about have as much to do with tired eyes as a broken bone has to do with a bruise. The worst example of my symptoms comes in expensively lit rooms, such as museums, jewellery shops, and conference venues. Obviously not all venues impact me, but I can feel physically nauseous in minutes in some places.

I haven't actually tried disabling the Intel drivers, I may give this a shot. I remember in the mid/late 00's getting eye strain at my desk job, however I define eye strain as actual eye muscle pain (in my case I believe it was caused by a bad monitor position). This newer issue is more like nausea/motion-sickness than actual eye strain for me.

The very fact that we have no control over dithering means it can't be ruled out. Having researched into what temporal dithering actually is, I don't see what else it could be. Pixel colors are changing on our screens in ways they didn't before; fact. Even if I didn't have symptoms and was 'normal', knowing what PWM is (essentially an on/off strobe) and temporal dithering (a pixel flickering between two colors to generate the intermediate color), I wouldn't want either of them.

Edward You can check if you are on Microsoft Basic Display Driver by running dxdiag.exe and selecting the display tab. It will state "Microsoft Basic Display Driver" near the top. It is very easy to enable the drivers again if you want to play games, do colour sensitive work, etc. For office applications and web browsing, I am happy to use the basic display driver.

Thanks for the tip. I gave it a try on a known bad device. It defaulted at 1024x768 and when attempting to change it to a higher res, it went to a black screen (hmm..). It definately looked calmer compared to the Intel driver, however IMO there is still some strain going on. I would say it would prolong my use on the machine but not for more than a few hours at most. I suspect maybe it's W10 shennanigans or just something in the VBIOS of this device. I may try it at a later date on a known good device to see if it makes a difference.

Which is making me realise, we could get a dither toggle tomorrow, but it is useless unless we can control what the VBIOS is doing first.

Intel are going to include Color Depth/Subsampling controls later this year in the updated Graphics Command Center.

We wanted to include the option to manually select Color Depth and Subsampling by end of Q4'19 or earlier Q1'20, but it was necessary to push it back (that is why I usually don't like providing ETAs as dates can shift). Rest assured that the feature is still on track for implementation in a next Intel Graphics Command Center release (updated target is Q2'20).

https://forums.intel.com/s/question/0D50P0000490JMTSA2/advanced-users-we-need-your-feedback-control-panel-color-configuration-options