• OtherPWM
  • New car, LED screens/lights, PWM

Yesterday I sold my 15 year old second-hand car. I am temporarily renting a late model vehicle.
To my shock, after a 30 min drive, some pain and the feeling of a foreign body developed in my left eye, which is my weaker eye. Back home, I pulled out my laptop and realized that the initially moderate pain had quickly turned into a more diffused eyestrain in both eyes, strong twitching of the left eyelids and neck tension, similar to what I experience when I look at a bad device.

I drove the car only once and it was night. I am 99% sure the cause of my troubles is the illumination of the dashboard. Any suggestion? Have you guys succeeded getting rid of the strain by covering the display? Luckily, from what I remember, there are no other sources of lights, not even the classic light when the door opens. I am thinking of shielding the illuminated area with cardboard. Option number 2, since I will be renting for a month, is to ask for a replacement of the vehicle, but I am not sure they have old models available and I would sound a fruitcake.

    AGI have you tried to use only one eye? For me it has been the way back to modern screens. So it maybe works for you too?

      mike Do you have some kind of eye phorias? Did you try to use glasses with prisms?

      • mike replied to this.

        mike No, I have not tried. I may want to, but perhaps not while driving :-)
        I am not reading or straining my eyes in any way in the car. The symptoms developed by just looking now and then at the speed display and peripherally viewing the lights which intermittently change from green to orange. I wonder, what is the point of those lights? It is a car, not a Christmas tree.

        Doing computer work, how long can you use one eye for? Can you stay the whole day in the office with an eyepatch?

        For your information, I have done quite a lot of exercises with a pen and a Brock string to relax my eyes. I have also visited numerous ophthalmologists and an orthoptist. No one found anything anomalous. I am currently trying glasses with a blue filter, and I do not wear prescription glasses.

          AGI About three-four years ago a company opened a new store i the town where i live, they had led lights in the roof. After 15 minutes in the store i could feel tension headache. Not long after that a new restaurant open in a central galleria, they had also led lights in the roof. My girlfriend wanted to try it, unfortunately i had to leave the restaurant before i was finished and got long tension headache. That sucked.

          Same with cars, i have friends that have newer BMW, Volvo, Audi etc. Just sitting in the passenger seat and avoiding the screens also gave me tension headache after a while.

          When i have trained with one eye i have done it for one or some hours on a day. Not a whole day, its a little bit uncomfortable. And repeat on that for some days to get results. Because it works on me, maybe it works on somebody else with same/similar symptoms.

          I have tested a lot of things under the last nine years. In the end i think the solution is to relearn how the brain controls the eyes, and then we are back on one-eye-training.

            Next week should be registered and I hope that I will get used to it. It had the best displays from new cars, but LEDs Headlights gave me strain at testing. I will try to put some black foil on it we will see.

            I know this, too. I sit in the passenger's seat and look out of the window, yet the dashboard's LEDs trigger long-lasting symptoms within a few minutes (or seconds, rather). Sitting in the backseat doesn't help. If the LEDs are in the peripheral vision, it's all that's needed to trigger in no time. It is hard to convince anyone this problem is real.

              mike Read this carefully
              A few nights ago, I was crossing a street with many shops.
              I turned on the cell phone camera
              I set the mobile camera to Proffessional mode
              Then I set the shutter speed to 1/1000
              I started walking past the shops and it was very interesting that some of the shops had their lights on very Flickering.
              While others used LED bulbs, there was no blink.
              In fact, I am coming to the conclusion that a number of LED manufacturers, for various reasons, including increasing the lifespan of LEDs in situations where those LEDs are of poor quality, try to reduce the frequency of turning on and off the LEDs, and this is even for some people. It is also dangerous that they do not have a problem with this issue. Because after a few years, their eyes will definitely have problems.
              Is health important for trade and income for these producers? Yes sure . Just sell for less.
              You can also test this, with safety and caution

              WITHUT MOBILE CAMERA AND 1/900 OR 1/1000 OR 1/1500 , ...... sHUTTER SPEED CANOT SEE FLICKER BY EYE !
              BUT IT CAN START YOUR HEADACHE
              YOU SHOULD NOT TAKE PICTURE ! ONLY SHOULD VIEW BULB BEHIND CELL PHONE CAMERA IN 1/N SHUTTER SPEED IN PICTURE MODE !
              sOME CELL PHONE WITH AUTO SHUTTER SPEED MODE PREVENT TO SEE FLICKER BUT FOR EXAMPLE I AM SEE fLICKERS BEHINDS HUAWEI MATE 8 AS CELL PHONE , AND HUAWEI MATE 8 IS A GOOD CELL PHONE THAT IN LOW OR HIGH BRIGHTNESS NOT HAHE PWM FLICKERING PROBLEM , I CN SEE 4-6 HOURSE MOVIE BEHIND HUAWEI MATE 8

              KM THAT'S Right . Because some manufacure of LED use low frequency with PWM to low Cost and increase the LED life.

              Lauda89 I think i have some type of eye phorias. No one of the specialists i have visit has confirmed that. The answer I get a lot is, we can’t find any problem, you should try a pair of glasses.

              My optician has confirmed that only one eye moves when she moved a pen to my nose while i am watching the pen. I got a set of glasses 1,5 years ago, i am not sure if they have prisms. I tested the glasses for two months without results.

                mike Uh, it is too bad that no one noticed that only one eye would follow the pen. It is a pretty simple test.
                It is shameful how many ophthalmologists work. It seems done on purpose. When I went to a vision therapy session, the therapist explained how he had to fight the ophthalmologist community all his professional life. He mentioned (in 2014) that especially in Asia there is no vision therapy culture. I am experiencing it myself. I have not been unable to find any support in the past three years in Japan.
                Also, I too found that my old optician without a medical degree was the only one to put me on the right track a couple of decades ago. He noticed that my left eye was a bit lazy and recommended me some simple exercises with a pen. They helped, as the Brock string helps to relax my eyes, but sadly there is no exercise which soothes my symptoms in front of a bad device.

                  AGI Good to hear that an optician put you on the right track. Looks like a good optician is the best way to go.

                  Back in 2011-2012 i did some simple tests at home with one eye. It was on a screen that was a little bad. At that time I didn’t discover any diffence between one and two eyes. I should have done more and longer test behind bad screens. So when i got a question from a specialist, is it any difference if you cover one eye i answered no. Which i know now is incorrect, at least for me.

                  Because of that i want more people with same/similar problems to cover one eye and train with bad screens.

                  About training with a brook string, i got this answer from a Swedish orthoptist - “In Sweden we don’t do training, we don’t believe in it. Only glasses.”

                  For a couple of months ago i found a specialist that maybe could be worth to meet. But because i have made a lot of progress, i haven’t book a time with him.

                  https://medarbetare.ki.se/people/tonpan

                  https://www.sankterik.se/sv-se/forskning/vara-forskare/tony-pansell

                  Use google translate to translate from Swedish.

                  @martin should i book a time with Tony?

                  • AGI likes this.
                  18 days later

                  Ok so after almost 3 weeks of using my Volvo V60 MY21 Rdesign, I can say it is the best car with all digital displays and LED headlights form me now. I've been trying some other's like VW, SKODA, Audi and BMW and there I felt like using new MacBooks after few minutes. First drive with Volvo I felt that this interior is friendly for my eyes it was worst during night drive at testing. In test unit I had HighBeam Led's. In my car I have just regular LED this is very white but after few days I can drive at night with just little strain. I don't use now ambient LED's and all is an minimum level but I can use this car like old ones. No compere to others like Passat which gave me big head pain. So if you considering new car please look at Volvo too.

                    tomek I can say that you may have a point with Volvos. My bosses XC90 seems ok when I am in the car with him. But i cant buy this one 😁, so I will have a look at a cheaper one to see how it is. Their displays seem more friendly in the eyes for me.

                    4 months later

                    valex13 In my job they will provide me as a company car the new Toyota Corolla. My wife has an older model and it does create me strain. Have you managed to somehow ease the discomfort with the Rav4? Thnx

                    +1 for Chevy Equinox, paper like feel. Matte TN, no glare, not too bright.

                      daniel_mate at the car show, along with the forester, the equinox / terrain had the lowest strain screens

                      someone else in this thread though had a bad luck with his Subaru where as the one he test drove was fine, so we can have panel lottery with our cars too :/

                      I will be doing this dance soon. My problems are made worse because I want a very specific thing in a car. I am looking at the Subaru WRX and the VW Golf GTI because they have a manual transmission and are performance cars. I will also consider older BMW like 2015-2016. I haven’t even looked at Volvo yet although maybe they made a stick in 2019?

                      The lighting on my 2014 Ford Fusion (Mondeo) hybrid screens was very bad for me at first but I adjusted. The lighting on my wife's Subarus (2015 XV/Crosstrek, 2018 Crosstrek, 2019 Forester) was an adjustment but now is fine. So I’m hoping even a 2021 WRX will be ok since it uses the exact same displays but as people have noted it is hit or miss.

                      I was ok driving older VW's. A 2012 Passat was fine. The Golf GTI in the USA has not been refreshed like their other cars have sonic still uses components from 2017 era and I’m hopeful, as I spent some time driving a friend's 2016 with no issues.

                        Gurm Subaru XV-Crosstrek purchased in 2019 and the dashboard lights are great, no impact at all from the first day.
                        Same car purchased in the 2020, the dashboard lights are piercing my eyes. Tried it a few times because a colleague owns it. Dashboard lights are more bright than mine, even when dimmed. The dealership swears that 2019 and 2020 models are identical, but probably Subaru changed something.
                        I think it is a good idea to sit in front of the dashboard for some time and see what it does.

                        • Gurm replied to this.

                          Peter I’ll definitely give it a try. The WRX tends to be leftover parts from prior years - it is basically unchanged since 2017 at this point - so I’m not too worried but I will definitely check it out.

                          dev