Solved Windows 11 display behaviour - random brightness and colour changes?

Hi all,

Just wandered over from tenforum (and previously sevenforum) having bought a new Windows 11 laptop after the old Win 10 one died.

The laptop is a 2024 model Asus Vivobook S15 with the OLED screen. One of the reasons I bought it was because I hoped to get a wider colour gamut for photo editing, but I'm wondering now whether it was a good idea. I'm seeing some odd, or unexpected, behaviours with the screen, and before I go to the manufacturer I'm wondering whether it's Windows 11 behaviours / settings rather than the display itself.

I've noticed at times image sharpness, particularly when viewed in the Photos app, is really poor. At first I thought we were getting poor focus in the camera, but having also cast images to a TV or connected to a separate monitor, I've noticed that there aren't any focus or sharpness problems on the other display.

I'm also noticing random changes to brightness, contrast and colour which seem to depend on the content displayed. For example, when I scroll through a document or web page from text only to text and image, the whole screen appears to dim; I'd expect the text areas to stay the same. The display colour balance also seems to change, as if night light is coming on; the display will change from a very blue, colder light to a much warmer and pinker light and back.

It feels to me as though this could be display or driver issues, but the colour and brightness changes at least feel as though there's some sort of dynamic adjustment going on which I'm not aware of. Just wondering if this is a laptop in Windows issue, and if there are Win 11 settings I should be checking before I complain!

Thanks.

Hi Addlepate.

Turn off adaptive brightness if you haven't done so already.

Content adaptive brightness control in Windows - Microsoft Support

Is the display set to the recommended resolution? Is the scaling set to the recommended ratio? Have you looked in Windows Updates, optional updates to see if there are any driver updates?

Hello both, thanks.

@fishingfool - thanks, I'd missed the content adaptive brightness, I've switched it off. I thought it felt like a dynamic adjustment. I'll give it a try and report back. Probably not the sharpness issue though, and maybe not the colour / warmth?

@kelper - thanks. Display is set to the recommended resolution (1920 x 1080) and scaling (125%). Updates checked, latest display drivers installed and no display driver updates available.

That is basically your Display/Graphic/Power options, and the settings of each individual application. There is no basic difference in Windows 11.
They are not issues as such but knowing where to find the relevant Settings and Options.
These are a couple of suggestions assuming Intel hardware.

1. Go into the Intel Graphics Command centre >
Go thru each section looking for Auto/Adaptive features, e.g. there are some for Video content.

2. Some settings have moved in to Windows 11 settings > System > Display.
Night light > Off. That is very irritating as it just wrecks any colour calibration.

Use HDR > Probably start with this off.

Display resolution use the (Recommended) as that is the native resolution of the panel.

Power Options > look for options that use auto dimming display to save power.

The Photos App is fairly useless, e.g. the zoom blurs out pixels with apparently no option to switch that off.

You must have tried out better Apps like IrfanView, Paint.NET, Gimp, etc.

You have bought the right Laptop, Windows 11 makes use of the HDR potential of a high brightness 600 nits display panel.

Hello @Helmut, thanks. Interesting comment on Photos and I wondered if someone might know if there's an issue with the app. I haven't, but probably should have, checked whether we see the same sharpness problem in other installed image apps.

It's a horrible app for editing anyway and not really the intent, it's just what was on the laptop for image viewing. The intent was to use Lightroom but Adobe have turned off the authentication server for the old version we have so will have to think again.

HDR is off, night light is off, can't find a way of getting to the Intel graphics - it all seems to be through Settings.

Intel has two utilities, the good old Intel Graphics Properties and the new Intel Graphics Command Center which you can download from Windows Store. If you already tried the Intel Graphics Properties, download the Intel Graphics Command Center from Windows Store and see it you can find the setting you need.

@spapakons, thanks. The 'good old Intel graphics properties' doesn't seem to exist in Win 11, at least in the installation I have; all roads seem to lead back to the settings app. However on searching 'graphics' I found the Intel graphics command centre is preinstalled (@Helmut), and has the settings I'd expect for colour balance, brightness, contrast etc.

It's not obvious there's anything set in the graphics command centre that might be causing the effects I'm seeing, but I need to understand what it does / can and doesn't / can't do. I also need to understand the effects of DC dimming through the MyAsus app vs. dimming via settings, and how to set a basic brightness.

It looks as though switching off adaptive brightness has fixed the changing brightness when scrolling, and possibly the colour shift as well. I'll experiment with other image apps to see if they improve the sharpness, though it's not obvious why Photos should have poor focus on this display but be sharp when duplicated to another screen.

To get the sharpest possible image you first have to make sure you set the native resolution of the monitor. Then from the monitor press the Auto button or find the auto adjustment from the menu to optimise the image. Check the specs. Some monitors have native resolution 1920x1200 (16:10), not 1920x1080 (16:9) and using the latter would explain why the image is not sharp, because it is scaled to the monitor, rather than 1:1 pixel correspondence.

@spapakons, thanks. Apologies for the delay replying. It's the built in display, rather than a monitor. It's set to the native resolution and recommended 125% scaling, though 100% scaling makes no difference.

After a couple of weeks with adaptive brightness off I'm not seeing the brightness and colour change issues. When I have a minute I'll sort out another image viewing / editing app and see if that makes a difference to the image quality, and report back.

Hi all, just wanted to follow up on this in case anyone else refers to it.

Changing the adaptive brightness settings fixed the colour and brightness changes, but I wasn't able to find a solution for the display sharpness problems despite using different (and non-Microsoft) imaging apps.

It turns out there is a general sharpness issue with OLED displays. As I understand it this is caused by the non-standard and varying sub-pixel arrangements used in OLED displays, and partly by Windows not playing nicely with those layouts. This causes colour fringing and bleed across to adjacent sub-pixels and pixels, and is worse the lower the pixel density.

I ended up having a lot of quality problems with the Asus anyway, ending up with it going back for warranty repair and Asus losing it (or at least failing to return it), so I got my money back from the retailer and bought a different make with an IPS display. If I was using a laptop for entertainment or gaming I'd consider OLED again, but I don't think I would for image editing unless I could be sure of sharpness.

See the various scaling settings in your graphics card Control Panel. I don't remember where to look for Intel, but for my nVidia it is in "Adjust desktop size and position" and I can select "No scaling", "Aspect ratio", Full-Screen" and "Integer Scaling". I select "Full-screen" to always stretch the image on the whole surface irrespective of resolution. Probably "Aspect Ratio" will be sharper for non-native resolutions, but I hate black bars. If I remember correctly, Intel has similar settings. Same for AMD. Choose any setting and see if the image improves. Also the default refresh rate is 60Hz, but some monitors can also accept 75Hz. See if that makes any difference.

spapakons said:

See the various scaling settings in your graphics card Control Panel ... Choose any setting and see if the image improves.

Click to expand...

Well, the laptop's gone now, but I'd tried all the display settings I could find or think of, and it didn't make a difference; I'm pretty sure it was an inherent display issue, not a resolution, scaling or refresh rate issue.