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Hi there,
I've had a Surface 2 Pro for a month or so. Haven't done anything funky with the display that I know of but recently I noticed some really bad things going on in the dark areas of images on the screen. This is a big deal to me as I use this computer for work in visual effects and photography.
There is severe banding in the dark areas of the image and more worryingly, the display does not seem to be showing any pixels with a brightness darker than 14 out of 255 in the sRGB scale. It just comes out black on the screen. That's 5% of the brightness range gone.
The most basic demonstration of this effect is to go to this page:
http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/black.php
For me, all the swatches from 1 to 13, instead of being many shades of grey, are all 100% jet black even with the screen on maximum brightness.
It is certain that the colours are there in the image itself. This can be demonstrated by plugging the signal from the Surface into a separate Dell monitor via HDMI. Presto - you can see all the shades of grey again. But on the screen of the Surface
I've tried fixing the problem by applying different ICC profiles etc. The sRGB IEC61966-2.1 profile gives the best image, but the best image is horrible as described above. There is severe banding when displaying this image (http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/gradient.php)
The most interesting fact is this. My workmate also has a Surface 2 Pro, bought months earlier at a different store. I asked him to check his display using the same web pages and he sees exactly the same errors as me. Lots of banding. All greys darker than 14 are crushed to black. Is this a systemic problem with the display driver? A LUT applied by the bios?
Problem might be the same as mentioned here http://www.surfaceforums.net/forum/microsoft-surface-pro-2/7270-recent-update-killed-video-quality.html
I have applied all Microsoft's recommended updates including the most recent one.
Look forward to any tips, hints, fixes, etc. Cheers,
Stuart
Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.
Hi again all,
After rebooting my Surface, I noticed that all the banding is gone and my gradients look perfect again.
I believe the problem was that the display driver had crashed and somehow put the display into 16-bit color. Has anyone tried rebooting and checking the gradient again?
Hi I do visual fx work and the recent updates have caused my screen to seem like an old tablet that cannot delay a full range of colors..
There was another thread about this and the answer involved installing different drivers. I'd rather wait for an official fix and was wondering if this is coming soon? its pretty frustrating because I cannot tell weather the footage I have is over compressed or the screen is displaying incorrectly so I'm forced to check everything with a different monitor.
It is especially noticeable in gradients they do not look smooth but have visual breaks in the color now. especially near black.
Hello again!
I just installed the drivers as you directed to and everything looks great again! And as you say no real impact on battery life. Truth be told with the latest update making battery estimates a mess it'll be hard to notice anything anyway, but I do hope Microsoft will take notice of this thread and change their Surface Pro 2-optimised drivers to rectify the introduced problem. Have a feeling they don't know this is a big issue.
Best,
James
I just want to quote this again. This is a pretty major issue for me. I am working on a project now and cannot tell weather my footage is over compressed or its the screen issue....
This is pretty major for anyone doing visual work.....
Can anyone speak for Microsoft? Id rather wait a few days for a fix than install drivers on my own.
Hello again!
I just installed the drivers as you directed to and everything looks great again! And as you say no real impact on battery life. Truth be told with the latest update making battery estimates a mess it'll be hard to notice anything anyway, but I do hope Microsoft will take notice of this thread and change their Surface Pro 2-optimised drivers to rectify the introduced problem. Have a feeling they don't know this is a big issue.
Best,
James
