Surface Book 2 screen flicker issue

Anonymous
2017-11-20T22:26:35+00:00

Hi,

I have the 15" SB2 and am experiencing a screen flicker issue. Here are the details:

  1. You have to be using battery only, will not happen when charging SB2
  2. You have to have brightness below say 35 or 40% - harder to see when brighter though still seems to me to be there
  3. They way to reproduce this is as follows:

    a. Choose a solid background - I used the "Cool Blue" solid color.

    b. Have a window with a lot of WHITE background available

    c. With nothing open, just desktop background with solid color, open window with a lot of WHITE background

    d. Look at the white area and do you see flickering? 

    e. Looking closely at this, if you see it, you can see there is a stepping function of some sort that goes about 10 times getting slightly brighter each time/flicker. After the 10th or so time, it stabilizes and stops.

    f. Next, if you close the window and go back to just the solid background, you see it do a similar flicker and you can see it step back down in brightness about 10 times and again stabilizes/stops.

I did call Microsoft yesterday about this and they had two 15" models and saw this on both and said it shouldn't do this and there would be a fix for this coming. 

My reason for posting this is I have two questions:

  1. Microsoft, can you tell me when this will be fixed and how I can find out about the fix? I am assuming it will be a software fix? I forgot to ask this...
  2. Is everyone seeing this or just a good number of SB2's?

Obviously, I just got this SB2 and if everyone is seeing it, I am less concerned as I expect a fix will be coming. However, if there are only a few SB2's seeing this, I am wondering if I should return it and get a new one as perhaps it might be just a couple SB2's.

Thanks!

-DM

-Dave

Surface | Surface Book | Display and screen

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Anonymous
2017-12-20T04:47:02+00:00

Hi,

I have a significant update:

Over the past couple of weeks I have been working with Microsoft Tech Support (who was interfacing with MS Engineering). Today, I spent some time with tech support testing out a possible fix for this issue. I am VERY PLEASED to report, it appears they have given me a fix that WORKS!!!!!

The fix is a very simple registry setting. I have been playing with things since making the change and have not seen the issue anymore...

This clearly works with Surface Book 2. I don't know if it will work for other surface devices but if you have this registry entry, you can try making the change. The step to fix is as follows:

  1. Open up Regedit (to edit registry)
  2. Backup your registry before making the change - Once in Regedit, Right-Click on Computer, then Export to backup file, can put on desktop...
  3. In the image below, it shows you where the registry entry is. You need to find this, locate the "FeatureTestControl" entry where the image shows you to find it. The value for FeatureTestControl should show: 0x00009240. Right-Click on this entry and modify binary, change the 40 to 50. Then exit registry.

Note, as indicated on left side, I had to select 0001. If for some reason you don't see FeatureTraceControl there, you could check 0000 just above 0001. Again, I saw it at entry 0000.

  1. Once you have exited registry, Reboot system

Again, this worked for me and hopefully for you.

Let me know if this works for you.

Thanks,

  • DM51

P.S.   Great work by Microsoft getting this resolved!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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  1. Anonymous
    2018-01-10T15:51:14+00:00

    So I've started a new thread for everyone affected by the flickering on the top edge of the screen.

    https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/forum/surfbook-surfdrivers/surface-book-screen-top-edge-flickering/d0cd71fe-c9d0-460b-b9c1-d1330385b582

    I've also created an entry on the Feedback Hub app to get more visibility from the Microsoft Engineering team - as suggested by DM51: https://aka.ms/Lo911v (You need to have the app installed to open the link).

    Please help us sort this out.

    Pedro

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  2. Anonymous
    2018-01-10T09:43:46+00:00

    Hey DM,

    Thanks for trying to replicate the issue. 

    I have all the lastest updates from Microsoft.

    I have a SB1 so I think the GEFORCE Experience doesn't apply here. Maybe someone with SB2 should try it. 

    Something I've noticed is that when I install the graphic card drivers directly from intel it stops. So it is definitely software related.

    You are right this should have its own thread. I will do it later today and also report to the feedback hub.

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  3. Anonymous
    2018-01-10T09:15:14+00:00

    Hi aleshippuden,

    Yes the issue is real, see my post above. It afects lots of people as reported on reddit and other forums. This is different from the problem outlined by DM51 where the whole screen flickers when you change from dark to bright content or vice versa - this is also present in the majority of devices as far as I know.

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  4. Anonymous
    2018-01-10T07:14:22+00:00

    Hey DM,

    It is the same issue, I saw Ebrahim's youtube video, and I am having the same exact issue. I just did not know how to explain it very well hahaha.

    But it is that, its an annoying little flicker that at least to my very OCD eyes, is very noticeable., but the fact that is affecting a lot of people really helps, but the fix did not work for me at least, and it seems for a few more other people too

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