Surface pro 3 Brightness control missing

I just had this problem and it was fixed by uninstalling Surface_Brightness_Control

What you describe has been my experience also.  It is so difficult to troubleshoot when there have been multiple updates and applied patches.  For now, I don't have the issue but it may reappear after the next Windows update.  I will more than likely replace this Surface Pro 3 at some point soon and have moved most of my apps to my desktop device (iMac running Bootcamp).  My Surface has been relegated to mostly reading books and watching movies!  Thanks for the input.

Well... this is awkward.   I did a hard rest (thinking the image stored on my Surface Pro 3 was Windows 8.1),   and I actually ended up reinstalling Windows 10 again.   Upon boot, the Brightness worked.      

I've made it his far before, so then I began to apply updates.    And, the brightness is still working (12 hours later).   

I've seen this before (where it worked for 2-3 days after an reset), so I don't want to get my hopes up. 

Still,  I'm cautiously pessimistic that by going back to an OLD version of windows and jumping to the MOST RECENT Roll-ups, I've somehow sidestepped whatever patch or configuration issue caused the problem.    I'll report back in a week.  

I've done complete resets and reinstalls several time before, so this is the very definition of insanity (Trying the same thing and expecting different results).    I can't imagine what's changed, except that the path to the current version of Windows bypassed some of those in interim builds.   

Perhaps there was a minor defect layered into an obsolete minor update that can't be remedied by subsequent updates... but the defect can be avoided by leapfrogged from an old build directly to the most recent 1909 Roll-up Package.   

I have no idea what to think anymore. I've tried 14 solutions over 18 months including two other resets.    I just hope the problem stays "gone".    I've also got back my power management settings, and my power/sleep  button is still working.   So, so is the magnetic keyboard trigger to go to sleep when the keyboard is closed.    None of that worked after a few days in prior resets.    

Anyway, I'm currently running:

Edition:  Windows 10 Pro

Version: 1909

Instaled on:  8/4/2020

OS Build: 18363.959

On a Surface Pro 3 with an Intel i5-4300U CPU at 1.9ghz 2.50Ghz and 8Gb Ram.

 I downloaded the HD 5000 graphics driver for win 10 64 bit.

When I attempt to install any Intel driver, I get a message that the manufacturer has a custom driver and I can not install the version from Intel.  I tried downloading several MSI and ZIP versions with the same results on my i5  256k Surface Pro 3.

I know from experience that if I reimage with an older version of windows 10, the feature works until my PC auto-updates.     After picking away on this for almost 18 months,  I'm just reverting back to Windows 8.1.     The issue seems to relate to something that changed in Windows 10,  and I honestly just use my surface for browsing the web, word, and some Ancient Adobe CS6 Master Suite stuff on the road.   

Windows 10 adds nothing (materially) as long as I run Stardocks Start8 to fix the metro design of the windows key.    I'll probably be done with my old Surface Pro 3 by 8.1 end of life in 2023.    So, my ultimate solution is simply to revert to an old version of windows.   (I tried an earlier version of windows 10, and no matter what I disable... it eventually updates something that causes me to loose the brightness controls again).

The earlier post suggested microsoft drivers not Intel.....

Just posting in case others have this issue and are not using teamviewer.

That's interesting and definitely useful. In my case, I had also uninstalled the Intel graphics card device and drivers (provided by Intel, part of the Microsoft Surface pack), but that didn't fix the problem. I think all the MS Surface laptops have Intel graphics cards.

It seems that either or both Intel drivers and other screen management apps cause this control to disappear. People may have to fix one or both to resolve the issue.

For the benefit of others: Do you have or use any other remote control software, or perhaps the Intel "Wi-Di" or equivalent screen casting.

It might be that the common denominator is an app or drivers affecting or controlling screen settings, and only certain changes that break it.

In the Teamviewer case, the Brightness control disappeared when I used the software setting to black out the remote laptop screen. It had been in use as installed for 3 years, without causing trouble before that change.

I don’t use any screen casting software on my surface pro 3.

Also I’d like to add, the Intel driver directly from Intel might be more up-to-date than what Microsoft is providing since it’s dated as of March 2020.

Your issue makes sense though on why reinstalling teamviewer would resolve the screen brightness. Correct me if I’m wrong but that blackout feature requires a driver from teamviewer to be installed, right? That may be what caused it as you suggested but strange that it happened after 3 years.

In my case microsoft firmware updates caused the issue and I had looked into solutions about a year ago and could not get it working even after installing all the updates from Microsoft along with their driver package. I finally had some time today since I’m currently recovering from surgery and found a post on reddit suggesting to install the display driver from Intel’s site. This resolved it for me right away.