m11xR2 calibrated LCD ICC profile

01.01.2011 - New profile added (attached below). This profile was created after 6 months of heavy daily use. For those of you with AUO panels that have similar mileage on them you might find that this profile is a slight improvement. Give both a try.

Updated ICC installation and configuration procedure

A little background is in order to explain why the following procedure is necessary in order to have a calibrated ICC profile work properly in Windows 7.

There are a huge number of events that will reset your video card's gamma LUT in Windows 7 (and Vista).

• a reboot
• waking from sleep
• logging in after the system has been locked
• the UAC prompt
• running Media Center, or XBMC and Boxee
• starting a game
• etc., etc...

So now you have a better understanding of the problem let us look at the fix for the M11x.

First off calibrate your display. If you or someone you know owns or has access to a colorimeter that's going provide you a much more accurate calibration than a software based calibration tool. If you don't have access to a colorimeter then the Display Color Calibration wizard in Windows 7 should provide you with a decent improvement over an uncalibrated display.

For those of you with and R2 and the AUO panel, you can try out the profile I've provided here. It was produced with the X-Rite i1 Display 2.

## This procedure does not apply for those of you who use the color and gamma settings in the Intel Graphics Properties to get the results you like, as that method of adjustment does not involve an ICC profile. That method of adjusting color is a reference-less means of eyeballing it.##

Procedure for installing the ICC profile:

1. Download and unpack the attached profile to a temporary folder
2. Copy the ICC profile to C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color

Procedure for configuring an ICC profile:

1. Click the Start button
2. Type "color" and open Color Management
3. Go to the Advanced tab at the top and click the Change system defaults button
4. Make sure the Device dropdown list has Intel(R) HD Graphics selected and check the "Use me settings for this device" box
5. Click the Add button
6. Scroll down to ICC profiles and locate the m11xR2_xx-xx-xxx.icc profile
7. The profile is now set as the default ICC profile for the Intel HD Graphics adapter
8. Go to the Advanced tab
9. Check the "Use Windows display calibration" check box
10. Click the Close button
11. Click the Close button again

Almost there!

The last thing we need to do is to disable the Intel Persistence Module ( igfxpers.exe) from loading. You can do this through msconfig, Autoruns, CCleaner or any other utility that disables startup items. This has no negative impact on your IGP that I'm aware of. I've been running without it for months without any loss of functionality on my system. Each time you update drivers for the Intel HD IGP you will need to do this step again.

The key I'd been missing was step 9. The last step of disabling igfxpers.exe is something unique to Intel adapters though.

That's it. I can't tell you how frustrating it is to fire up XBMC or a game to have your calibrated output suddenly reset. The procedure I've outlined here solves this problem for good on the R2. No more over-saturated skin tones making people look like they've fallen asleep in a tanning booth. No more grays with color casts.

 

Did you do this while on the 335? Or does the R2 not go through a noticeable change from integrated to dedicated?

Wonder if this would be good on the R1, would love to have better colors on my R1.

Also, thanks a ton, that is a $200 device you used, and this is really pretty valuable for image quality.

 

Given that I can't force the 335 to activate on the R2 (that I'm aware of) I'm not sure how I'm going to get its output calibrated. REALLY wish R2 had a manual switch...

Give it a try on your R1, although I'm pretty sure I saw one floating around here for the R1 already.

 

I downloaded and used the one calibrated on an M11xR1 and it works OK, however it may need to be developed a bit more to give the best coverage on both discrete and integrated graphics. Also HDMI and DisplayPort seem to have there own idea about the colour display depending on the device you're connecting to.
I have another ICC profile for my external Dell IPS monitor.

Previous M11xR1 ICC Profile follows:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/ali...monitor-icc-color-profiles-windows-linux.html

 

Also it may be worth noting what panel you have? There is at least two in circulation with different colour characteristics in the m11x r1 and we dont know what has been used in r2 yet. What panel did you get slickie?

 

how do you know which LCD one you have? which one is considered better?

 

Thanks for the info Slickie!

 

I applied the icc profile. But I am noticing a blue tint like image still.

 

I applied this profile as well, but I don't think I see any differences. Still a Blue tint. I have an R2 and the AUO panel.

 

me too annyoing

 

As the 335M outputs through the intel intergrated GPU, will it make any differance colour wise on the display? I imagine one profile 'would fit all' in the R2's case

 

if you made explorer.exe a gpu program in the nvidia options would that not fire up when you boot up into windows?

 

You can thank Microsoft for ignoring a major bug in how profiles are applied to Vista/7. There are a huge number of events - reboot, sleep, unlocking, UAC prompt, etc. - that will reset your video card's gamma LUT.

Windows Vista's Gamma Table Bug — The NeoSmart Files

First, you need to make sure you're applying the ICC profile to the Intel adpater properly.

• Copy the ICC profile to C:\Windows\System32\spool\drivers\color
• Click the Start button
• type "color" and open Color Management
• Make sure Device is Intel(R) HD Graphics and check "Use me settings for this device"
• Click the Add button
• Scroll down to ICC profiles and locate m11xR2_xx-xx-xxx.icc
• Highlight the newly added profile and click the Set as Default Profile button
• Go to the Advanced tab at the top and click the Change system defaults button
• An identical looking color management window pops up and again, you'll want to add/select the m11xR2 profile for the Intel and set it to Default Profile
• Close everything out

Don't ask me why MS made setting up profiles to ridiculously obtuse. Now having done all of that, you're still going to have deal with the bug I mentioned earlier. It's a pain in the arse.

The work around that I've been using is to setup a scheduled task that reapplies calibration at logon, on connection to user session, and on unlock of any user.

• Start
• type Task and open Task Scheduler
• On left hand pane navigate to Task Scheduler Library > Microsoft > Windows > WindowsColorSystem
• Add whatever addition triggers you like there.

Some people have it run at an interval. Once you start to see just how many things unload the gamma LUT table you'll probably get tired of the whole process, but if you're like me and need accurate color rendition (or at least as close as you can get on the M11x's tiny gamut panel) then you'll just have to put up with it.

 

Can you share what the values were for red,blue,green, and the contrast, brightness, and gamma. I think it will be better if we just apply these settings in the Intel settings. Every time I apply your profile, something manages to change it back. I want to get rid of this very annoying blue tint.

 

The icc profile generated by a colorimeter is a lot more involved and accurate than the simple RGB and gamma settings you find in drivers. There are no correlating values I can give you.

Give the built-in monitor calibration a go. It should get you a better than nothing result.

 

the new LCD i got replaced was much better in quality, had no blue tint but the damn thing is unaligned and sits the keyboard so bad it doesnt even rest on the those little rubber bumpers to the right and left of the trackpad. Oh well.. i even took my comp apart and lifted up the LCD and rescrewed it in but it didnt help.

 

Wow. Call Dell back and tell them it's still not right. Take pictures and provide those to them. If it's not sitting on rubber bumpers then you're very likely going to have issues with the hinges again. Do whatever you can to push for an outright replacement of laptop.

There are a couple of different panels that they use in the m11x. My guess is that you now have an AUO105C. You can check by doing the following:

• Device manager > Monitors > Generic PnP Monitor
  
• Right click > Properties > Details tab, and select the "Hardware Ids" property.

The other panel that's been reported is a SEC5441. The differences are:

SEC5441:

Maximum: 193.4 cd/m²
Average: 172.5 cd/m²
Illumination: 78 %
Black: 1.56 cd/m²
Contrast: 124:1

AUO105C:

Maximum: 175.6 cd/m²
Average: 157.5 cd/m²
Illumination: 80 %
Black: 0.81 cd/m²
Contrast: 217:1

 

Well I got the profile active, but anytime a game is launched, its reverts back to the ugly blue tint profile. Anyway we can force this to stick when launching a game?

 

Going to bump this. Anyone find a solution for this?

 

I explained that there are a whole lot of events that can cause the card's gamma LUT to be reset. This is what you're seeing when games run games or you run certain media players. There is no proper solution, only workarounds such as the scheduled task I've outlined above.

Lots of info on this out there. Until Microsoft fixes it, it's just something you have to deal with.

 

I tried the scheduler and its not kicking in. I will google around and see what I can find in the way of freeware.

 

Can anyone calibrate for srgb profile so photo editing would be more accurate?

 

I can confirm if we can apply these settings in the Intel color settings, they will stick and not adjust if you launch a game etc... I am working of trying to eye ball this.

 

your colors are kinda grayed out and desaturated. i dont know if its just me or not.. but on a DELL monitor, NBR is supposed to be bluish, not grayish.

 

I find that going into the Intel Control panel and only increasing the "saturation" from "0" to "10" makes a huge difference! you feel like you get colours back, without it being too much.

 

Thomas which panel do you have. Dell uses 2 types. AUO and a Samsung panel.

 

everytime I set this icc profile and i close the lid, it reverts back to whatever its using.. the uber bright one.. How do i save the ICC profile? I set the profile to default already.

 

your right it does, thanks for that

 

Found a possible solution for us. Maybe. Disable the Intel Persistence process and this will get us past some of the gamma LUT resets we're seeing. I've tested with closing the lid, starting games, Media Player and Media Center, Lock/Unlock - all triggers for biffing the IGP's gamma LUT that custom ICC profiles are correcting.

To test you can simply kill the igfxpers.exe process in task manager. I've disabled the process from starting with CCleaner and so far so good. I'll look into this more later on.

Don't worry about the smell of burning electronics components. I think that's normal.

JK...

 

Well, belay my last. Seems there are still some things that will cause the LUT to be reset. I find anything else more promising I'll pass it along.

 

I just got my panel replaced a week ago today through an in home service call. (Dust was under the screen of original panel)

My panel ID is SEC5441

Anyone know what make this is? Is this the original R1 panel? Or a new unknown make?

 

See my post in this thread on page 2. Both panels were reported for the R1. It's possible both are being used in the R2 as well, although we haven't seen a new R2 reported with one yet.

 

My M11xR2 (Core i3) shipped with a SEC5441 panel.

 

Damn Slickie,

I was hoping to apply your calibration profile. But I don't have the right model

Are there advantages to the other model? I like that it's a Samsung, but the contrast ratio is bad, but the black levels seem better. I don't understand, but I'm not an expert by any means.

 

You have a brighter panel (which is good) with worse black level/contrast according to the specs. It's interesting that you're seeing better blacks. Do you have a good external panel to set it next to for comparison?

The specs for the SEC5441 were taken from here. It's the same panel used in the Inspiron 11z. However I supposed it is maybe possible that they might have changed things under the hood for that panel. Power Strip might provide some insight to that if we had an 11z to compare with.

 

I got the SEC5441 panel.. does that mean the profile should work on mine or? im a bit confused but if the profile doesn't "stick" after programs have been opened.. whats the point?

 

I wouldn't use it on the SEC5441. Hardware calibrations measure an individual panel at certain point in time. A panel's characteristics, luminance, contrast, etc will change as it ages. So technically this calibration was very accurate for my panel when I made it. I typically calibrate my monitors once a month and validate the calibration once every other week to track how things are or are not shifting over time.

It will be less accurate for others who have the same AUO panel as it is for me, but it will be much better than you're going to get using software calibration such as what Windows 7 has built in.

But no, the SEC5441 is a completely different panel and this profile should not be used for it. Use 7's monitor calibration wizard or ship me your M11x and I'll calibrate it for you.

 

For SEC5441 and AUO105C comparison/discussion see this thread:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/464852-m11x-screenid-5.html#post5995538

 

Installed, thanks!

 

I have the AUO105C but after applying your ICC profile, it looks worse in my opinion, I have dropped the brightness down two notches also. Everything looks desaturated and with a reddish-orange tint, don't know what's going on. I have used the Eye One Display2 in the past and I have never had problems with it, and considering we have the same panels and settings and don't understand how there can be such a difference...

 

Not sure what to tell you. Colors are vibrant and grays are very neutral on my panel. I validate the profile once a week and have recalibrated about 6 times using 3 different i1d2's since I've had it. Each time I've gotten the same results.

 

the screen is fine.. i dont see any problem...

 

I just received two of my inspiron 11z laptops, both with SEC5441 panels. On default settings one of them is actually slightly brighter then the other, seems like colors are more accurate so photos do seem slightly better, however it is oversaturated so gray areas are almost white, for example this forum the gray heading lines or columns are almost white. The other one is a better one overall and is not oversaturated, big difference so it's the one I'll keep. Both laptops have same bios/drivers, I bet the panel revision/model are different or major variation in manufacturing. I'm tempted to open them up and check. Perhaps anyone know where I can buy a good 11.6" LED non-glossy panel for a replacement? The notebook is really nice with the dual-core, 6-cell and updated touchpad, though.

 

I've /finally/ found the solution to the gamma LUT reset issue that causes ICC profiles to have to be re-loaded. I'll do a full write up of the settings required on my original post.

 

New ICC profile setup procedure added to the 1st post.

No more gamma reset when starting games or anything else. At last...

 

Slickie your the man!! Kudos dude! +rep

 

This worked great for me until I rebooted then the Saturation returned to "0". When I checked the Intel control panel it stated saturation was at "10" but clearly it was actually at "0" (the grayier look). When I moved the saturation up to "11" it jumped back to the blue look. Again I rebooted and again it returned to the grayier look. Did this happen to you when you rebooted?

 

good work +rep

edit: slickie quick question.. when my screen dims it comes back very dim and in like a sepia photo tone color? have I applied the icc incorrectly?

 

If when you've applied the ICC profile you're seeing whites and neutral grays become noticeably less blue then that should be a good indication that the icc profile has been applied. Neither dimming or turning off the display should unload the profile or the gamma LUT that's defined in the profile.

So let's look at your dimming setup. I know there had been reports of people having dimming issues in the past. If I'm not mistaken the fix for that was to disable the AlienFusion service. That's the power management component of Command Center. For some reason Dell felt the need to muck up what was already a very straightforward and working set of settings for managing the display power settings in Windows 7.

This is the only thread I was able to turn up in a quick search here.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m11x/513060-dimming-screen-problems.html

There's another thread where the issue was discussed in more detail. Hopefully that's what you're experiencing.

 

Since I am just like this... here is a comparison between a calibrated U2311H and a calibrated AUO m11xr2





I think I used AWB on my camera, but in reality, the m11x was a bit pink vs the u2311h. Not a great big deal, since slickie88's profile made my m11x leaps and bounds better than it used to be

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