Why high gamut screens are NOT suited to gamers

Let me just preface this post by stating that I absolutely love high gamut screens. Ever since I purchased my Dell SXPS with an RGBLED I knew I wouldn't ever want to go back to a standard gamut screen. I ordered the 95% matte panel with my P150EM but here I will discuss why I now regret that choice.

To get the best out of your high gamut screen it needs to be calibrated. If you don't have calibration equipment you can use one of the pre-calibrated profiles (by users/resellers) which are surprisingly accurate as most screens are incredibly closely matched to other screens of the same model. The best profile for the 95% matte is in my opinion the NP813_5_LEN40B2_Matte_95_NV_V2. If you apply this profile in Win 7 everything looks fantastic. Accurate colours, nice contrast, native white balance etc. Without it and everything has a bluey/grey cast and generally looks pretty awful.

Now here comes the problem - full screen DirectX games ignore this colour calibration thanks to a few crazy technical decisions by MS and game devs. Before Enduro existed you could override this issue with PowerStrip by writing your calibrated LUT to the required hardware registers of your AMD card with the 'Write directly to palette DAC' feature. I used to do this with my 4670 on my SXPS RGBLED and games looked fantastic. I have now discovered that because of Enduro this is no longer possible as the hardware registers are either not visible or not used (most likely the Intel 4000 is used instead). Nvidia users have unfortunately been in a similar situation for a lot longer than AMD users as Nvidia blocked access to the required hardware registers many moons ago.

There are some other work arounds but they are not ideal and each has its own compromises. There is an excellent post ( cached here) on the Nvidia forums which goes into much more technical detail, some of which I will quote:

Personally I'm using a combination of options 1 and 2. Color Clutch only works with some games and I wouldn't advise using it with online games with anti cheat systems as it is a DLL injector. For those games I use option 1 however there is a significant loss in performance as it forces games to run on top of Windows GDI (hence colour corrected). If I had known that Enduro blocks access to the required hardware registers which previously allowed for PowerStrip to universally colour correct full screen DirectX games I would not have ordered the high gamut screen. It makes such a big difference to the look and feel of games (try it by switching your favourite games into window mode whilst running an active colour profile).

I hope this can help some of you trying to decide which screen to buy and also existing users enjoy some of their games in full fidelity

P.S. Simple instructions for installing a calibrated ICC profile for the 95% matte in Windows 7:

P.P.S. Full technical reason as to why this problem occurs:

P.P.P.S. I've uploaded the five colour profiles I found for the 95% matte, although V2 works best on my screen: Zippyshare.com - Colour Profiles for 95 Matte.zip

P.P.P.P.S. arcticjoe has pointed out that a select few games (BF3, Batman AC, Crysis 2 and ME3 tested working - HL2, L4D, L4D2, CSS, CS:GO, TF2, Portal 2, Race'07, GRiD, DiRT 2, DiRT 3, F1 2010, F1 2011, FUEL, Portal 2, C&C 4, Deux Ex HR, L.A. Noire, PES 2012 and ARMA 2 not working) will allow the PowerStrip hotkey method of changing colour profile to stick during gameplay. To do this you must set up a hotkey to change to your captured colour profile and select the 'Recall color changes' option. Let's hope more developers follow suit.

Update: If you are a gamer I've found a better fix which isn't as accurate as using a custom ICC with non linear gamma curves but it's not too far off and the changes are persistent in all 3D games and applications.

The iGPU controls the LUT so I experimented with the very limited colour controls in the Intel control panel to match the Matte V2 profile I posted on the first page as close as possible.

The settings are as follows:

• Under 'Red' set 'Brightness' to 1 and 'Gamma' to 0.9
• Under 'Green' set 'Brightness' to 1 and 'Gamma' to 0.9
• Under 'Blue' set 'Gamma' to 0.8

Save these changes to a profile and you are good to go.

 

interesting read, I did not know this. Hmm now I might have to go back to the drawing board.

 

I've been using powerstrip to force calibration on and it works very well. I havent seen a game yet where I could not keep my profile.
Every now and then it will forget the profile when ALT-Tabbing, but it can be re-enabled via hotkey combo.

 

Thank you very much for this info. I too was very impressed with RGBLED screens and because of that I was planning to get the 90% glossy panel for my NP9170.

Do you mind posting a comparison picture between a calibrated and uncalibrated screen so we can have a better understanding on the gravity of this issue?

 

Except the high gamut screen provides superior contrast and viewing angles and lets be honest, the actual colour accuracy in games is not really amazingly important.

 

Please post your system spec.

The latest build of PowerStrip turns the screen pink if I select "Write directly to palette DAC" and previous builds have no effect. I have emailed the developers and they have informed me that the 7970M + 4000 Enduro setup is not supported and it is not likely it will ever be supported:

Sure I will try and get some pics taken tomorrow.

It has nothing to do with colour "accuracy". It is all to do with vividness, pop, feel and how pleasurable the screen is to look at and use. Without having that profile active it looks down right awful especially if you are used to the full monty. If you have been using a high gamut screen uncalibrated in games and you switch to calibrated you will go WOW!

 

Very interesting read! I was in doubt between a normal screen and 95% gamut for my upcoming Clevo purchase, but this (and the higher price of course) definitely makes me reconsider.

 

I'm using 7970m + 4000 too. I will post my settings when I get home, but I dont think I was using the "write to DAC" option anyway.

 

Well without "Write directly to palette DAC" enabled full screen DirectX games will not be using your custom LUT.

 

trust me, it works, I will post instructions once I get back home. Without powerstrip crysis 2, BF3, Black Ops and probably most other games look far too blue.

 

Trust me it doesn't. What you may be experiencing is certain games which do not reset the LUT on initialisation. As mentioned on the Nvidia forums post I quoted there are a small minority of modern games which don't.

However this will have nothing to do with PowerStrip, you could use any LUT loader including Windows 7 colour calibration, and unfortunately games that work this way are few and far between.

 

But how is that different to using a low gamut screen? Basically it would mean during gaming both are the same (apart from contrast and viewing angles).

 

No an uncalibrated high gamut screen looks nothing like a standard gamut screen.

An uncalibrated high gamut screen is completely out of whack unless it has sRGB/AdobeRGB emulation which only proper high end monitors have.

 

Not to mention the fact that you are paying more for the high gamut screen but will not be getting your money's worth...

 

Fine, stick to low contrast, poor viewing angle, low colour gamut displays then.

 

Not sure who's got your beef today Meaker.

I'm not saying stick with anything. I'm saying I wish I hadn't ordered the high gamut display as it's more hassle than it's worth for someone who plays games.

Also the stock standard gamut matte screen is a great screen. Yes it might have a slightly reduced on/off contrast ratio but it's also a lot brighter. The high gamut matte is not very bright at all and in full daylight it leaves me wanting more brightness. With these colour issues on top I think the standard gamut is definitely the better choice.

 

err, you are wrong here mate. If I load BF3 or Crysis 2 my colours change immediately. If I quit any of those games my colours stay changed until I re-apply my calibration.

If I have powerstrip set up this does not happen.
My powerstrip settings are attached. One thing you MUST do for calibration to stick is to save your settings under some profile name, enable hotkey to switch to that profile and make sure "recall color changes" tickbox is checked. First time you will get into a game it will reset the calibration, - press the hotkey you've assigned and it will re-apply your settings and they tend to stick afterwards for as long as powerstrip is running.

 

Thanx iaTa, I applied the V2 profile as default in Windows color management settings and used Monitor Calibration Wizard software with setting (see pic.) before playing BF3 and the colour profile sticks. And yes, the colours r much more realistic.

+rep

 

Pretty interesting OP... And a good read too. Thanks!

 

I believe my Asus G73 has a Nvidia 460m. It has a hotkey for using 5 color profile presets, Theatre mode, Vibrant etc. I fairly certain this works in games. This would seem to imply it can be done although it may take a hardware solution.

 

I just tried this on a number of Valve games, plus Dirt 3, CoH and C&C and it did not work. What build of PS are you running? I'm on 3.90 736.

As I mentioned before I think BF3 and C2 are a couple of the very few games which do not reset the LUT on a regular basis.

This however is not the norm.

 

Well... getting one of these screens sounds like an absolute nightmare from what you've said here and another thread on NBR I happened to see. I wish I'd done more research on these high gamut screens before I spent a bunch of money on it.

I thought people said games/movies/etc looked AMAZING on these screens, so it was kind of a no-brainer upgrade as long as it fit in my budget...

Some guys in another thread were saying high gamut screens have natural warm/cool hues depending on how they were made, so blacks and whites are always tinted unless calibrated. That means if games are unable to stick with a calibrated profile, they'll just look terribly off color?

Kind of sad.. I expected something that had the capability to show many more colors would just look better by default.

I get my P170EM tomorrow, so I guess I'll see how much I regret the screen upgrade then =/.

 

You generally don't want to change the white balance / temperature with a profile as you will lose a lot of brightness if you do so. Usually the whites are warmer on a high gamut display but that's not a bad thing.

Ideally what we need is for AMD/Nvidia to implement this at a driver level. With the popularity of high gamut screens now it should be on their priority list. The problem is Enduro adds a major complication to the mix. If only we could go back to manual switching and get rid of this blasted Enduro.

 

I thought that Win8 was going to correct this issue? I could have sworn I read something on it a while back.

 

Not that I know of but I will have a look to see if I can find anything.

 

i'm on the same version, but i dont have any of the games you've mentioned. Do you know any other games that do not work for you so I can see if I have any of them?

 

HL2, L4D, L4D2, CSS, CSGO, TF2, Portal 2, Race'07, GRiD.

I'll be able to test MP3, LA Noire, Deus Ex HR in a few days.

 

ok i will download and install css to test.

 

Wait, so the standard screen is nativley calibrated? Wouldn't you also need to calibrate a standard screen to get an accurate picture, and thus while playing games you would have the loss of calibration just as with the 95% screen?

 

No a standard gamut screen does not require calibration as it is designed to display sRGB natively. Yes calibration can produce more accurate results but it is generally fine without.

A high gamut screen is not designed to display sRGB natively and thus requires calibration or emulation otherwise it displays incorrect colours which are completely out of whack.

 

Yeah it really just sounds to me like standard software hasn't caught up to hardware... on both the screen and the 7970m, which is incredibly disappointing. I'm sure it will get better as time goes on (especially with the 7970m, no idea about the screens), but as for now, you're sending an old color profile to a new screen that doesn't use the same "directions."

 

ok so i've just tested CCS and it looks like it does not work in full screen mode with my Powerstrip method... Weird, because Crysis 2 and BF3 definitely work ok.

 

Well.. he did say that both of those games are the only two he knows of that still work with color calibration.

I hope this screen doesn't just look like garbage in games =/.

 

you can add Batman Arkham City to the list of games that work with calibration via powerstrip method... Will test AvP and Arma 2 OA tomorrow..
EDIT: Mass Effect 3 also works... so far more games have worked than not for me.

 

I have heard so much on this high gamut screens this is the first time I have read, needing to have power strip running in the background for it to work correctly in games. I will probably scratch this off my list now. Thanks for the information.

 

Alright, reading this thread I've seen a few things I disagree with.

First off, myself and several other soldiers ordered the 9150's for our upcoming deployment and compared them. I myself ordered the upgraded 95% matte gamut screen, and compared to the stock screen out of the box, with no color calibration, my 95% screen is worlds better than the stock screen that my other friends have in almost all fields from viewing angle, contrast ratio, and overall black and white/color depth and appearance.

I have used the profile posted in the original post, and while it does look amazing even though it can shut off in certain games, the gamut screen w/o profile still beats the stock screen in games from what i've seen.

 

Sorry killer but I just don't agree.

I have a number of laptops here and every single one looks better than the uncalibrated 95% matte in games. The same was true of my SXPS RGBLED until I discovered the PowerStrip write to DAC feature. Yeah viewing angles and on/off contrast ratio are slightly improved but that's hardly worth the trade off.

arcticjoe are you 100% sure about those games as I would be very surprised if that was the case. The method you are using simply cannot work for the majority of games unless you are running in windowed mode.

 

Another day another Enduro problem..

Not good at all to be an Enduro owner..

 

iaTa, got to give it to you. Great observation and write up. Do you still give your P150EM some love

 

Haha cheers, yeah of course

I run older games in borderless window mode but v-sync doesn't work as smoothly and I notice a slight judder due to Windows GDI.

Newer games like Dirt 3 lose far too much performance in window mode (15+ FPS) plus they have the well discussed Enduro losses on top of that.

Color Clutch doesn't work with Dirt 3 and certain other Steam games so I'm left running those uncalibrated

 

screen quality is party perception anyways.. it's unfortunate that games wont keep the calibrations, but to say a screen looks better then another is just preference.

 

Interesting I guess? My preference, I much prefer using this matte 95% NTSC screen than the glossy Hannstar on the G73jh. I'm not worried about calibration at all.

 

Yeah, I agree. I really enjoyed the 95% matte screen when I had one. It came pre-calibrated from Myth, and was my favorite laptop screen I've used to date.

 

so what about the Samsung Gamer 7 laptop screens? those are not matte and also (im guessing) it comes natively calibrated. how does the Sager 9150 w/95%ntsc compare to that?

another thing is that you would HAVE to install that V2 profile AFTER you receive the laptop from xoticpc (or whoever) to start seeing ACTUAL results? sounds kind of weak..

 

That's generally very true but when the difference is as clear cut as this, not so much.

Try it and you won't want to go back to using it without a profile.

No idea and yes that's correct.

 

it can confirm it definitely works in fullscreen for BF3, Batman AC, Crysis 2, ME3. I bound another hotkey to reset profile to default so I can easily verify that it works whilst in game by switching from one to another. It does not work with ARMA 2, Source engine games, Dirt 2 / 3.

 

I'm pretty sure this applies to nVidia/Optimus as well

 

Hmmm interesting thanks for that info arcticjoe. I will try and test some of those games in a few days time. Can only be a good thing and I hope more developers follow suit.

It would be so much cleaner, easier and universal if this was fixed at a driver level or the 'Write directly to palette DAC' feature worked with the 7970M and Enduro.

 

I wouldn't be so sure, with all my previuos laptops nvidia cards always handled calibrated screens better in games.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2

 

Except of course that the stock screen suffers from a heavy blue tint. I always calibrate my screens (using a Spyder) and the difference is striking on any screen.

If you do any kind of graphical work, even just preparing your family photos for printing or uploading, calibrating is a must.