Windows 8 - Intel graphics Brightness broken across the board

This probably deserves its own topic. This should affect everyone running Intel integrated graphics, regardless of Intel-only or with AMD or NVIDIA discrete card.

Brightness settings are ignored.

Brightness controls in Windows 8 have been broken since June. Last working driver is 15.28.0.2770. Everyone having trouble with Fn keys and manually changing Power Options, you need to uninstall your new Intel Driver in Device Manager, and Have Disk manual install 15.28.0.2770 (the setup file won't run on non-approved computers, but Windows will happily install the drivers manually the old-fashioned way, choosing the folder with a .inf)

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What model Samsung notebook are you talking about?

 

Should be all of them with Intel chips. My specific experience however is with the Windows 7-era NP700Z5C (Ivy Bridge w/ NVIDIA).

 

Are you sure that this isn't just a problem with the Adaptive Brightness Power Management setting in Windows 8?

To find this, click on the Battery Icon, then "More Power Options", then "Change Plan Settings" for the plan you are on. Once you have the plan up on the screen, look under Display for Adaptive Brightness. Until I turned this off, the brightness adjustments did not work for me either on my NP900x4c. Now they do.

Keep in mind that you have to do this for each power plan that you use.

Also, I'm using the updated "Settings" application from Samsung, rather than the Win7 vesion of Easy Display Manager. Not sure if that makes a difference.

 

Yes, I'm sure. Makes no difference whether Adaptive is On or Off, brightness was stuck at MAX regardless of my environment. I know my brightness sensor works because it was just fine before running Samsung Update to get drivers so it wouldn't make sense to have burning brightness all the time.

I moved to this beta old driver and it fixed my problem, also fixed the problem of the guy in the Intel thread, and this guy too. It's definitely a problem that Intel needs to fix, just do a search on Intel's discussions for Windows 8 and brightness. (Few laptops have brightness sensors as well, it can't be the problem.)

 

I have been looking for a driver for the amd switchable graphics for days now. Finally i managed to find a solution. This driver worked for me here.

 

That's a newer Intel driver than 15.28.0.2770, which is interesting if you say it fixes your brightness controls.

So far, reported problems with Intel from a quick Google:
Lenovo Y580 - i7 + GeForce
Series 7 Z5C - i7 + GeForce
Dell M4600 - i5/i7 + Quadro
HP Envy 17 - i7 + AMD
Slate - Atom

I can only assume these people are using drivers newer than 4 months old... and I've yet to see this old driver not work for anyone.

 

I worked on this for hours last night, and I can say with 100% certainty that either switchable graphics work, or adaptive brightness works, but not both simultaneously . I surgically replaced individual inf files and whole installations, and at no time could I get both working at the same time.
If someone has SPECIFIC instructions, I would be more than happy to give them a try. But at this point, I am going to say that it just doesn't work, and Samsung/Intel/IAMD need to release proper drivers.

 

the driver i linked to fixes both the Fn brightness and switchable graphics. They have modified both drivers to work together. Of course i will go for the genuine amd driver when they manage to fix the problem, but for now this is a great way to make it work in the meanwhile. btw i am on a series 7 chronos with i5 and amd.

 

Thank you, I will definitely try them out!

 

I don't know if I would say it *can't* be the problem. Most problems that are stupid like this tend to have causes that are a combination of items, making them harder to troubleshoot. All I know if that the adaptive brightness thing worked for me, along with the latest version of "settings" from Samsung (not the EZ-Settings from Win 7).

Driver version that I'm using is the latest on Samsung's site.

I would bet that the ultimate solution IS a better driver from Intel, you're right, I was just trying to offer a possible alternate. It may be that my alternate only works on the Series 9 machines. Not sure, as all I have to test on is this one machine.

 

Thanks Lassern. I too will give it a try this evening.

 

I just post a reply that I found an official Samsung driver that will solve this. Refer to topic name Windows 8 Fn-Keys.

 

Perhaps meaning this thread?

John

 

The Samsung SW Update solved all the graphics and brightness problems in Windows 8 for me today.

They finally offered the AMD Radeon 9.2.00 drivers, and the Intel HD drivers got updated too. Everything looks fine in the device manager now. Just run SW Update.

The auto brightness feature is no longer controlled with the Samsung Settings program as it was in Windows 7. It's now controlled in Windows 8.

Just bring up the Windows 8 Charm bar (move mouse cursor to far top right or bottom right) then select "Settings" then "Change PC Settings" at the bottom, then select "General". Under "Screen" you can now select to turn on or off "Adjust my screen brightness automatically". I prefer to keep it off.

It looks like I finally now have everything working after the Windows 8 upgrade.

 

Yes the amd 9.2.00 drivers worked great for me too. finally everything is working as it should

Spoke to fast. switchable graphics doesnt work for me... back to the other driver that actually work.

 

It should work. As I said in other topic, you need to clean all previous driver by using some sweeper software in Safe Mode, and then reinstall that driver. I tested the driver with game like D3 and I did not have to choose High Performance. Catalyst already done that for me and switchable worked really well, especially better than the previous W7 driver.