Windows Display Settings Changes Color Calibration

[BirtDike]

I dont exactly know how to explain this, so Ill give it my best shot. Randomly, a couple weeks ago, my display color started to get very whacked out, where the saturation is seemingly blown out and disrupting color accuracy, which is a very big no no as a digital artist. Whats odd is that this seems to get fixed the second I open specifically the windows display settings in control panel. I have reinstalled, rolled back, and switched dch to standard nvidia drivers, changing monitor calibration, nvidia calibration, basically every setting you can think of related to HDR, color, display, everything that doesnt involve changing system files which there should be no reason for that to be necessary. Its reproduceable but it seems to only change monitor calibration and not software calibration, every single system driver is updated except for wifi which I dont use. The monitor doesn't show the calibration profile has switched so I have no idea what else to do. I updated windows which actually broke even more stuff but I fixed all that garbage. No viruses, no hardware malfunctions (from my knowledge) but the display issue seems to persist. If this helps at all this might have started around the same time I uninstalled ReShade from a game, but I have deleted every single instance of reshade on the machine, I could also mention it is possible that I had an hdr setting on in reshade in game, and when I turned it off and uninstalled it may have done something but I dont know because I went through hours of diagnostics with reshade support people, and they seem to have also narrowed it down to a windows or nvidia issue rather than ReShade or Vulkan, however Im willing to believe things like this can happen at this point. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated

Windows Reinstall is my absolute last option, I have a large amount of particular settings that I would rather not reset, and windows recovery is not an option for some reason (that got stripped from me when I updated to 21h1.)

 

[Ferd]

and they seem to have also narrowed it down to a windows or nvidia issue

No idea what kind of system you have ! Assuming it’s a desktop try running on the integrated gpu if that’s possible and see what happens then , if it’s related to nvidia it shouldn’t persist I guess hope that narrows it down even more

 

[BirtDike]

No idea what kind of system you have ! Assuming it’s a desktop try running on the integrated gpu if that’s possible and see what happens then , if it’s related to nvidia it shouldn’t persist I guess hope that narrows it down even more

Thank you for your reply, it is a custom desktop PC, Ill provide full system info if requested, but the general hardware is AMD Ryzen 5 2600, RTX 2070 MSI, Asus ROG Strix x470F, 32gb RAM, Win 10 Pro 21h1 (19043) Unfortunately I dont believe I have that iGPU option (I have asus rog mobo) and there has never been an integrated graphics driver in device manager like there is on other builds. I read up on this a bit and apparently its manufacturer default to disable integrated graphics driver control in asus (rog) bios. I reseated the GPU and cabling as well but its the same situation. This was a great suggestion though, I just wish it was available

 

[tabascosauz]

I dont exactly know how to explain this, so Ill give it my best shot. Randomly, a couple weeks ago, my display color started to get very whacked out, where the saturation is seemingly blown out and disrupting color accuracy, which is a very big no no as a digital artist. Whats odd is that this seems to get fixed the second I open specifically the windows display settings in control panel. I have reinstalled, rolled back, and switched dch to standard nvidia drivers, changing monitor calibration, nvidia calibration, basically every setting you can think of related to HDR, color, display, everything that doesnt involve changing system files which there should be no reason for that to be necessary. Its reproduceable but it seems to only change monitor calibration and not software calibration, every single system driver is updated except for wifi which I dont use. The monitor doesn't show the calibration profile has switched so I have no idea what else to do. I updated windows which actually broke even more stuff but I fixed all that garbage. No viruses, no hardware malfunctions (from my knowledge) but the display issue seems to persist. If this helps at all this might have started around the same time I uninstalled ReShade from a game, but I have deleted every single instance of reshade on the machine, I could also mention it is possible that I had an hdr setting on in reshade in game, and when I turned it off and uninstalled it may have done something but I dont know because I went through hours of diagnostics with reshade support people, and they seem to have also narrowed it down to a windows or nvidia issue rather than ReShade or Vulkan, however Im willing to believe things like this can happen at this point. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated

Windows Reinstall is my absolute last option, I have a large amount of particular settings that I would rather not reset, and windows recovery is not an option for some reason (that got stripped from me when I updated to 21h1.)

More so than your PC specs it might be more important to know what monitor you have...? Windows color management is known to be pretty unreliable from the inconsistent way it deals with different applications, and if you've ever used Night Light you'd know that Windows can't even be trusted with itself

If you have a colorimeter, I'd download DisplayCAL and use it to calibrate your monitor, then let the software's system tray app handle the loading and management of the final colour profile upon boot. That's what DisplayCAL itself recommends upon starting up the program. It is indeed more consistent than letting Windows do it, but nowadays I just use Windows to cut down on the amount of background processes I run.

I'm assuming you already have one, as an artist, but if you don't, the entry-level SpyderX Pro has worked very well for me on multiple monitors. Helps me dial in my S2721DGF a bit, which has good colour potential but lacks sRGB-only profile out of the box, as well as tame the ridiculous greens on my GW2765HT.

 

[BirtDike]

More so than your PC specs it might be more important to know what monitor you have...? Windows color management is known to be pretty unreliable from the inconsistent way it deals with different applications, and if you've ever used Night Light you'd know that Windows can't even be trusted with itself

If you have a colorimeter, I'd download DisplayCAL and use it to calibrate your monitor, then let the software's system tray app handle the loading and management of the final colour profile upon boot. That's what DisplayCAL itself recommends upon starting up the program. It is indeed more consistent than letting Windows do it, but nowadays I just use Windows to cut down on the amount of background processes I run.

I'm assuming you already have one, as an artist, but if you don't, the entry-level SpyderX Pro has worked very well for me on multiple monitors. Helps me dial in my S2721DGF a bit, which has good colour potential but lacks sRGB-only profile out of the box, as well as tame the ridiculous greens on my GW2765HT.

Oh yes I forgot to add monitor, it is a BenQ EX3501R (300 nits cap, 100hz (99.98), 3440x1440, AMD FreeSync, HDR400 (off, and I also understand HDR400 is essentially BS), so not the best monitor but it has worked for me just fine up until this issue. I was actually looking into a SpyderX but haven't decided to fork out the money yet, since I can achieve accuracy that is almost impossible to tell the difference from an iphone or mac screen without knowing what to look for and staring at it for awhile (apple screens tend to have more brilliance in the blues and pinks and brighter whites at 650nits) but other than that, my nvidia settings cant get any more accurate, but Ive done very extensive testing and comparing and I can safely say I have a decent eye for color accuracy. The only thing I have left to do is figure out how to push my monitors maximum white into the mix, for some reason it doesn't want to push out peak whites until I overdo the contrast or brightness (but then the max white doesn't blend with the rest of the picture, same result with HDR enabled but HDR is overall useless so I leave it off on both windows and monitor. There are a couple of other monitor profiles that might allow me to reach peak whites but id have to do a complete new nvidia profile along with that, so what I have now works just fine and I can just do touch ups and compare with other screens to get an accurate result (still not perfect since the blues and whites dont emit as much light in harmony with blacks and warmer colors, but enough to where you can't tell without a comparison right next to it. But thats aside the point, I will most likely purchase a spyderx soon (i was off put by negative reviews) just to try it and maybe get more accuracy, also Im hoping it will allow me to change the actual white point. But the problem at hand is different, thing is, this shouldn't even be happening, I cant think of a reason for the temporary fix being just to open a specific windows setting (literally dont touch anything, it fixes when the actual control panel display window is open) It doesn't seem to be related to anything else, since the main issue is very obvious in any profile, windows or monitor. It almost seems like the windows control panel is forcing my current nvidia calibration into a previous calibration I had with another monitor profile when I open it after reboot. Im gonna try rolling back like 10 drivers this time and see what happens.

Update: rolled back a few and same thing, no fix, on startup it switches back and forth like 3 times and stays on the bad color mode, sometimes it flickers back to normal for a split second. Going back to 472.12

 

[tabascosauz]

Oh yes I forgot to add monitor, it is a BenQ EX3501R (300 nits cap, 100hz (99.98), 3440x1440, AMD FreeSync, HDR400 (off, and I also understand HDR400 is essentially BS), so not the best monitor but it has worked for me just fine up until this issue. I was actually looking into a SpyderX but haven't decided to fork out the money yet, since I can achieve accuracy that is almost impossible to tell the difference from an iphone or mac screen without knowing what to look for and staring at it for awhile (apple screens tend to have more brilliance in the blues and pinks and brighter whites at 650nits) but other than that, my nvidia settings cant get any more accurate, but Ive done very extensive testing and comparing and I can safely say I have a decent eye for color accuracy. The only thing I have left to do is figure out how to push my monitors maximum white into the mix, for some reason it doesn't want to push out peak whites until I overdo the contrast or brightness (but then the max white doesn't blend with the rest of the picture, same result with HDR enabled but HDR is overall useless so I leave it off on both windows and monitor. There are a couple of other monitor profiles that might allow me to reach peak whites but id have to do a complete new nvidia profile along with that, so what I have now works just fine and I can just do touch ups and compare with other screens to get an accurate result (still not perfect since the blues and whites dont emit as much light in harmony with blacks and warmer colors, but enough to where you can't tell without a comparison right next to it. But thats aside the point, I will most likely purchase a spyderx soon (i was off put by negative reviews) just to try it and maybe get more accuracy, also Im hoping it will allow me to change the actual white point. But the problem at hand is different, thing is, this shouldn't even be happening, I cant think of a reason for the temporary fix being just to open a specific windows setting (literally dont touch anything, it fixes when the actual control panel display window is open) It doesn't seem to be related to anything else, since the main issue is very obvious in any profile, windows or monitor. It almost seems like the windows control panel is forcing my current nvidia calibration into a previous calibration I had with another monitor profile when I open it after reboot. Im gonna try rolling back like 10 drivers this time and see what happens.

Update: rolled back a few and same thing, no fix, on startup it switches back and forth like 3 times and stays on the bad color mode, sometimes it flickers back to normal for a split second. Going back to 472.12

I was also hesitant on the price but it's proved worth every penny, if you care even a little bit about colour accuracy. ACan't really think of any drawbacks with my SpyderX; I'd bet that the negative reviews come from Datacolor's own calibration software that they want you to use, which seems to just be doodoo. Doesn't matter since you'll be using DisplayCal anyways.

There are .icc profiles out there that other people have tested on a specific model of monitor but with panel variations on consumer monitors it's not really the same. Same deal with just rough eyeballing it compared to another monitor. I used to use TFTCentral's GW2765HT profile and it's way too green on mine. Ended up calibrating it myself and it's much closer to my S2721DGF.

I'm kinda curious to see whether you can just use DisplayCal to set your existing profile. But it doesn't quite work the same way as Windows in that the DisplayCal"profile" is much more than just a simple .icc/.icm profile, it's a whole collection of files and I'm honestly not sure how it works. Could give it a try if you're on the fence.

 

[BirtDike]

I was also hesitant on the price but it's proved worth every penny, if you care even a little bit about colour accuracy. ACan't really think of any drawbacks with my SpyderX; I'd bet that the negative reviews come from Datacolor's own calibration software that they want you to use, which seems to just be doodoo. Doesn't matter since you'll be using DisplayCal anyways.

There are .icc profiles out there that other people have tested on a specific model of monitor but with panel variations on consumer monitors it's not really the same. Same deal with just rough eyeballing it compared to another monitor. I used to use TFTCentral's GW2765HT profile and it's way too green on mine. Ended up calibrating it myself and it's much closer to my S2721DGF.

I'm kinda curious to see whether you can just use DisplayCal to set your existing profile. But it doesn't quite work the same way as Windows in that the DisplayCal"profile" is much more than just a simple .icc/.icm profile, it's a whole collection of files and I'm honestly not sure how it works. Could give it a try if you're on the fence.

View attachment 220268

Duly noted, I think Ill buy one. On color calibration, I was really hoping I could make adjustments on DisplayCal without the colorimeter when I was doing this a few weeks ago but I need the device in order to use the software so I suppose im out of luck until I buy one. Id like to fix the issue at hand first though if possible, after all thats why im asking tech forums, which aren't getting a whole lot of responses, Im grateful for the few that do though

 

[tabascosauz]

Duly noted, I think Ill buy one. On color calibration, I was really hoping I could make adjustments on DisplayCal without the colorimeter when I was doing this a few weeks ago but I need the device in order to use the software so I suppose im out of luck until I buy one. Id like to fix the issue at hand first though if possible, after all thats why im asking tech forums, which aren't getting a whole lot of responses, Im grateful for the few that do though

If it's available on Amazon, perhaps you could send it back after you're done with it?

Are you connecting with HDMI or DP? HDMI can be kinda flaky and is not ideal for colour accuracy since a lot of monitors lock out RGB channel control on HDMI.

 

[BirtDike]

If it's available on Amazon, perhaps you could send it back after you're done with it?

Are you connecting with HDMI or DP? HDMI can be kinda flaky and is not ideal for colour accuracy since a lot of monitors lock out RGB channel control on HDMI.

Hmm thats a possibility, although some of the reviews were saying awful customer support and not able to return it but for all i know those are just angry people who haven't even read any directions. I use display port 1.4, HDMI is long gone from my hardware components list. But again, this is not my concern right now, I need to get that primary software bug sorted, theres gotta be some explanation and some solution, after all something had to happen in the first place, its just finding out what. Im sure theres something I could do if I knew the culprit of the problem :/

 

[elghinnarisa]

Try disabling the calibration loader task in task scheduler, then re-run the calibration and see if it sticks after that.
Microsoft -> windows -> Windowscolorsystem -> Calibration loader

 

[BirtDike]

Try disabling the calibration loader task in task scheduler, then re-run the calibration and see if it sticks after that.
Microsoft -> windows -> Windowscolorsystem -> Calibration loader

I have tried that, didn't seem to do anything, im at the point where im in process monitor (ProcMon64.exe) (yes I know that is not a noob utility) looking at system files when the issue happens but of course thats not very efficient since there are millions upon millions of processes and Im not sure where else to narrow it down to other than render engine files (nvidia, vulkan, opengl etc.) and color management processes, but even then its just too much and not showing me anything of much use

Update (nothing exciting): I changed the color management task scheduler to "run with highest privileges" and when I open the color management settings and click reload current calibration it then goes back to normal color, but this is just similar to what the windows display settings window does except I have to click a button for it to do something, all are system defaults (i messed around with every available profile previously, but that didn't do anything) but now Im more confused as more than one system process seem to affect this issue. Other than that the issue is the same. I appreciate your reply, thank you