2007WFP Gradient Banding Issues

Question

Hi all,   I recently bought a 20' Dell 2007WFP, Revision A04. I mainly bought the monitor because it was a relatively cheap 8 bit panel, with good color and excellent view angle. Perfect for web design and graphics work on a budget I thought.   I read about previous revisions and issues they have had with gradient banding. However I assumed from what I read that by A04 all these issues were fixed. Alas they're not. I still get really bad gradient banding on both VGA and DVI. No matter what mode I set, it looks horendous. The cheaper 6 bit Dell I use at work does a better job.   Has anyone else experienced the same problem? Is there a fix? Any help is greatly appreciated.

DELL-Chris M · Answer

ohmike, A04 should have the banding fixed. Please post some pictures of the banding.

ohmike · Answer

Thanks for the quick reply Chiris.

I read more about this issue and did a few different tests. Here are some photos I took of the banding issue. The monitor is set to Desktop mode. Although all other modes do the same thing, only worse.

Banding Photo: http://www.ohmike.com/images/banding1.jpg

Banding Photo: http://www.ohmike.com/images/banding2.jpg

Banding Photo: http://www.ohmike.com/images/banding3.jpg

I did the very same tests with my laptop, which has an 'inferior' 6 bit dithered panel, and the gradients come out much smoother. There is no visible banding at all on my laptop monitor.

Any help on the matter is greatly appreciated.

EDIT: Also, the photos don't do it much justice. It actually looks considerably worse than that. I did some different tests, including the one from: http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/ which has a smooth gradient on other monitors that I tested.

On another note, when I ran the test from lagom.nl, the Inversion test showed massive flickering at 1, 2a, 2b, 3, 4a and 4b. Basically it flickers quite badly on all of them. Is this normal for this monitor? The cheaper Dell 17" I use at work only has a fainy flickering on 4b, all others are fine.

Message Edited by ohmike on 10-17-2007 09:59 AM

DELL-Chris M · Answer

ohmike,

* Other users have fixed color trailing while scrolling by tweaking the R, G, B, settings. You have to play around with the adjustments until you find the combination that fixes your issue. At that point, you may make any further changes you see fit knowing that you can always restore to the Factory Defaults. If you do not see one of these listed below, just skip it.

* Click here
* On the left by the disk icon, click sofMCCS
* Click Run
* If asked, click Run again
* Click OK
* Check I agree...
* Click Next
* Click Start
* Click OK
* From your desktop, double-click the softMCCS icon
* Under Preset operations, click all the green Restores one at a time

* Under Geometry -
Horizontal position (phase) = 50
Vertical position (phase) = 25

* Under Image adjustment -
Luminance (brightness) = 30
Contrast = 47 (if listed)
Red video gain = 85
Green video gain = 85
Blue video gain = 90
(Others have had luck with R86, G85, B84)
Red video black level = 8
Green video black level = 8
Blue video black level = 8

* Close the softMCCS box
* Click No to KEEP your changes

How does it look now?

ohmike · Answer

Thanks Chris. I'll try this when I get home. You mentioned 'color trailing while scrolling'. Is this the same as gradient banding? I get gradient banding on a static image, wherever there is a gradient on the screen. It's not smooth, but very choppy instead. Are the two the same thing?

ohmike · Answer

Well Chris, I did what you said. However the instructions you gave must be for someone else, because they didn't fix anything for my dithering issue. As a matter of fact, if I follow those instructions, my screen is unusable... so I'm guessing they're meant for someone else. So, is there a fix for the gradient banding or not?

DELL-Chris M · Answer

ohmike,

Hmm, do me a favor, run this and tell me what the Factory Default Red, green, Blue settings are -

* From your desktop, double-click the softMCCS icon
* Under Preset operations, click all the green Restores one at a time
* Under Image adjustment, list all of the default settings

ohmike · Answer

Thanks Chris!   I'll do it as soon as I get home this afternoon. The program you suggested is great. The only thing I found interesting was that the image looked pretty unusable when I reset everything. I had to reset the first one again afterwards, which caused the monitor to do an auto-adjust to fix itself.   Ok, thanks again. I'll keep you posted.

ohmike · Answer

Hi Chris!   Good news. Further to my previous post, I managed to tweek the monitor and pretty much fix the gradient problem.   I was mucking around with the nVidia drivers for my graphics card, when I stumbled across Color Correction. I mucked around with the settings, until bam! the gradient was all of a sudden really smooth.   I'm not sure if all my colors are still ok, but everything else looks fine. Contrast is ok too.   So it seems you were pointing me in the right track... it did have something to do with colors! :)   Thanks again!   EDIT: Talked to quick. Turns out the color gradient are even worse now... black to white is ok though... back to the drawing board. What do you suggest Chris? Message Edited by ohmike on 10-18-2007 10:01 PM

ohmike · Answer

Hi Chris,   I did a restore, but I did it all in reverse order. First Color defaults, all the way up to factory defaults. If I do it in the right order, the screen geometry stuffs up.   Defaults:   Color temp increment - 1500K Color temp request - 6000 Clock - 50 Luminance - 50 Contrast - 50 Color preset - Display Native Red gain - 100 Green gain - 100 Blue gain - 100 red bideo black 8 green video black 8 blue video black 8   Does this info help, or should i be looking for something else?   Thanks again buddy.

DELL-Chris M · Answer

ohmike,

If under warranty, get it replaced. If you have a service tag number associated with your monitor, you may use Chat or Email support to setup the monitor exchange.

If you only have an Order number associated with the monitor, you must call in,
1-800-624-9896.

They will need the following information -
20 digit PPID number on back of monitor
Name, address, phone, email address
Order number
Issue
Troubleshooting done

ohmike · Answer

So you think it's a monitor fault Chris? Everything else seems ok interms of color, view angle, no dead pixels, etc.   Also, I'm afraid of replacing it, since I'm weary of the panel lottery that's still going on with 2007wfp.   And I'm not 100% sure that it will fix the problem... but that the new one will just be the same.   What do you suggest?

DELL-Chris M · Answer

ohmike, Just checking, do you have another PC to try that monitor on?

Monitors

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