S3220DGF, Nvidia RTX 2070S, G-Sync on, flickering

I have a dell 32 arriving today and am expecting the same issues to happen with a 2070.

Obviously one could forget gsync all together and play at 165hz, hoping that no flickering occurs. 

I have read that creating a custom resolution in Nvidia control panel at 144hz is a possible solution.

Alternately one has to fiddle for hours with the custom resolution utility and lower the bottom refresh rate number, then do some pendulum tests.

There is one large post on Reddit which details this procedure.

Before I even get to this point, the Dell S3220DGF will be placed next to an Asus Pb328Q. I want to compare a very color accurate monitor to this dell. Hopefully these two monitors are similar color wise since they are both AMVA. If the dell is color accurate it will probably stay with me. I may want to try the 27" IPS model as well.

FYI = The S3220DGF is not on the Dell approved list of Dell AMD FreeSync monitors with G-Sync compatibility. The S3220DGF was marketed as an AMD FreeSync monitor to be used with AMD FreeSync video cards.
Dell-Admin

This issue is not specific to this monitor, but is a combination of general "it is what it is" combined with VA panels showing it more obviously than others. You'll notice there are no 32" curved VA panels on the g-sync compatible list, because they can't pass the tests. Dell obviously originally intended for this to be a g-sync compatible model (that's what the G in "DGF" stands for), really wish they had removed that G when it become obvious they wouldn't not ne able to get certified. I certainly assumed it was compatible before I learned a lot about this whole situation after purchase.

The core issue is that your monitor is actually brighter at higher refresh rates. They all are, it's normally not too noticeable. However, it's more pronounced on VA panels due to their greater contrast ratios and slower response times.

This alone isn't normally a problem as you've likely discovered. It's only a problem when you have FreeSync enabled. The reason why is because part of FreeSync is "low framerate compensation" or LFC. What this means is that when your frame rate drops below the FreeSync range, the monitor will double or triple that frame rate as the monitor's refresh rate. This helps to make gameplay appear smoother even when the framerates are low. The problem with this is that it causes your refresh rate to rapidly fluctuate from 50-100, or 45-90, etc. This is when you see the drastic "backlight flickering". Your monitor is noticeably brighter at 100hz than it is at 50hz, so when it rapidly switches between the two you see this brightness changing as flickering.

The people that don't believe they have this problem are just happening to avoid situations that highlight it. They either don't have FreeSync enabled (you'd be surprised at the number of people that buy these things and never actually set them up properly), or they don't play games/at settings that cause their performance to hover around the lower limit of the FreeSync range (48fps by default). Many people say they only notice it in menus, cut scenes, etc. because those are scenarios that often have drastically different framerates than normal gameplay.

It truly is a tough quandary. The screen looks beautiful when you can avoid these situations, but I'm not sure if I'm willing to have to fight with this issue for the entire time I own it. It's like every demanding game will require tweaking around this specific issue to avoid unbearable flickers. I've had this monitor for a week and still trying to decide whether to ride it out or just return it and get a 27" IPS monitor that will sacrifice contrast/black levels for stress-free set and forget gaming with proper G-Sync certification too.

If you're still having this issue, I think I might have a solution. My Dell S2716DG was having similar flickering issues with G-Sync turned on in certain applications. To fix it, you have to go into Nvidia control panel, Manage 3d Settings, Program settings, then select the application that is causing the flickering. Scroll down to the monitor technology option and select Fixed Refresh in the drop down menu. I believe this issue is caused by the framerate of the application being outside of the monitors variable refresh rate range. If you don't want the flickering in a game but still want to use G-Sync for it, you might have to turn down your graphics quality settings in game in order to get a framerate within your monitor G-Sync range.

Thanks for this.  I've spent too much time trying to 'fix' this.  I'm better off just disabling G-Sync and being done with it. I have a feeling that this could be part of the reason they we're as low as $350,  it might just be that fundamentally Freesync/G-Sync will not perform on this hardware.  It's too bad, I wonder how many people have returned because the bought it specifically for Freesync (even with an AMD GPU).  Luckily I didn't buy it for this, but it would be nice.  I can't imagine the amount of migraines and general eye strain from staring at a subtlety flickering game for a few hours.

For what it's worth, I did ultimately decide to keep it. I came from a Dell S2716DG (a TN panel, but the unquestioned best value in the world for a g-sync monitor back when it was new, you had to spend $800+ to get a better monitor at the time and those two options were plagued with terrible quality control issues), and the incredible contrast and vibrant colors on this model by comparison made me decide to deal with it.

For the most part, I will simply try and avoid the situation by only playing games at settings that allow me to stay safely north of 60fps and away from the LFC danger zone. In the rare game that I really want to have everything cranked up despite running into these issues (looking at you Cyberpunk), I disable Freesync.

It's not perfect, but the unfortunate reality is that when you look closely at all your available options for high end gaming everything is a compromise of some sort. There is no perfect solution available, no matter how much money you spend. I spent 4 years with the awesome speed but criminally poor gamma of the S2716DG, now I'll spend some time with the pretty colors and deep blacks of this monitor while fighting with LFC flickering and having to constantly toggle Freeysnc & HDR on and off situationally. Pro-tip, remap two of your physical buttons to Freeysync and HDR toggles so you don't have to open the OSD menu every time you want to switch them.

Do you need a program or script or something to remap Freesync/HDR to a button?  That would be nice to have. 

I've found something that I think helps with the flickering (no guarantee, though).  In the Nvidia Control panel I've set "Preferred Refresh Rate" to  "Highest Available" I think that I was getting a lot more halving of refresh rate with this set to default, so it seems like now my refresh rate would stay at my current in-game FPS, and the flickering is mostly minimal.

Another note - after deciding to mostly not use Freesync/G-Sync... I disabled it via the actual monitor.  I realized that black colors are much darker, to the point that I can't see what is happening in moderately dark areas in games, without adjusting a lot of settings.  With Freesync "On" via monitor controls, but G-Sync/Freesync off via software, the picture is lighter and easier to see.  Anyone know why this happens?

No, you don't need special software.  There are options to remap the physical buttons right within the OSD itself.

I'm honestly not sure why you'd see a brightness difference between Freesync off in the monitor vs on but with g-sync off in the control panel.  I would expect those two situations to effectively be the same.  My only guess would be that you are falling back to v-sync settings in that scenario that are changing the refresh rate of the monitor.  Did you disable v-sync in the control panel when you disabled g-sync?  Do you have v-sync disabled in the games?

But in general, yes deep blacks is one of the pros of VA panels.  Where as IPS panels are always "gray-ish" at best, VAs can get much closer to true black.  This means things should look much closer to as intended by the artists, but you have to pay a lot more attention to those gamma sliders that most games make you play with when you first calibrate ("move the slider until the image is barely visible" prompts).  If you've ever played games that have light sources like torches/flashlights, but always ignored them because you could see just fine without them, that's why...your monitor/settings were preventing you from actually seeing the scene as truly dark like it was intended to be.  But at the end of the day, a combination of gamma and brightness settings is what you should adjust to find the image quality you're comfortable with.  Note, there is no built-in gamma settings in the monitor that's something you need to adjust with software (usually supported directly within individual games that include dark scenes for this purpose).

Hello,

I have the S3220DGF, and I love the curved 32" monitor.

I did buy a new DP cable at the same time as I saw somewhere that sometimes the DP cable supplied with the monitor is not the best of Quality.

I did have GSYNC problems, I did create a custom resolution 144Hz 1440p as I saw the same idea, but somewhere along the lines removed it.

Windows displayNVIDIA displayGSYNC

I am currently correctly GSYNCed at 164Hz as per FPS counter overlays.

However, if I do not correctly ensure that the DP cable is properly inserted after removing it and make sure it  is properly flush to the GPU, the screen blacks out and comes back 2-4secs later every now and then.

Just some ideas maybe to help.