White Glow and Thin Letters on New Build

[Algus44]

Hey everyone. I've completed my new build with a 1060 Nvidia GPU and Windows 10 Home.

I've been messing around for a few days no with no luck to my current problem:

I upgraded from a very old computer (Vista) and I play on a 40' LCD-LED Back-lit TV through HDMI. On that computer and display everything was crisp and clear.

Now, on this new build of mine, I find that any text with a small font size that's on a white or gray background will appear very thin and usually have a white shadow or blurry effect behind it.

It makes it really frustrating when trying to read message boards or code. It's also sometimes hard to read the little tabs on property windows, and even the details inside. So, I've finally come here asking for help.

I've tried nearly everything I can think of from adjusting the TV settings, as well as the settings in the Nvidia Control Panel.

I've done the Clear Type Text test dozens of times, using the most bold of fonts to no avail.

I've checked the Nvidia settings, and it's not an overscan issue.

I force updated the Creator's Update today, reading that it might help, but I can't tell any difference.

These are the notable things that I can think of that could be affecting this:

Resolution: 1920 x 1080 with 150% DPI.
GPU: Nvidia 1060
Display: 40' LED TV

I've tried switching the resolution back to when I was on Vista (1366 x 768 100% DPI) and it fixes the white shadow problem, but makes everything blurry.

Drivers are up to date, and I've tried everything I can think of except buying new display cords.
So as it stands right now these are my 2 options:

1920 x 1080 @ 150 DPI: Causes white shadows with dark text on light background & thin letters. Some things become very hard to read like when reading the "Properties" menu.

1366 x 768 @ 100% DPI (No Scaling): Causes all text to become blurry, but everything is readable no matter the situation. It's also more familiar to me like this, and everything looks "right".

When I was on Vista everything was perfect, and I'm trying to replicate that. With how much I've been messing around with this though, I'm not sure if it's possible anymore.

If anyone has any feedback on what I can try, I'd really appreciate any assistance, thanks!

 

[parthtrivedi]

I had the same issue with LG 32" LCD, The issue in my case was with the TV aspect Ratio. Try changing the TV aspect ratio setting to JUST SCAN mode or something similar usually will work.

 

[Algus44]

Hey, thanks for your reply I've looked at all the different settings, and I don't see anything like that.

I'm pretty sure the TV is just default to 16:9.

 

[parthtrivedi]

Can you give me your TV model number?

 

[Algus44]

KDL-40EX521

 

[parthtrivedi]

taking TV aspect ratio as 16:9 caused similar distortion in font on my TV as well with a Geforce GPU, because it is outputting a slightly diff aspect ratio. you will have to find a mode called just scan in the TV settings.

 

[Algus44]

I've looked through-out all the settings I could find, and I can't find another for"Just Scan".

These are the different options I get under different categories:

Pictures Adjustments:

Standard Custom Vivid

Backlight Picture Brightness Color Hue Temperature Sharpness

Noise Reduction MPEG Noise Reduction Dot Noise Reduction CineMotion

Advanced Settings:

Black Corrector Adv. Contrast Enhancer Gamma Auto Light Limmiter

Clear Whiye Live ColorWhite Balance Detail Enhancer Edge Enahncer

Wide Mode:

Wide Zoom Normal Full Zoom Captions

Scene Select:

Auto General Cinema Sports Music Animation Photo Game Graphics

Using the common sense settings, and changing between all scene selections and messing around with all the advanced options, net me nothing when it comes down to the foundation of the text.

 

[parthtrivedi]

Have a look at this.
http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=961258
does it have a full pixel mode?

 

[parthtrivedi]

"on my Sony there is an option called Picture Mode under Picture, change that to Full Pixel. I think some older sony's had a Display Area setting instead"
Quoted from that thread

 

[Algus44]

I read through the thread you posted and it looked like most were complaining about the "Overscan" issue, but I have made sure that it's already set to off. For the other thing they mention - full - my TV is already set to "full" 🙁

Starting to think I might just be stuck with the way it is, unless anyone can think of anything else?

 

[parthtrivedi]

In the geforce panel can you tinker with the 1080p and 1080i setting?

 

[Algus44]

Anything specific? I can change the color settings (brightness, contrast, gamma, etc) through it. Adjust the desktop size and position, anything really.

 

[parthtrivedi]

Try setting the reso to 1080i and checking, however I doubt that will help. The Only thing I can see to be usefull is the Full pixel mode.
I'm sorry I can't be of anymore help.
Good luck

 

[Algus44]

After digging around more in the settings of the TV, I found more advanced settings that might mean something:

I was able to find this "Full Pixel" Mode you were talking about; it was already set to that.

One setting I found is called "Pro Picture Seup:

That branches into 2 options:

Color Matrix: Lists the current inputs, then lists 480i 480p 1080i 720p 1080p and beside each of them it lists another setting that can either change to [Custom] ITU601 or ITU709.

HDMI Dynamic Range: Full Limited Auto

If any of this means anything?

 

[parthtrivedi]

The Color Matrix is not relevant,
1st try changing the full pixel to any other option and check if the font is proper.
2nd the HDMI dynamic Range to other option.

 

[Algus44]

For the "Display Area" mode the 3 options are Full Pixel, -1, Normal. The other 2 options are just 2 different over scans, so it has to be on full pixel for sure.

For the Dynamic Range, it's normally set to Auto, which I'm not sure is Limited or Full by default. So I've switched it too Full since I've read they say it give the full 0-255 color range as opposed to the limited getting rid of the top 16 darkest and lightest colors.

Not sure if that's actually helped or not, or if my brain is just getting used to the way it looks now 😛

I'll post back again after some sleep, and see if that changes anything.

Thanks for all your help by the way, I really appreciate all the input into this you've given to me

 

[parthtrivedi]

Hey thank you for your kind words.
Sorry I couldn't do more.
Goodluck.
Keep us.posted

 

[Algus44]

After a few days of more tinkering, I feel that it's stuck this way, at least with my current set up. I mean, I can use the computer with the display like this, it's just not "perfect" like I was hoping.

It really only comes down to reading text on the light backgrounds, so it's not really an issue when gaming or anime/movies. I think that's just the way it'll have to stay for now.

The only other option I can think of (other than getting a new Display with direct Display Port compatibility) is to use a Display Port to VGA adapter. Does anyone know if that would help the picture?

Does anyone know if I get an Active Display Port Adapter that has Audio support as well, if it'll degrade the Audio quality as well? Or is that something I don't really have to worry about?

 

[madmatt30]

http://windows10_dpi_blurry_fix.xpexplorer.com

Works for me mate , I had exactly the same issue upgrading from 8.1 to 10.

 

[Algus44]

Hey, thanks for your reply madmatt30!

One of the 1st things I tried was DPI Fix from them, but it was a no-go. Since I couldn't get it to be fixed after trying for 2 weeks, I'm currently using option 2 in my op:

1366 x 768 @ 100% DPI (No Scaling): Causes all text to become blurry, but everything is readable no matter the situation. It's also more familiar to me like this, and everything looks "right".

So right now I'm trying to fight with this "blurry" issue, which I'm not sure is from the display (even though it worked perfect on Vista) or if it's because I'm forcing it too not use it native resolution (the one that causes the white shadows).

 

[madmatt30]

I would say actual picture settings can have a profound effect mate.

I have 2 settings set on my TV , one for general desktop use & one for gaming/video.

I don't know how much you've tinkered but try setting to game mode - original.
Turn the backlight down to 50%, turn the contrast upto 75-80%.

Turn sharpness all the way up.
Noise reduction - off
Dot noise reduction - off
Film mode - off


Advanced settings - play with both the detail & edge enhancer settings.

 

[Algus44]

Thanks again for your reply I've done a lot of tinkering with the TV, but nothing I do is on par with the perfection I had with my Vista computer. Which I basically switched my Picture Mode to Vivid, all Advanced options were locked; I could only mess with the color, brightness, sharpness, etc, and everything was good after a few minutes. This was on a Nvidia 240 or whichever it was around there from years ago. Still same TV through all these years. It's just crazy how upgrading like 8 years and everything goes crazy, even after 2 weeks of research XD

In game mode > Picture Mode there is:

Game Original & Game Standard. With Original giving it then more natural "warm" look; standard giving it the "cool" look.

Then after Back light, Picture, Brightness, Color and Hue is Color Temperature. Those settings can be Neutral, Cool, Warm 1, Warm 2. Each one dramatically changing the screen. Then finally Sharpness. Noise, MPEG and Dot Reduction are all forced off by default in this setting. CineMotion can be on or off.

Now the bigger problem comes to the advanced settings. I have:
Black Corrector: Off, L, M, H.
Adv Contrast Enhancer: Off, L, M, H.
Gamma: -2 -1 0 +1 +2
Auto Light Limiter: Off, L, M, H.
Clear White: Off, L, H.
Live Color: Off, L, M, H.
White Balance to adjust: RGB Gain & RGB Bias.
Detail Enhancer: Off, L, M, H.
Edge Enhancer: Off, L, M, H.
Skin Naturalizer: Forced off.
i/p Conversion: Quality, Speed

I noticed that it's the Edge Enhancer setting that gives it that gives the white shadow the more you increase it. However, keeping it "off" gives it the blurry look.

I think I've decided that I'm going to stick with my normal setting from my Vista days of 1366 x 768 @ 100% DPI (No Scaling) even if it's not the "native resolution". When in 1920x1080 it just makes the letters so thin and nasty looking. It changes the layout of websites I frequent, and for example if there's graphs where each category is supposed to be separated by a single black line, the higher resolution seems to mess it all up, making some really thin or getting rid of it all together. So even if I can fix this white shadow/blurry problem, it seems like 1920x1080 just isn't for me at the moment.

I know you can't actually see what changing the settings will do, but do you have recommendations on what to set all these settings at in "game mode"? With the way I have it now, everything just seems so dark and gloomy, then when it comes to text, especially on a colored background, they are "fuzzy". It's just become frustrating lately because I've been at this for long and haven't really made any progress. Especially with the amount of money I've put into this build it's kinda depressing with what's been happening.

Do you think a Display Port to VGA Adapter would make any difference picture wise? Or just keep messing with the TV settings? I'm hoping once I have the money to get a new display, that specifically getting one with direct Display Port compatibility will solve my display issues. Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks!

 

[Algus44]

Is Display Port on TVs a regular thing yet or will I have to pay outrageous money for that? I've looked at monitors, and getting anything above 32 is quite the price 🙁

 

[parthtrivedi]

Display port on a Tele is a rare thing, I don't think there are any which make it. however i'd recommend to go for a higher refresh rate monitor.

 

[Algus44]

So, people have been telling me to get a HDMI 2.0 cable, to see if that fixes the problem. However, as far as I know, my TV only supports up to 1.4, so I don't see it making a difference.

If I were to buy a TV with HDMI 2.0 slots, and used a new HDMI 2.0 cable, do you think I'd see a difference? Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks!