Issues with color banding on my monitor.

[Benjaminius]

I bought an Asus ROG Swift PG248q from Best Buy. The only thing I don't like about the monitor is that dark images have really bad banding. I've spent a few hours messing around with calibration settings and ICC profiles, but nothing seems to help. It's bad enough that I'm going to return it. If I exchange this monitor for another PG248q will it experience the same problem? Also, do you have any suggestions for reducing banding that I might not have tried yet? Are there any monitors similar to the PG248q that won't have the same problem? Thanks.

[Revelene]

What exactly does it look like?

Many games have banding, just because of the color bit used. This will be highly noticeable in dark and solid color areas with less post processing.

Does it occur on the desktop? Try bring up paint in full screen and color it black. Does it show banding? Try a few different colors.

[Benjaminius]

Originally posted by Bruh!:

Many games have banding, just because of the color bit used. This will be highly noticeable in dark and solid color areas with less post processing.

Does it occur on the desktop? Try bring up paint in full screen and color it black. Does it show banding? Try a few different colors.

I'm using another monitor as a comparison. The other screen does not have any banding issues, so I know it's a problem with the monitor, not the games / images. It occurs in any game or image with dark gradients (solid colors don't have any issues). It happens pretty much everywhere (desktop background, games, images, etc.). Lighter colors don't appear to be a problem.

[Benjaminius]

Originally posted by Bruh!:

What exactly does it look like?

It's hard to explain. Instead of an even gradient from a dark color to a light color, I can see "bands" in the gradient that don't blend together. They aren't bands of solid color, but they are noticeable.

[Revelene]

What kind of settings do you have on the monitor? I'd try messing around with them. Try to find something about sRGB, bit depth, etc.

If it is only affecting dark gradients, then I wouldn't believe the monitor is bad, but rather a setting.

[Benjaminius]

Originally posted by Bruh!:

What kind of settings do you have on the monitor? I'd try messing around with them. Try to find something about sRGB, bit depth, etc.

If it is only affecting dark gradients, then I wouldn't believe the monitor is bad, but rather a setting.

I only have a few image modes (Scenery, Racing, Cinema, etc) and the standard settings: Brightness, Contrast, Saturation, Color Temp, Gamma. I've spent (literally) hours messing around with settings and image modes. Also messed with the Nvidia control panel's display settings, downloaded an ICC profile from the manufacturer's website, and used Window's color calibration. Nothing makes a significant difference.

[Revelene]

http://www.lagom.nl/lcd-test/gradient.php

Does the issue show in this test image?

[Benjaminius]

Yes, but it isn't as obvious as some examples, the bands are almost unnoticeable. The opening title sequence of Westworld has the worst color banding (looks fine on my other monitor).

[Revelene]

Originally posted by Benjaminius:

Yes, but it isn't as obvious as some examples, the bands are almost unnoticeable. The opening title sequence of Westworld has the worst color banding (looks fine on my other monitor).

Look at the pictures below. Do any of them come close to what you are seeing?

[Ocelote.12]

Is "output dynamic range" in video driver's control panel set to "Full" or to "Limited"? It should be set to Full, also the monitor menu settings must also be set to "Full Dynamic Range".

Sometimes you get banding if these monitor's and the driver's current settings are different.

[Benjaminius]

Originally posted by Manul:

Is "output dynamic range" in video driver's control panel set to "Full" or to "Limited"? It should be set to Full, also the monitor menu settings must also be set to "Full Dynamic Range".

Sometimes you get banding if these monitor's and the driver's current settings are different.

I don't have a monitor menu setting for dynamic range, but it was set to Full in the Nvidia control panel. I set it to Limited (just as a test) which seemed to reduce banding slightly, but not by much.