Horizontal Screen Tear issue in Windows 10 on dual graphics card laptops

Hi!

I have a 17R3 Laptop build late 2015 / early 2016 version with integrated Intel HD Graphics 530 and Nvidia GTX 980M 8gb. I opted to go for Windows 10 when I purchased this laptop and still can't sort out Horizontal Screen tear issue in games. I managed to sort out Screen tear in videos and in browsing by dedicating either one or another graphics card to this process but there is little that I can do about fixing this issue in games.

My laptop doesn't support G-Sync, there also isn't "adaptive" option for Vertical Sync, only on or off are available. Switching Vertical Sync on does sort out horizontal screen tear issue but games become very uncomfortable to play as I can feel the lag from moving mouse to seeing movement from it on my screen.

Locking FPS to exact same, or slightly less or slightly more than refresh rate of my monitor doesn't help at all
Only if FPS stays over 100 then issue becomes less noticeable but doesn't disappear completely.

My last XPS Dell laptop before Alienware one also had 2 graphics cards, but because it had Windows 7 I never had any Screen tear issues happening.

So at first as Windows 10 just came out from Beta I was sort of expecting them to fix this issue in the coming months, now after 2 years passed and issue still being there I doubt it will ever get fixed. I've reinstalled windows 10 for a different reason, I reinstalled and tried numerous different driver versions for both Intel and Nvidia graphics card but issue is still there.

Is there anything else that can be done or should I just consider installing Windows 7? This by itself is going to be a challenge as Laptop hasn't got any DVD drive and installing Windows 7 from USB on a SSD drive can prove difficult.

 

What is your monitor refresh rate?

 

Just to avoid any confusion this is a laptops own screen that we are talking about. Not any kind of external monitor.
Display refresh rate of laptop screen is 60.02Hz
This is Screen model taken from Invoice list that I received when I purchased my Alienware:
391-BCMW17.3 inch UHD (3840 x 2160) IGZO IPS Anti-Glare 400-nits Display

 

You always have screen tearing if no vsync is enabled (or gsync) maybr you did not notice it before but its always there.

 

I am pretty sure I never experienced Screen Tearing when I was using my old laptop dual graphics cards and with Windows 7. (Apparently has something to do with Windows Aero which Windows 7 supports but Windows 10 doesn't ) I still have my old laptop on me, so I can check again but I am 110% confident I didn't have any G-Sync, V-Sync on, and regardless if FPS was locked to screen refresh rate or if it was higher or lower, there was still no Screen tear visible. Only noticed this issue with Windows 10, there are numerous posts on various other forums about people upgrading from Windows 7/8/8.1 to Windows 10 after which everyone who has 2 graphics cards laptops noticed sudden appearance of Horizontal screen tear which wasn't there before

 

No vsync means no synced frames. I have seen it since the early days of quake 1.

 

I will try to capture gameplay video in Windows 7 on my old XPS laptop with no V-Sync on, and then will record same gameplay in Windows 10 on my Alienware. Will do this at some point during this week and will then post video here.

 

why do you think gsync was invented?

 

Use nvidia inspector to use Adaptive Power mgmt mode and even adaptive screen refresh rate for low end GSYNC capability. Actually the monitor shifts/changes refresh rates acc. to current FPS.

 

they should include those setttings as global settings in NV control panel..