Dell XPS 15 B+RGLED screen quailty concern

I am convinced the quailty of my B+RGLED screen on my XPS15 is not as good as it used to be.
For example, recently when viewing a 1080p video on ac power the image quailty was excellent, quite distinguishable from when running on battery when the quaily would diminish.
Now whether or not I am on ac power or battery the quality on the same video is nowhere near as sharp as before.
I have video quality optimised on ac power and balance on battery, but there doesn't seem to be any noticeable difference.
I have max res set to 1920 x 1080.
Has anyone come across this before, or have any ideas how to resolve?
In Device Manager under Monitors it just says 'Generic PnP Monitor' - don't know if this means anything or not, or should it indicate here 'B+RGLED' screen??
Many thanks for any feedback.

 

Have you done a complete reinstall?

 

No, but I am strongly considering this as a course of action. Do you think it may resolve this issue?

 

Yes.

A complete system format usually helps determine if something may be a hardware issue.

At the same time, this video quality may be caused by some weird settings in either the nVidia Control Panel or the Intel Control Panel. Might be worth uninstalling and re-installing the video drivers (both) to test it out.

 

As far as I can tell all settings are correct. I just updated the nVidia driver yesterday. See below for screen shots of my settings, do you think these are correct? Thanks.

Flickr: xpsfing's Photostream

 

The problems you're describing seem to point to Intel Display Power Savings as being the problem.

Open power options (click "more power options" from the battery icon in the taskbar), and then the Dell Battery Manager. Click settings, and make sure "Enable Intel Display Power Savings Technology" is not selected. That might fix it.

 

To check your display right click on pnp monitor in device manager then select properties, then go to details....in the drop down menu select "hardware ids", if you have the good 1080 screen you will see "MONITOR/AUO17ED" pic below

 

This setting is with 'Enable Dell Extended Battery Life' settings, which I have never had selected. So this isnt the issue but thanks all the same !

 

Sure! You could also try going under the "Power" tab in the Intel Graphics Control Panel and making sure that under the "On Battery" menu, "Display Power Savings Technology" is off.

 

No change I am afraid.
To explain clearly again how I first noticed this:
When viewing a full HD video tutorial on battery the picture quality was pretty normal, but then as soon as I plugged in power the display became vivid, the guys eyes and hair become very sharp and the text titles on books on a shelf in the background became very sharp - but this doesn't happen any more. When on a/c power I am getting pretty much the same quality, the only settings difference that is noticeable is a brighter screen.

 

That definitely sounds like software issue (which is great, because it can be solved any number of ways). How to solve it, now, depends on finding out what the problem actually is.

Have you tried changing the Windows power plans when you are on AC vs battery power? Have you played with the LCD's brightness settings? Have you completely uninstalled and re-installed both the Intel and nVidia drivers?

What about if you try watching the (same) video in the reverse method: start the playback while on AC power, and then unplug your laptop and go to battery power: see if the video goes from the "bad quality" back to the full HD quality you described. I'd like to see if this is a driver-based setting.

Also, what video player are you using to watch the video? Does this same thing happen with another video player?

 

I have changed the Windows power plan setting many times but to no avail.
It's not to do with LCD brightness.
I have installed the latest driver for 540m direct from nVidia website, however device manager is still showing the older driver in properties (I didn't uninstall this however, I simply installed the new driver from nVidia website - should I have uninstalled the old one first do you think?)
Have tried every combination of checking but still not working correctly.

 

Yes I think it wouldn't hurt to uninstall both the Intel and nVidia drivers, reboot, and install them again - this is just to see if the drivers may have some sort of "saved setting" at fault here.

Another thing to try is if this loss of quality has anything to do with the video itself. Have you tested any standard resolution videos? Also, what video player are you using? You haven't mentioned it yet, and I wonder if you could test a different set of videos in a different application

 

Ok, so I have reinstalled both drivers now and still there is no difference.
I have confirmed the advance power settings for both Intel Graphics and Multimedia settings are 'optimize power' on battery and 'optimize performance' when plugged in. But when I am playing a HD video on either battery or A/C there is no difference.
I have tried different videos in windows media player, vlc and quicktime.
Also, I tried a standard length movie that is more than 10GB in size in VLC and there is no difference when plugged in and on battery.
Any more ideas?!

 

Since you mentioned you have the same trouble with a different video in VLC, I doubt this is a codec issue (since VLC uses its own internal codecs).

My next step would be to re-format your system and see if the problem persists. This is a relatively extreme "next step", so I would prefer if someone else chimmed in to recommend another troubleshooting idea. You can't really "oh sh!t UNDO UNDO!" a system wipe.

 

I think I will just have to find a spare hour or two and make the call to Dell.