Dark Display

[Phil]

OK, this has always been an issue since this computer was built...the display is always really dark. Like pictures are dark and videos are always dark. Whenever I watch a video in windows media player, I have to manually push the brightness up a bit to actually see what's going on...

...The monitor brightness is up to full and I've gone to advanced in display properties by right clicking on the desktop, properties, settings, advanced and have messed around with the gamma, brightness and contrast...but they still have to be really high up to see things the way they should be...and you lose detail and stuff....does anyone have any idea as to what the problem could be???Dodgy graphics card?

[MartinBradley]

What's the graphics card?

[DrBroccoli]

How old is the display, I used to have an old CRT that was always dark, it was just losing its life...

[Phil]

The graphics card is a Radeon 9600...and the monitor is quite old but not massively...I would say it is about 3-4 years old...its not exactly a poor monitor though! I mean we have a monitor thats lasted for a good 6-7 years!

I'm guessing that the best test we can do is use a different monitor to see if it is that that's causing the problem...it's just getting around to doing it because its quite a hassle!

[DJHyperbyte]

Another display would certainly be worth a try, but first go to display properties again and then into the advanced settings. There's a tab "Adapter" where you pick "List all modes". You can then pick different refresh rates. Try the following:

800x600 high color at 65 hertz
800x600 high color at 75 hertz
800x600 high color at 85 hertz
1024x768 high color at 65 hertz
1024x768 high color at 75 hertz
1024x768 high color at 85 hertz

Let me know what this does to the brightness of the monitor.

[Phil]

They didn't really do much to the brightness...at the mo...its set to 1024x768 high color at 85 hertz...obviously 800x600 wasn't right the monitor and the brightness was the same...as for the other two at 1024x768 resolution...they just made the screen seem really flickery. didnt really affect the brightness.

[Aqeel]

Your moniter is quite old, the darkness problem can be solved by tuning the picture tube for this you must have to send it to some shop/mechanic. However I think it's time to replace the display