(11-02-2019, 06:32 AM)mattjb Wrote:(11-01-2019, 05:04 PM)Meatball Wrote: I have had problems with the screen though and since I haven't seen anyone else talking about these issues elsewhere on the forum it might be a problem with my specific unit. When I first started the unit it had big problems with flickering that grew when battery drained. It got better when I disabled dimming in the power management but it didn’t go away completely. After some charging cycles I find the problem have diminished but is still present, especially when battery is low and the screen brightness is dimmed.
I have a related problem with the screen in which it emits a high frequency noise which is more apparent when brightness is turned down. Its still present when fully lit though! When there’s a lot of sound in my surroundings this is not a problem but it is quite annoying when alone in a quiet room.
I'm experiencing the exact same issue as Meatball regarding the flickering screen when on battery. When on AC power, it's fine, but as soon as I unplug it, any graphical related activity (even moving the mouse) causes random massive headache-inducing flickering. It seems to get worse as time goes on... It is still present with all dimming options off and happens at any brightness level as far as I can tell. I'm also hearing a high frequency whine when it switches to battery power though I haven't paid attention if it happens at different brightness levels. It's happening on both the default Debian install and on ayufan's rock64pro bionic-mate-pinebookpro-0.9.14-1159-armhf. I'll report back on other observations I make regarding this issue.
An update on the screen flicker:
Played around with the brightness a little to see the effect and here and these are my observations on brightness levels while on battery power only...
0: no coil whine, no flicker, but absolutely too dark to see anything worthwhile
1: bad coil whine, no visible flicker, usable, just a bit dim to liking
2: horrible continuous flicker/strobe - completely unusable
3: flicker but better than 2
4: a little better than 3
5: as bad as 2
6: better than 5
7: same as 6, just brighter
8: random flicker (1-2 per second), not continuous (fractions of a second) like levels 2-7
9: horrible flicker/strobe
10: worse than 9
11: worse than 10
12-22: same as 11, just brighter, completely unusable
The flicker/strobe is also visible in non-GUI applications, like when Ctrl+Alt+F1'd
For tracking purposes, battery level is being reported as 52%. I haven't had a full discharge yet.
