[Michael]

Hi teedog,

I’m back again with some latest news.

Unfortunately, the black screen flickering issue came back after I upgraded the driver to 531.68, and the “CRU” method lost its magic. And reverting back to last driver didn’t fix the issue.

Several days ago, NV released the 532.02 driver, and I found an open issue stated in the release note(https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/game-ready-drivers/13/519572/geforce-grd-53203-feedback-thread-released-52423/).

It’s said “Some monitors may display random black screen flicker when in Display Stream Compression mode when using R530 drivers [4034096]”.

Maybe that’s bug causing my problem. And I realized that this issue had existed since the first R530 version, So I decided to revert to 528.49 driver.

And after that, I had played Dirt Rally 2.0(It’s the game that black screen flickering can be reproduced most easily) since last Friday, no issue so far. I even tried 10-bit color depth at 120hz today, all goods.

I haven’t try HDR yet, but I’m pretty confident.

However, I don’t want to jump to conclusion that the problem is solved completely since it’s just been a few days. I’ll keep testing different games and see what’s gonna happen.

Just want to share this goods news. Best wishes!

[Michael]

Finally, I bring some good news this time.

I found this reddit post https://www.reddit.com/r/nvidia/comments/10sqyoo/is_stable_triple_4k_120hz_possible_with_the/

the other day. And someone mentioned that a software called cru(Custom Resolution Utility) fixed the flickering problem.

Since it baraly cost any effort, so I decided to give it a try.

All I did is just opening the ‘restart64.exe’ in the cru folder everytime I boot up my PC, what ‘restart64.exe’ does is restarting my graphic driver.

So basically, turn on the PC, click ‘restart64.exe'(all monitors will disconnect and reconnect, and the NV panel color setting will be reset to 8bit), set the color bit back to 10bit, and start game.

I’ve been testing this method for two days, playing DR2 and ACC for almost 4 hours in total, so far so good.

I think the software ‘restart64.exe’ did the similar trick as what you suggested (close all NV background services).

I haven’t tried turning on HDR yet, I will tonight. But I’m already happy with what I have right now.

Thank you teedog, you pointed out the right direction again!

Is [stable] triple 4K 120hz possible with the Nvidia 4090 using surround?
by innvidia

[Michael]

Hi, teedog.

I’m bring some news you might be interested in.

First of all, taping DP cable didn’t work for me.

This time, I did a wild experiment. I configed the left-side monitor as the middle display in NV surround, and guess what? The left one started to go black!

So it’s always the NV-surround-defined-middle display that goes black no matter where it’s physically placed.

After I found that, I disabled NV surround and use SRWE to setup triple screen manually. I played DR2 for almost an hour, no black screen any more. However, there are some games requiring NV surround, so this won’t a perfect solution.

Also, I might be wrong about the EMI interference conclusion before. There might be some sort of interference. But it does not affect monitor directly. It more like affects the PC which causing some nv surround bug.

After all the experiments I did, the black screen only happens when all these conditions are met.

1. triple 4k solution displays

2. nv surround is enabled

3. playing games with wheel base

[Michael]

Hi, teedog.

Here I bring the latest news.

After I excluded the cable and GPU port, I was pretty sure it’s the middle montior’s problem.

However, I decided to swap the position of the middle one(let’s call it A) and the side one(let’s call it B) and played some games.

Then the wiredest things happen, black screen showed up again, on the monitor B, not A.

So the problem didn’t come with the monitor itself. It just happen in the middle monitor which NV surround defined.

And I did another experiment. I set the fresh rate from 120Hz to 100Hz. After half an hour playing, no black screen so far.

So it’s more like a bandwidth problem.

Now I think maybe it has something to do with the pcie riser cable. I did a vertical mount for my GPU.

I am gonna try stock mount and see what happens.

I assume you install your GPU directly to motherboard, right?

[Michael]

No worries.

The games I play most such as Dirt Rally 2 or ETS2 don’t support HDR natively anyway.

So I usually turn off HDR, and it’s not a problem for me.

[Michael]

HDR also works, no flickering issues. But the color is a little bit weird.

I heard that there is gonna be a new firmware release for PG42UQ soon.

I think I’m gonna stick to 528.49 driver for now unless a new version in which this open issue is completely resolved is released.

Thanks man for providing all these useful informations!

[Michael]

You are right.

However, given that after all the efforts, and It finally works with that “CRU” trick, I don’t want to mess anything up😅.

I’ll just keep the way it is right now.

[Michael]

Yes, I use Geforce experience.

And I also use 531.61 when I tried this “CRU” method. I did remeber I still had black-screen issue when I first installed 531.61.

[Michael]

Thank you! I’ll try tonight.

By the way, one of my friend suggested me to uninstall NV Game-Ready driver and use studio driver instead. Maybe it does have something to do with NV background services.

Hope I have some luck this time:D

[Michael]

I stopped enabling HDR since I found this issue.

And I only play games with this PC. However, I try playing DR2 with a joystick controller(turn off SC2 Pro, disconnect power), and no problems at all. So I am pretty sure that the interferenct comes from my wheelbase, and somehow only infect the DP connection of the middle monitor. (I can understand why the middle one, becanuse it’s the nearest. But why only DP?)

And It‘s hardly an new build PC, but triple monitor is new build.

I’ve been using single PG42UQ for a long time without any problems. It came up since I setup triple monitors.

PC specs:

CPU: 13900K

GPU: MSI 4090 suprim liquid X

MEM: corsair 16g x 2

SSD: WD SN850 2T x 2

System: Win11(latest version I assume)

I really apprecaite that you listen to my story and all the replies!

[Michael]

Bad news.

Fiber-optic DP cable didn’t bring any luck😅.

Guess I have to stick to hdmi + dp combination. No HDR, but at least I can play.

[Michael]

You are right.

Not the monitor, not the GPU dp port.

It’s some sort of electronic interference.

Last night I removed the GPU riser cable, and mounted it directly to motherboard, and restore the refresh rate to 120Hz.

Still no luck, black screen still happened on the middle screen.

However this time I was playing ETS2, and I noticed black screen happened the same time I accidentally crash the track into wall. It happended twice, but I couldn’t reproduce it when I crash the truck on purpose.

I have a feeling that everytime black screen happened, it’s always the time my wheelbase(I use simucube 2 pro) generate a sudden FFB(like a crash or a sharp turn).

However I don’t have this problem when I use only one monitor, there must be some changes trigger this after I setup triple monitor.

But I tend to believe electronic interference causes black screen. I am not sure where it come from and why only affect the middle monitor. My best guess is that it’s from my wheel base because it’s closest to the middle monitor.

One of my friend told me that Fiber-optic DisplayPort cable is anti-interference. I am gonna keep trying.

Thanks for pointing a direction to me!

[Michael]

I got the Zeskit DP cabels last night and tried them on. No luck for black screen issue, but they did speed up the monitor response time when you turn on the PC or turn on surround mode.

I guess the original cable came with monitor is trash indeed.

Anyway, I will call asus service to detect the dp port and see what happens.

Have a nice day.

[Michael]

Goods news.

Switching to hdmi port works. I’m pretty sure there is something wrong with the dp port on the monitor.

And combination of hdmi and dp ports also works for nvidia surround. The only limitation is that HDR can not be enabled, but G-Sync can.

Thanks for your help. Really appreciated！

[Michael]

Maybe the limitation you mentioned is G-sync. But I’m not sure either.

I’ll try with the hdmi port. Hope for some good news.

Thanks!