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Newbie Question - WinXP Colour Profile applied to all applications?

2008-03-25 by John

Hi Guys,

I recently became so frustrated with trying to bring my Dell 1707FP monitors to a decent 
colour state, that I got myself Spyder2Express.

I have tried the above on my Macbook and Powerbook laptops and it works just fine - 
Selecting a different colour profile on the Macs applies the changes immediately (and you 
can see the difference in real time).

Having tried the same on my PC however (running Win XP SP2); The profile is created, I set 
it as default from within Display Properties, but when I hit apply nothing happens. The 
screen remains just as before it got calibrated. Activating the default Dell colour profile 
makes no change either -

The question therefore is; Is the colour profile not applied on all applications in Windows 
(i.e. Desktop / Outlook etc), but only in colour-profile-aware applications like Photoshop?

If this is the case, how can you adjust the screen for a 'proper' business work environment 
(Outlook / Excel, etc)?

The Nvidia drivers that come with my Quadro FX card allow you to calibrate the monitors 
on the fly, but I cannot bring them to a satisfactory setting by hand.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Re: [colorvision_group] Newbie Question - WinXP Colour Profile applied to all applications?

2008-03-26 by CDTobie@aol.com

In a message dated 3/25/08 7:52:34 PM, jsyrakis@... writes:

I recently became so frustrated with trying to bring my Dell 1707FP monitors to a decent
colour state, that I got myself Spyder2Express.

I have tried the above on my Macbook and Powerbook laptops and it works just fine -
Selecting a different colour profile on the Macs applies the changes immediately (and you
can see the difference in real time).

Thats because the changes you are seeing are the video corrections (software calibration) that the Mac OS automatically flashes to your videocard when you choose a new profile at the OS level.

Having tried the same on my PC however (running Win XP SP2); The profile is created, I set
it as default from within Display Properties, but when I hit apply nothing happens. The
screen remains just as before it got calibrated. Activating the default Dell colour profile
makes no change either -

Thats because Windows does NOT automatically apply the video corrections when you choose a profile at the OS level. But our application does that for you, so its not an issue, except when you play around with profiles at the OS level, where you won't see the "flash" you are expecting from using a Mac.

The question therefore is; Is the colour profile not applied on all applications in Windows
(i.e. Desktop / Outlook etc), but only in colour-profile-aware applications like Photoshop?

You are confusing the software calibration of the videocard (global, applied to the screen at large and everything on it, flashed at startup) and the profile (make available to all color managed applications, not in use except in color managed applications). The flash you are seeing is the videocorrections, not the profile application.

If this is the case, how can you adjust the screen for a 'proper' business work environment
(Outlook / Excel, etc)?

There is no color management for Excel, Word etc... because their development teams have not chosen to implement it. Thats why so many Mac users prefer Keynote to the unmanaged PowerPoint, or why some Windows users us the color managed Safari browser (or more recently the managable, but not managed by default FireFox) to the uncolormanaged Internet Explorer. All you can do is calibrate to 2.2/6500, which will at least be the correct gamma and whitepoint for the "assume sRGB" applications. It won't fix the oversaturated colors such applications show on wide gamut displays, however, only a fully color managed application converting from the tagged profile (or, sigh, the assumed sRGB) to the display profile will do that.

The Nvidia drivers that come with my Quadro FX card allow you to calibrate the monitors
on the fly, but I cannot bring them to a satisfactory setting by hand.

You need to turn all that stuff off, if you want managed color! The settings such utilities put in place are typically overwritten by your software calibration LUTs, but not always, so uninstalling any utilities that the videocard company supplies it the first step towards properly managed color.

Any ideas?

All of the above...

C. David Tobie
WW Product Technology Manager
Digital Imaging & Home Theater
Datacolor
CDTobie@...
www.datacolor.com/Spyder3

**************
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(http://home.aol.com/diy/home-improvement-eric-stromer?video=15?ncid=aolhom00030000000001)

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Newbie Question - WinXP Colour Profile applied to all applications?

Newbie Question - WinXP Colour Profile applied to all applications?

Re: [colorvision_group] Newbie Question - WinXP Colour Profile applied to all applications?

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