Two sliders and one gamma setting decide whether shadows stay visible or turn into a flat black area. A controlled room and a test pattern get you most of the way for free.
Reset the monitor to a neutral preset, set **brightness** so black stays black in your room, set **contrast** so near-white steps stay separate, then verify gamma 2.2 with the Windows calibration tool.
Open the monitor menu, choose **Standard** or **sRGB** and disable dynamic contrast, game mode and any eco setting. Calibrating on top of a dynamic preset is wasted work, because the monitor overrides your values on its own.
Judge black level in the light you actually use. A monitor tuned in a dark room looks grey at noon next to a window, and one tuned in daylight crushes shadows after sunset.
Open a black-level test pattern and raise brightness until the darkest step is barely visible, then drop it one click. For SDR desktop work a target near 120 cd/m2 is comfortable; gaming in a dark room needs less.
Use a white saturation pattern with several near-white squares. Raise contrast until the brightest steps stop being distinguishable, then back off two clicks. Too much contrast clips detail that the game is still drawing.
Run the Windows calibration tool and look at the gamma page from your normal viewing distance. The middle square has to blend into its background pattern. Adjust the monitor's gamma setting, not the GPU colour saturation.
dccwStore the result in the monitor's user preset and assign it to that input. Then load a game with dark corridors and confirm that texture is still visible in the shadows instead of a uniform black area.
Contrast is too high or a dynamic mode is still active. Reset the preset and repeat the contrast step.
Brightness is too low or the game has its own gamma slider. Set the in-game brightness against its own test image first.
Each input keeps its own memory. Save the preset while the input you want is active.
HDR and SDR keep separate settings. Calibrate SDR with HDR off, then calibrate HDR separately in Windows.
For photo or video work, yes. For games and desktop use the free route above lands close enough.
Leave them neutral for SDR and adjust on the monitor. Digital vibrance and saturation changes hide clipped detail.
Run a factory reset in the monitor menu, or load the preset you noted in step one. Nothing in Windows is changed by this guide.
Free · no account needed · tracks your progress