Windows 7 – Restore Missing Brightness Settings

brightnessnvidia-graphics-cardsony-vaiowindows 7windows xp

I have a VAIO CW laptop with Windows 7 x64, and after installing new NVIDIA drivers, my screen brightness controls are no longer available. (Not in the control center, not in the power options, buttons don't work even though VAIO's brightness adjust window pops up, etc.).

My display doesn't dim either.

It works fine on other OSes (e.g. Windows 8).

I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling a bunch of drivers (even tried installing the factory-default NVIDIA driver) and software (including the VAIO event service), but it doesn't work.

Any idea how to fix this?

Best Answer

Navigate to Start -> Control Panel -> Hardware and Sound -> Device Manager.

In the Device Manager window, look for “Monitors”, then right-click your monitor and select “Uninstall”. Be sure to also check the “Remove driver” option. Once removed, click the “Scan for hardware changes” icon. Doing so should bring the brightness settings back.

For both NVIDIA and ATI drivers for Sony Vaio, after performing this solution, you can restore the brightness via the Mobility Center (Windows+X).

Related Solutions

Windows – Remove NVIDIA Update and UpdatusUser

It looks like there is a nVidia knowledge base article that deals with the Updatus user account. The short story is that this behavior is by design, and they won't fix it. If you have an Optimus-enabled notebook, even if you don't want nVidia update, it will be installed. They seem to think that creating a user account is a perfectly good approach to auto-updating. I don't know anybody else who is using it, but nVidia seems to think it's perfectly OK.

Also, I have found a way to disable the creation of the user account when installing the driver, even though it implies editing a file before installing the driver. If you use this method, when you install the driver, you won't get the UpdatusUser account, or service installed. Here are the steps you need to follow:

Start the installation, and press OK. The installation files will be extracted to a location on your hard drive (C:\NVIDIA is the default)
After the files are extracted, the installer will open. Now you need to cancel the installer.
Open this file using a text editor (Notepad, Notepad++): C:\NVIDIA\DisplayDriver\295.73\WinVista_Win7_64\International\Display.Optimus\Optimus.nvi (the path may vary if you have another driver version, or you extracted the files to a different location)

Delete the following lines

<dependencies>
 <package type="requires" package="NVIDIA.Update"/>
</dependencies>
<phases>
 <custom phase="enableUpdatus" action="EnableUpdatus" when="install"/>
 <custom phase="disableUpdatus" action="DisableUpdatus" when="uninstall"/>
</phases>

Save, close the file
Restart the installer by running C:\NVIDIA\DisplayDriver\295.73\WinVista_Win7_64\ International\setup.exe (again, the path may vary if you have another driver version, or you extracted the files to a different location)
Now you can install the driver, and the UpdatusUser account won't be installed automatically on your Optimus-enabled laptop.

Windows 8 Fn key doesn’t work for brightness

If keys works before logon, thought you need to check programs which starts after logon. Disable them one-by-one and logoff/logon?

You may disable startup programs in Task manager on "Start-up" page.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Windows – Remove NVIDIA Update and UpdatusUser

Windows 8 Fn key doesn’t work for brightness

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