U2410 monitor in standard mode - gamma incorrect

I tried to calibrate it with gamma 2.2 in standard mode, but it resulted in a very noticeable banding effect

HOW did you try to calibrate to gamma 2,2? I assume you have calibration hardware software. The banding then comes from the LUT of your graphics card.

Isn`t it possible to get the gamma close to 2,2 by adjusting the monitor itself with its brightness and gain values? And calibrate it after that so that the graphics card doesn`t have to adjust the gamma that much?

With the Lacie Blue eye Pro colorimeter/software and also with other softwares and the same colorimeter.
The result is always the same: even the smallest change in the gamma curves causes a noticeable banding effect.
I don't think it is possible to manually adjust the gamma.

The software ist adressing the LUT of your graphics card. This causes the banding. You should try to adjust the gamma with the monitor buttons (probably  "gain"). Ant THEN run the software.

There is no gain control in standard mode.

I don`t have the monitor, so I don`t know what there is. There should be seperate Red, green and blue controllers etc. and brightness and contrast (should influence  gamma).

Look at this. Even a so small change in the gamma curves causes a noticeable banding effect. This report refers to the aRGB mode calibration, but what I'm telling is valid for all the presets.

Strange. But it says that you already had gamma 2,2 before calibration. I thought you said you had 1,8.

But since you don`t see banding before calibration and you don`t do anything to the monitor`s settings it has to come either from your card or from the resulting ICC profile. If so it has nothing to do with the monitor itself IMO.

"This report refers to the aRGB mode calibration, but what I'm telling is valid for all the presets".

I really can't be more explicit! aRGB mode comes with a 2.2 native gamma, but even the smallest change in the gamma curves causes the banding. In Standard mode (and in the other wide gamut presets) things goes worse because the calibration starts from a 1.8 gamma and it results in a heavy change in gamma curves and in a more noticeable banding effect. I also tried to load ICC profiles created on a different monitor by a different user (just to see if the banding issue was related to my colorimeter). Since the problem is still present with an old card I can't conclude that the issue has nothing to do with monitor itself. Ok.. I don't see banding before calibration.. But is it possible that there is no way to calibrate the monitor and at the same time avoid banding?

Sorry, I misses the aRGB mode.

But anyway. The banding obviousely comes from your calibration and in this case should be also there with any other monitor. IMO calibration without any banding is ony possible if the calibration is done within the monitor LUT itself. That`s the reason why there are hardware calibratable monitors like the EIZO CG series. In this case the graphics card LUT (which mostly is 8bit) is not used at all but the 12bit LUT of the monitor instead. ICC profiles can also produce banding if they are only 8bit profiles. Some profiling software can produce higher bit profiles. Sometimes you can also choose between matrix and LUT based profiles. Photoshop for example sometimes produces banding with LUT profiles. Try matrix based profiles, if you can.

Some calibration softwares also support precalibration. That means, they help you to set your monitor as close as possible to the target values (gamma, whitepoint etc.) with the help of your measuring device before the actual calibration.

My software helps me to manually set brightness, contrast and color temperature.
Can you suggest a particular calibration software?

Thanks

P.S. I also tried Matrix profiles.

Basicolor "Display 4" is very good IMO.

http://www.basiccolor.de/

BTW., I have a nvidia 8600GT. Its VGA output has an internal 10bit LUT while the DVI output seems to have an 8bit LUT. (both put out 8bits to the monitor).

If I use the DVI output I also get banding after calibration. If I use the VGA I do not get any banding, because it has 10bit internal LUT. Maybe worth a try in your case.

You can also try it if you go to the  nvidia driver and adjust gamma or brightness or whatever. YOu get banding on the DVI and no banding on the VGA output.

Maybe similar with ATI. Don`t know what card you use.

I have a Radeon 9600, but I can change it if necessary.

Do you think that a DisplayPort or HDMI connection can solve the problem?

Not sure about HDMI. But Display port is able to output 10bit (at least in theory, in practice it depends on the driver etc.. Not sure about ATI, but nVidia has only one card, a Quadro, that can output 10 bit via display port ) . But we are not talking about 10bit output, but 10bit internal (what is important for calibration).

I would assume that Display port also uses 10bit internally. You could just try it out and connect your monitor via Display port.