This is a small dumby-dummy solution to a very unpleasant problem for some people still using these old SP4s.
It turns out that some SP4s started to have monitor/screen jittering, a problem that can be as strange and different from one SP4 to another.
This problem appeared on mine quite some years ago.
After searching on Bing + Google + Baidu with "surface pro 4 screen jitter fix" and other variations over a long period of time, testing many pseudo solutions (i do not remember all), I first found one solution that did the trick for my SP4. The use of the CRU to change the refresh rate downwards. By the way, this also improved the energy consumption, giving me some more time on battery-only.
But the problem reappeared. But with a half positive side, the screen was normal if the SP4 was plugged-in to charge. So, basically, my SP4 became a desk computer, necessitating constant power plug.
I was re-searching the issue for the last 2-3 weeks. In one place, I read that somehow the screen was not jittering when something moved around (e.g. a movie or the mouse was used), which I had noticed but not thought and looked further because I had the charger plugged in almost all time. Just habit.
When I read that point, I tested it rapidly. And yes, the jitter was scrambling my screen with lines and jittered monitor images around, overlaid in some random pattern. Moving the mouse made it disappear, systematically. Launching some video online or on the computer made it disappear too.
So, I thought, let's make something change all the time, even when I don't touch the screen or do anything but read. Here was the idea: "make one pixel change luminance continuously at some refresh rate, and put the process doing it in the background".
To be sure that i don't mess around with the Windows 10 system and overuse the computer resources, I asked "Copilot" to do it. And it worked.
So, here is this dummy but very practical solution :
- I asked Copilot for a simple solution. My prompt:
Hello, can you provide a small program in C++ for win10 that changes the luminance of one pixel, preferably located in a corner, at each frame.
- Not being happy with the result and example code, I reasked:
I need this program to run in the background and that it does not affect the running of normal Windows 10 programs. can you rewrite the C++ program for being run in the background, for example as a service
- Now it looked good. And last I asked:
Good. Probide me an example of how to simply compile it without installing big programs as Visual Studio
You can find here :
- the C++ code (bg_pixel.cpp)(I modified the timing to 15 ms, see the code)
- the compiled program (bg_pixel.exe) --> for the instructions how to compile, see next point; i used exactly what Copilot proposed
- the full discussion with Copilot (Microsoft Copilot_ Your AI companion-Tzvet-SP4-PxSolution.html) for those interested how i got the result. I strongly suggest people to read the answers of Copilot. I found them very useful for pointing various issues I was not aware of.
Hope this is useful to other persons who have to stick to an old SP4.
Bon courage.
Tzvet
PS. Since I am a visual psychophysicist, among the ones "knowing a bit" about low-level visual processing, I advice people to use this solution on a last resort and after good consideration. There might still be some "ghostly" jittering, not consciously visible but still processed by your visual system. For example, eye movements are ubiquitously following motion in the field of view, especially helping to move attention or attract it to a given location. So, i don't know. If any perceptually not visible jitter remains, at the moment i have no idea of its possible consequences, e.g. visual fatigue etc. Read the License ! You were warned.
PPS. 2026/01/19 --> some hashfiles
SHA256 hash of bg_pixel.cpp:
0209e1975bdac43cbb21a3b8e69af0ec249b390b053900084212e9b38e10ec35
CertUtil: -hashfile command completed successfully.
SHA256 hash of bg_pixel.exe:
b5fdadd0c48b042b7d6daae41377f626ebc2e3cab5348c8c181e8e14ca6a8af3
CertUtil: -hashfile command completed successfully.