it’s a BenQ SW240.
I am kind of not looking for help here. It is just a discussion about the availability of screen manufacturer’s software for Linux.
I know what hardware calibration is. I kind of assumed that everybody here knows what it is.
So far it is indeed an interesting result that some important brands do “secretly” provide their software for LInux as well.
Yes indeed! I was confused because here and there Eizo mentioned Linux but no official statement. So I wrote to the distributor asking about it and they give it to me without any further questions 
It’s many things, so it would be good to start off with a definition of what you mean by it.
See page 42 of the “SW240 User Manual” SW240 User Manual | BenQ US :
Custom 1 Custom 2 Applies a combination of color settings defined
by users.
SW240 Data Sheet: https://gzhls.at/blob/ldb/c/e/3/6/e19cd14d9e98798cea135719f881ce828639.pdf
But OK, for those who do not know what hardware calibration is - although this is not easy for me in English: h.c. is basically when it is not the user who sets brightness, contrast, color temperature etc. with the help of the screen’s OSD and the buttons of the monitor but a software. You connect the screen and the computer with a usb cable, attach the calibration device, place it on the screen and launch the software. At the end of the process the software saves the settings in the screen and you can access the setting (which is usually called calibration 1-x) with the OSD, but the software usually activates it. If the “mode” is active, you cannot change brightness, contrast etc. But of course you can disable the this color mode and switch to “custom” or “AdobeRGB” or whatever it you want. Then you can tweak brightness etc.
But whether you use h.c. or not, you still need to profile the screen with a software such as Displaycal.
If you do h.c. there is no need to change the video card LUT or whatever it is called, i.e. do actual (software) calibration.
yes. But Custom1 and Custom2 are “only” in AdobeRGB. Believe me, I have the device. I know it.
Although it would be interesting(nice to somehow activate the native color space in custom mode. But I am quite sure that it is not possible.
Maybe I should just ask BenQ if they have the PME software for Linux.
In the color world, calibration could mean:
- Tweaking knobs on your CRT screen.
- Tweaking digital parameters via an OSD on your modern screen.
- Loading the things @gwgill mentioned above into the monitor.
- Loading calibration curves into the GPU (VCGT).
It seems by “hardware calibration” you’re referring to points 2 and 3.
I agree.
A LUT is a LUT, whether in the GPU or monitor (with the caveat as explained by @gwgill). Both are software, you’re not tweaking any analog knobs.
Also see
amen
does anybody happen to know if it is possible to use a spyder on a virtual pc?
I mean this: Virtualbox is installed on Linux. Windows is installed on Virtualbox. a calibration software such as Palette Master Element is installed on the virtual Windows.
I am thinking of buying a license key for Windows in order to install it was a virtual system and then use it for the Palette Master Element software and the Olympus Viewer in order to update the firmware of my camera and lenses.
but the license would be more or less useless if it would not work.
Probably not, or at least not to its full extent. Try for yourself, download a Windows ISO for free from here:
https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/windows10ISO
Virtualbox offers usb passthrought so why not?
You need to pass spider to Guest os (Windows) and that’s it.
I did it and it worked perfectly. Display and x-rite pro were simply passthrou to guest os. CN uses usb cable to control monitor so there was no issues. If you passthrou device it can’t be used in host os. You can passthrou other devices too 
What you need to know whether your calibration software also uses usb to control monitor.
And download Virtualbox extension pack and in windows install guest additions.
Good luck!
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Sorry, to be precise: my guest os was Centos6 32bit on Ubuntu 16.04 64 bits. But it should work for Windows anyway. That’s the idea of virtualization.
Was the VCGT set correctly?
I see the extension pack is only free for private use
Oh, the process is 2 step really. Now I understand your reservations.
- Calibration in guest os. Set desired hw profile in cal. sw. Grab icc profiles.
- Import generated icc into host os. Set the proper one.
Guest is only for hw profile change or recalibration/verification. No need to use it otherwise.
Vitrualbox is free only for non comertial use. Check the license.
I think the same will work for livirt/quemu.
palette master element crashes at start on windows on virtualbox
the problem appears to be the fact that linux does not recognize the screen - only a usb serial cable
updating the firmware of my camera is no problem though on virtualbox
edit: however, the reason might be that the camera is comparatively old but the screen very new
plus, I am now on Mint Debian which has an old kernel. maybe check out the 4.19 kernel?
You need passthrough the USB to the guest. So that for your host linux the USB device becomes invisible. It should not matter if linux is able to detect the hardware … so no kernel upgrade.
how do I do that? all usb devices are invisible/disconnected form the host if I “attach” them to the vm
as I said, olympus camera updater works perfectly
btw, I checked it with the 4.19 kernel - same
The only solution I can image here is: If you have 2 graphics cards then pass the one which connects to the monitor to VM and use for system other one. That would require 2 monitors and I’m not quite sure if qemu/virtualbox supports that.
Dual boot seems more reasonable.
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