Laptop Brightness Control doesn’t work after upgrading to Windows 7
I recently upgraded to Windows 7 Professional x64 on my laptop – a Dell Latitude D530.
Everything went well and all the hardware components were recognized by Windows 7. However the Fn+(page up/down) display brightness control would not work and in Control Panel –> Power Options the Screen Brightness Slider would not move.
This frustrating problem is being reported in many places.
I tried going to the Intel website and downloading the latest drivers, but no luck.
With a 32bit installation I had tried installing the Dell Latitude D530 Vista drivers, according to this advice so that the brightness control worked, but this made the system unstable. The same fix would not work for 64 bit Windows 7 as there were no 64 bit Vista drivers available from Dell.
Thanks to the solution given here the Intel GM965 Express Chipset drivers given below do work on my Dell Latitude D530 (Windows 7 64 bit) and restore the Fn+(page up/down) display brightness control functionality.
INTEL GM965 EXPRESS CHIPSET Video Drivers:
Other solutions:
- Lenovo 3000 G530
- Lenovo T500
- Sony Vaio VGN-CS36GJ, VGN-CS38GD, VGN-CS36TJ, VGN-CS36MJ, VGN-CS37GH, VGN-CS28GD, VGN-CS36SJ, VGN-CS27GJ
- Brightness control breaks after resume sleep/hibernate – (solution at bottom of page) and this post
- Other solutions are discussed here
- If you find a solution for your laptop please post it in the comments and I will update it here
Free Download Windows 7 – Create a Windows 7 Installation DVD or USB Flash Drive
Alternative Solutions:
1. F.lux – Automatically Adjust Screen Brightness and Color to the Time of Day
Makes your computer screen softer on the eyes when working at night – this is a very popular alternative – good review here
From stereopsis.com/flux
Ever notice how people texting at night have that eerie blue glow?
Or wake up ready to write down the Next Great Idea, and get blinded by your computer screen?
During the day, computer screens look good—they’re designed to look like the sun. But, at 9PM, 10PM, or 3AM, you probably shouldn’t be looking at the sun.
Downolad F.lux
F.lux fixes this: it makes the color of your computer’s display adapt to the time of day, warm at night and like sunlight during the day.
It’s even possible that you’re staying up too late because of your computer. You could use f.lux because it makes you sleep better, or you could just use it just because it makes your computer look better.
f.lux makes your computer screen look like the room you’re in, all the time. When the sun sets, it makes your computer look like your indoor lights. In the morning, it makes things look like sunlight again.
Tell f.lux what kind of lighting you have, and where you live. Then forget about it. F.lux will do the rest, automatically.
2. Desktop Lighter
You could also try the Freeware stand-alone brightness control called Desktop Lighter
It runs unnoticed in the system tray, uses only 1.5mb RAM, launches with Windows and uses Ctrl+> and Ctrl+< keys to control the brightness rather than the Fn keys
This is not a “true” brightness control – it doesn’t cut the power consumption, but uses some software manipulation of the screen function to dim the screen. I used it for a while until I found the driver above, and it was useful if I wanted to read at night in bed without hurting my eyes or disturbing my partner – but it’s no substitute for the real thing!
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Thanks so much for posting this! I have been looking for a way to do this for months now, ever since I upgraded my Dell D530 from Vista Ultimate 32 bit edition to Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit edition. It (Desktop Lighter) doesn’t seem to actually dim the backlight, so it probably won’t save as much of my battery life as would a real fix (ahem Dell and Microsoft!!!), but it certainly makes it much easier to read in dark settings by lowering the pixel brightness. A great find! Thanks again!!!
Thank you this worked great, ive been trying to get that to work since i installed windows 7 months ago.
YEAH!
That driver worked, I have my brightness control back
PS don’t use that Desktop Lighter program, it uses a software mask to dim the screen and doesn’t reset it, even after uninstallation.
I have a Dell XPS M1330 running Win7 64 bit.
None of these links worked for me (not even let me install, they said “The computer doesn’t accomplish minimum requierements” or something.
I just uninstalled QuickSet64 and voilá!
The driver worked for me, thank you.
The software is suitable for me. I had the same problem too.
Thank you
Thanks that work great!
The driver worked for me, I had the same brightness problem. Thank u..
does this work in my DELL xps M1330??
I have no idea. I only know that it works on the Latitude D530 – it may work on other models also
Thanks a lot for your help. The INTEL GM965 EXPRESS CHIPSET Video Drivers for W7 32bits solved the brightness issue. Great work!
Works like a charm! I love you guys. This has been such a pain in the ass lately.
Glad it worked!
Great job man. this working. thanks a lot
Thanks very much man!!
Our IT installed win7 E without checking this
Will forward your solution.
can it work on hp g62-b80ev, windows 7 64-bit?
I have no idea, sorry. You could try it.
Can’t seem to find a solution for my laptop. HP dv7 4020sd Pavilion. Install chipset drivers, installed videodrivers, installed special keys keyboard driver, enabled the Fn keys in BIOS. Nothing works so far.
Anyone has an idea?
Hi Steve, unfortunately the chances of this working are getting less. Older hardware will not always work with Windows 7 and the manufacturers of older hardware don’t bother to update the drivers.
I have to install it then I’ll give my opinion.
This worked great for me – i had already downloaded the latest Intel chipset drivers, and the ones mentioned in the first solution were essentially a downgrade to an earlier set of drivers, but worked!!
After upgrading my D530 to Windows 7, i’ve spent hours trying to figure this problem out… so thank you, thank you very much indeed for your help!!
I know, crazy isn’t it? It’s essentially a downgrade, and yet it works…
Incidentally – I’ve subsequently discovered that if you upgrade to Windows 8. the brightness control for the D530 will work with the drivers included in Windows 8 – no need for the Intel drivers.
media accelerator.
I suffered a lot due to unchangeable full brightness on my VAIO SVE15113..
Tried too many derivers but maximum were incompatible nd other were not up to the mark.. Finally tried Cnet’s Monitor bright application… nd it worked!!
I HAVE LENOVO G580 LAPTOP IN BRIGHTNESS IS NOT WORKIN SO PLZ SUGGEST ME