Anti blue light screens for laptops etc. - Thyroid UK

Thyroid UK

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Anti blue light screens for laptops etc.

linzee3 profile image
11 Replies

Hello all. I am trying to work out buying one of these screens for my laptop, ie recent diagnosis of cateracts and malacular degeneration. Hoping you all can give me advice. The adverts show a huge differance in pricing and I am cynical enough to wonder if the Uk suppliers who are selling at 25-30 £'s, have a better product than those coming from Malaysia and China, Hong Kong, who are selling at less than a fiver. ( I wonder if UK sellers get them from the same countries and then re-sell) Of the listings I have seen, the most detailed info is in the adverts from China. But then that leads me to wonder how we can actually tell if the product does what it says on the tin! So hope those of you who have bought can tell me your experience with these screens. Also want to know if the film, once applied onto your existing screens, blurs the images somewhat? Do they cut down on glare and has anyone noticed a marked improvement on eyestrain? Are the colours on your screen affected? Thank you all very much for your info and help.

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linzee3
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11 Replies
humanbean profile image
humanbean

I haven't bought any kind of physical things to reduce blue light. Instead I've installed a free program called f.lux :

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.lux

justgetflux.com/

Do you need to reduce the blue light in your gadgets all day? I'm not sure if that is possible with f.lux but it would be worth investigating.

F.lux is intended to reduce blue light from gadgets as darkness approaches, during the night, and then will gradually return the gadget to daytime lighting. It is one of the things I installed in an attempt to reduce my insomnia. I think it has a small effect for me.

Clutter profile image
Clutter in reply tohumanbean

HB,

f.lux has a 'reduce eyestrain' option.

humanbean profile image
humanbean in reply toClutter

Thanks, I didn't know that. :)

Saggyuk profile image
Saggyuk

Yes those screens definitely reduce glare. I did have photophobia and the glare was killing my eyes to the point I could no longer look at the screen and had to go sit in a dark room so had to use them at work. They definitely mute the colour maybe but couldn't look without them anyway.

If you wear glasses, you can get lenses coated in something that helps too.

Personally, I'd want to buy it from somewhere reputable and close by so that I could return if it didn't work :-)

Saggyuk profile image
Saggyuk in reply toSaggyuk

Oh didn't blur the images.

I will sometimes buy direct from china - but nothing that is to do with my health or electronics lol

Saggyuk profile image
Saggyuk

Oh yes, strip lighting and flourescent tubes also made it worse - used to sit in the dark at work. They flash at a different speed to other light (same as screen) or something to do with the frequency (or something like that) so having multiple light sources plus sunlight doing different things always made eye strain worse too. I'm not read up on the science of it but have a google, there's loads of stuff as to which lighting will help eye strain.

spongecat profile image
spongecat

I use the f.lux gadget on my desktop for at least a couple of years now and it's brilliant. Funnily enough I have just browsed a website where I needed to do a nearish colour match with something and just remembered to go back to "daytime levels" temporarily (a little box you can tick to go bright for 1 hour on the dashboard) and it was whoa that's bright! :D

Recommended for the peepers, definitely.

Fruitandnutcase profile image
Fruitandnutcase

Have you got dry eyes ? In which case preservative free eye drops such as Systane or HycoSan or my present favourite Theolose Duo Gel will help you see better. I know my eyes dry out when I use my computer and I see much better when my eyes aren’t dried out.

Follow the 20, 20,20 rule for eyes - take a break from the screen every 20 minutes, look in the distance for 20 minutes and blink 20 times -

anthro.com/blog/2013/10/how...

and using your computer in as bright a light as you can might be more useful than putting a layer of something over your screen.

G2G2 profile image
G2G2

I use orange plastic glasses to block blue light. They fit over my glasses. I bought on Amazon. Cheap & effective.

G2G2 profile image
G2G2

I also wear them to block blue light from the TV.

linzee3 profile image
linzee3

Hello again, and thank you all for your replies. I haven't been able to get back online, hence the delay in my reply, but I have taken all of the info found online, plus your personal experiences of aids, and in the end i bought a pair of glasses with no prescription for eyesight, but with anti glare coating and also bluelight and UV protection. .I do just want to say though, and I may have misunderstood some of the posts, that I am concerned that some people may use the anti glare sites and screening devices, without them having the protection against bluelight emissions, as then the fact of enabling longer viewing time would be increasing the amount of exposure to the bluelight factor, which was my main concern personally. So I would suggest that anyone with concerns of permanently harming thier vision, should perhaps make sure that bluelight protection is part of the package they use for antiglare. what I have done is buy some bluelight protection glasses from Comsafe ( or some similar name!) and they are definately helping with glare enormously. But I will also buy non prescription glasses from my optician with built in bluelight protection in the very near future, as I feel that that way I can be totally sure I have done all I can to protect vision. Thanks again for all response- was a great help in deciding what to do, as I found there was not a great deal of very clear info online about bluelight. Your personal experiences made it a much clearer decision for me to make.

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