Intel HD 520 graphics flickering screen

Question

I recently made the switch from Windows 10 too Ubuntu Mate (v18.04) and really like it. However, I just can't get rid of a screen flickering problem. It happens about 50% of the time and affects the left hand side of the screen. The problem didn't exist on Windows. I also tried Ubuntu Desktop (v18.04), and had the exact same screen flickering problem there too.

I've searched google extensively and found lots of people experiencing the same problem. However, no one ever seems to provide a definitive answer to this problem. A common solution proposed is to create a file called 20-intel.conf at  /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/

I have tried this with a few different contents such as:

Section "Device" Identifier "Intel Graphics" Driver "intel" Option "AccelMethod" "sna" Option "TearFree" "true" Option "DRI" "3" EndSection

However, none of the proposed solutions work for me and hasn't worked for many others. Here is a list of examples where this same issue seems to be happening:

"Solution" to Intel Graphics Screen Tearing/Flickering Causes Excessive Fan Use in Ubuntu 16.10/17.04/17.10

https://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2415246

Ubuntu 16.04 Skylake 6th Generation Screen Flickering

Screen flickering Ubuntu 16.04 Intel graphics 620

Flickering screen with Intel graphics on Ubuntu 17.04

I love Ubuntu and would love to resolve this issue so if anyone can help me fix it, I'd be very grateful :)

Answer 1

You should name your file.conf: 20-intel_flicker_fix.conf

And place the following inside:

Section "Device"
  Identifier "Intel Graphics"
  Driver "intel"
  Option "TripleBuffer" "true"
  Option "TearFree" "true"
EndSection

Answer 2

from digging deeper and taking my laptop apart, I'm starting to think this issue is hardware related. Especially since I am now getting the same problem in Windows 10 as well. Possibly bad workmanship from Acer or intel.