Damien Symonds

Yep!

I'll answer this part. No. You only ever need your resolution to be such that the pixels are small enough to reproduce the smallest detail of your wife's brush work. And on canvas, this is not very small at all.

For calibration purposes, it's the same as a laptop. Follow my laptop instructions. https://www.damiensymonds.net/calibration.html

Yeah

Well, it'll never be amazing, but some sharpening will make it passable. I think it's a keeper, just.

Is there any part of the photo with better focus than the eyes? Fur or bushes?

I don't know, I'm so sorry. I've moved this thread into Brian's area so we can see if he has any ideas.

Ok, phew. So there must be an obscure power setting on your laptop that's clashing with Bridge somehow.

Gosh, that's weird. You might need to do this.

The BenQ software is a dud, ignore it. Surely SpyderTune will take care of that?

Gosh, how weird. I'd be curious to know, if you plugged in an external screen, whether it also dimmed.

Well, the usual thing. Start by going to Preferences>Performance, and turning off "Use Graphics Processor".

You bought a new calibrator?

It's very very rare to have to adjust contrast, you're right.

I hate to raise this, but we can't ignore the possibility that the Spyder just doesn't work any more. It's a bit old now.