I've upgraded the BIOS to version 2.27 rev 2 from 2011 and upgraded the kernel.
The problem still occurs with 4.2.0-27-generic #32-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jan 22 04:49:08 UTC 2016 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux.
I also tested 3.19.0-43 again and wasn't able to reproduce the problem with "sleep 1; xset s activate". So it's likely that 3.19.0-43 doesn't have the problem.
I've upgraded the BIOS to version 2.27 rev 2 from 2011 and upgraded the kernel.
The problem still occurs with 4.2.0-27-generic #32-Ubuntu SMP Fri Jan 22 04:49:08 UTC 2016 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux.
I also tested 3.19.0-43 again and wasn't able to reproduce the problem with "sleep 1; xset s activate". So it's likely that 3.19.0-43 doesn't have the problem.