Re: occasional screen blanking

Jeff wrote:
> Running XP Home SP-2 on a Dell Inspiron 8100 laptop with a NVIDIA
> screen.
> Occasionally, the screen will blank out for a split second and
> return. Usually happens when doing something (close a message,
> delete, whatever) I ordered it to do with the synaptics touchpad. It is
> very brief and only happens once in a while. The video
> driver is up-to-date. There is nothing related in the Event Viewer.
>
> What could be causing this? Is there a way to find out?

Shenan Stanley wrote:
> If the laptop is under warranty - call and explain to them what is
> happening - otherwise - you may be seeing the preliminary to a video
> card or screen burn-out. Did you get CompleteCare? Hopefully you
> did - get them to replace the board and screen. If you got Gold
> Tech Support - the call should even be quick.

Jeff wrote:
> Thought so. It's an old laptop my college daughter left when I
> bought her a new one. No warranty anymore. Will trash it when it
> finally goes.
> Could it be just a loose video card that I could tighten back into its
> socket?

Well, not really. The video card is integrated (as is most everything else)
into the motherboard.

There is a way to test and see if it might be the screen or the video card,
however.. Hook it into an external monitor.. It should have a VGA Out port
as well as the fn+F8 key combination to choose what mode it is in.. Then
repeat the process to get the monitor to "blink", but while displaying on
the external display.

--
Shenan Stanley
MS-MVP
--
How To Ask Questions The Smart Way
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html


.

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