Comments | eliade: a technical question for the hivemind

eliade

a technical question for the hivemind

Mar 06, 2006 09:41

At home, either my monitor or my video card is crapping out. The symptoms and conditions are:

Usually when I start up, it works fine at first. If I stay on and the computer's in constant use, it continues to work.

If I leave it long enough that the screen saver kicks in, I can't get the picture back. (I've got screen saver set to kick in after 90 ( Read more... )

Comments 7

astolat March 6 2006, 17:50:29 UTC

It could be the monitor or video card or a software/os issue. Have you tried upgrading the drivers for your video card to the latest version? Start with that, as the simplest possible solution.

eliade March 6 2006, 17:55:20 UTC

Awesome--thank you! I will try that. :)

peasant_ March 6 2006, 18:43:10 UTC

If it's the monitor, they sometimes respond to being hit.

tabaqui March 6 2006, 18:47:49 UTC

Until you actually figure out the problem? Turn off your screen saver. You don't actually *need* one - the pixel burn-in thing has long been solved, and that's what they were for. If you use it to hide stuff...uh...i guess minimize is your friend, but i'd just turn it off until you work out the underlying problem.

Good luck! Sorry i have no *real* help.

coconutboi March 6 2006, 23:01:42 UTC

That depends on how old her monitor is though. Mine is about a year and a half old, and it had pixel burn after about a month. They fixed it or gave me a new one and it's been fine since then.

But yeah, dont know where I was going with this. Best of luck in the fixing dear.

lumenara March 6 2006, 21:09:11 UTC

Are you using an LCD or a CRT monitor? I had a CRT crap out on me last year, and the image flickering is a good sign that the monitor is on the way to doing so. There should be some diagnostics on your system that you can run (for both the video card and the monitor), although the best test is to just plug in another monitor, if you can.

If you can give me any more specifics, I can run it by my techie friends.

tovalentin March 7 2006, 06:35:47 UTC

Is it running hot? Do you vacuum it regularly? Is the fan working okay? Because heat'll kill your 'puter faster than anything, and the fact that it starts up okay after a few hours--maybe after it's had a chance to cool down?--might be an indicator.