Troubleshooting multiple monitors on a Surface Dock 2 (Surface Pro 7)

Arrrggghhh.  This thing sucks.  It worked, then it doesn't, then it does, now it doesn't, no, wait, it does ... 

I had two monitors working relatively well for almost a year.  By 'relatively' that means about 4-5 times a week I would have to unplug and replug monitors in, power down and power back up in order to have both monitors work.  Then MS had an 'update' and no matter what I tried I could only get one monitor to work.  I tried everything that has been discussed here (within reason).  My last attempt was active cables and nothing happened.  

Then I stumbled across the "magic bullet" of Win+Ctrl+Shift+Band VOILA!  It works again.

Hey Microsoft - you suck.

Fully agree!!!

Exactly the same thing started happening TODAY with me. With the difference that:

1. I have not changed any hardware configuration since yesterday
2. I have been using 2 monitors (Dell + Philips) on a Surface Dock 1 with a Surface Pro 4 over a year now

When the monitors are plugged into the Dock, Windows recognizes them, and they show up as active in Display Settings...BUT, only one actually displays something.

Have tried updating fir firmware (can't figure out how to do that), hard restarting (and thus cleaning the cache), plugging/unplugging etc.

Getting nowhere. Frustrating!!

Hi, everyone,

I just want to update everyone on this situation. My issue (see above in this thread) has been resolved completely and I no longer even need the "workaround" that I was using before (which was to use DisplayPort daisy-chaining). 

1. MS replaced my Surface Dock 2. That may have helped (I say that without certainty because the sequence of troubleshooting I took obscures exactly what issue it may have fixed, if any). Thanks, MS!

2. I rerouted my cheap USB-C to DisplayPort cables through the cable hollows of my dual VESA arms, thus isolating the video cables from power cable and everything else.

This 100% fixed all of my issues. I have no sleep/wake issues, no second-display-failing issues, no nothing. Zero issues. Not so much as a single flicker in one display. The displays work exactly as you'd expect them to. This has been the case for more than a week now.

So I think this may explain why using certain adapters or more expensive cables might help: perhaps that results in better shielding of the display signal throughout the path from the dock to the display.

It may also explain why daisy-chaining helped me too. It may have been just a coincidence: The signal path when daisy chaining just happened to run into less interference from, say, monitor power cables.

I still suspect that Windows is at least partly to blame here, as it could have handled the information it got from the displays at different times differently and thus provided for a seamless experience. But that's just speculation on my (non-engineer!) part. Also, I don't know how recent Windows updates may have addressed this (though I saw nothing in the update documentation that would suggest that). 

Hope this helps someone!

Andrew

Hi,

Sorry this is happening to you as well. This is the display adapter I bought. Surface Pro 7. On Friday I helped two staff having similar issues (one staff member had suddenly lost both monitors form a Dock1. I swapped him to a Dock2 and 2 x MS Display Adapters like the one below.
Still no luck. Turns out is was the HDMI-Display Adapter cables he was connecting to the monitors. When we swapped them out to pure HDMI cables with the adapters, everything worked fine.

I also had three cases last week of the docks2 with the MS Display Adapters and HDMI cables connecting to Clevertouch 86" interactive panels in classrooms.
All Surface Pro 7s.
Touch wasn't working properly (allowing only one point of touch) and resolutions were way off when connecting or mirroring the screen.

Exasperated as only a few weeks ago I had pushed out the latest Surface Pro 7 firmware update.
I downloaded the update again - and realised that MS have released a new one since I last updated.
This fixed all three issues. It was a firmware issue on the Surface pro 7. As soon as I restarted, it connected perfectly with 20 points of touch.

Perhaps look for firmware updates for your device if the MS Adapters don't work.
Failing that, MS need to be accountable for the device not wokring, especially given the 4 adapters you purchased.