Surface Pen makes screen flash black

Anonymous
2019-08-08T17:39:38+00:00

I recently purchased a Surface Go to use for in-class note taking, along with a surface pen. I have been using it for approximately 2 weeks and have noticed an issue when using the pen. Randomly, about once a day when taking notes in OneNote, when I press the pen to the screen, the screen will flash black. Oddly, this only occurs when using solid colors for the the pen and pencil. The highlighter and rainbow colors do not do this. I can fix it by restarting it, but it is an inconvenience. Any ideas what is causing it and how I can prevent it from happening in the future?

Surface | Accessories | Surface Pen

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  1. Anonymous
    2019-12-09T05:34:58+00:00

    Zacharee's workaround of killing Desktop Window Manager (which is under Windows Processes in the Task Manager from Cntrl-Alt-Delete) worked for me. There was no flickering in OneNote while using a pencil after Desktop Window Manager automatically restarted.

    I also hope that Microsoft fixes the issue soon. Having to terminate Desktop Window Manager to get the flickering to stop is pretty annoying!

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  2. Anonymous
    2020-04-26T02:17:12+00:00

    Definitely a Software issue!!! I had this issue post update. My surface pen worked fine and all of a sudden it lagged and then everytime the tip touched it, it would flicker at the touch and then writing would lag(only in One Note). I went into DEVICE MANAGER from the WINDOWS icon and then went to DISPLAY ADAPTERS and deleted the adapter and it worked fine with One Note! I didnt event have to reboot! I just use the POS for notes so its a quick fix for those in need.

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  3. Anonymous
    2019-12-18T19:29:11+00:00

    I reached out to Msft Support.     They worked with me to replace the driver that was causing the issue.      Unfortunately, after the flickering stopped, discovered a large "dead zone" on the screen where "touch" did not work.   Diagnosis-ed as a hardware issue and waiting for warranty claim "replacement device".

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  4. Anonymous
    2019-12-05T21:48:33+00:00

    Same issue with flickering screen. However, only happens in "Popup" Writing Window. No problem on OneNote. If I have an Epileptic episode from the Flickering there will be a law suite

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  5. Anonymous
    2019-10-09T20:19:17+00:00

    Ive been having the same issue with my Surface Lap2 and surface pen ...

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