I am working off of a laptop and have a second monitor to extend my displays. I have been using this set up for two years now and have not had a problem until last night. It seems that my attached monitor only (main monitor on laptop is not affected) will go black for a few seconds before turning back on and showing my screen. It should be noted that my laptop does not reset the display to place the windows back onto the main screen when this happens but the extended monitor goes black at random. Note that I am running Windows 10 and unable to upgrade to Windows 11 as of now. So far, I have tried the following solutions but still cannot figure this out. Bought brand new chords (HDMI + Adapter) Bought a brand new second monitor (issues happening with both old and new monitor) Checked for updates on all drivers Reinstalled both graphics drivers Rolled back graphics drivers Checked basic settings (sleep/power/screen saver settings) Disabled all services in background apps in "System Configuration" Restarted Windows explorer This means I have spent time replacing and even buying new equipment to get around this issue but cannot seem to figure it out! This is very important since I work at home as well. Please let me know if there is anything else I can possibly do outside of hard resetting the computer (which I cannot do for a few reasons). Thank you!

I am still in the midst of troubleshooting, but I realized the issue for me stops occurring when my monitors are directly plugged into my laptop (it has dual outputs HDMI + USB-C Display Port). It comes back when I plug the screens into my dual monitor KVM switch, which is strange because the switch is supposed to handle 4k @ 60HZ (what my monitors are capable of and what the graphics settings are set to). All of my cables are "high speed" hdmi so I do not believe it is the cables, and most likely the switch. I will likely be buying another switch with higher capabilities and will update here with the results.

I agree. For me it was swapping out the power strip with a new one. I also unplugged a few things that I didn't use that were plugged into the old strip, so they were not plugged into the new one, as well as plugging the new strip into a different wall jack. I think you are right about some other appliance in the room being plugged in and turned on. All I know is I have not had the issue since I switched the power strip out (Knocking on wood). I hope this fixes the issue for others too.

I also have a feeling that this is related to power issues. I'm still seeing it occur (although much less frequently) in Windows 11. The thing most likely to trigger it is powering another appliance in the room on or off.

Thanks for that. I have since upgraded to Windows 11. I had the odd recurrence just after upgrading, but nothing now for over a week, so I'm hoping that the problem might have gone away.

I've only experienced this very recently and it's been totally frustrating (I've used the same monitors for several years and they are identical). I appear to have solved the problem by going to the "power & sleep" settings and setting screen to "never" when plugged in. Same for screen saver.

Second monitor keeps on temporarily going black at random

Anonymous

I am working off of a laptop and have a second monitor to extend my displays. I have been using this set up for two years now and have not had a problem until last night. It seems that my attached monitor only (main monitor on laptop is not affected) will go black for a few seconds before turning back on and showing my screen. It should be noted that my laptop does not reset the display to place the windows back onto the main screen when this happens but the extended monitor goes black at random. Note that I am running Windows 10 and unable to upgrade to Windows 11 as of now.

So far, I have tried the following solutions but still cannot figure this out.

Bought brand new chords (HDMI + Adapter)
Bought a brand new second monitor (issues happening with both old and new monitor)
Checked for updates on all drivers
Reinstalled both graphics drivers
Rolled back graphics drivers
Checked basic settings (sleep/power/screen saver settings)
Disabled all services in background apps in "System Configuration"
Restarted Windows explorer

This means I have spent time replacing and even buying new equipment to get around this issue but cannot seem to figure it out! This is very important since I work at home as well. Please let me know if there is anything else I can possibly do outside of hard resetting the computer (which I cannot do for a few reasons). Thank you!

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157 answers

Anonymous

2024-02-14T22:06:07+00:00

I am still in the midst of troubleshooting, but I realized the issue for me stops occurring when my monitors are directly plugged into my laptop (it has dual outputs HDMI + USB-C Display Port). It comes back when I plug the screens into my dual monitor KVM switch, which is strange because the switch is supposed to handle 4k @ 60HZ (what my monitors are capable of and what the graphics settings are set to). All of my cables are "high speed" hdmi so I do not believe it is the cables, and most likely the switch. I will likely be buying another switch with higher capabilities and will update here with the results.
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Anonymous

2024-02-14T21:55:10+00:00

I agree. For me it was swapping out the power strip with a new one. I also unplugged a few things that I didn't use that were plugged into the old strip, so they were not plugged into the new one, as well as plugging the new strip into a different wall jack.

I think you are right about some other appliance in the room being plugged in and turned on. All I know is I have not had the issue since I switched the power strip out (Knocking on wood). I hope this fixes the issue for others too.
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Anonymous

2024-02-14T21:34:50+00:00

I also have a feeling that this is related to power issues. I'm still seeing it occur (although much less frequently) in Windows 11. The thing most likely to trigger it is powering another appliance in the room on or off.
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Anonymous

2024-02-05T15:08:02+00:00

Thanks for that. I have since upgraded to Windows 11. I had the odd recurrence just after upgrading, but nothing now for over a week, so I'm hoping that the problem might have gone away.
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Anonymous

2024-02-05T14:59:05+00:00

I've only experienced this very recently and it's been totally frustrating (I've used the same monitors for several years and they are identical). I appear to have solved the problem by going to the "power & sleep" settings and setting screen to "never" when plugged in. Same for screen saver.
Was this answer helpful?

0 comments No comments