Why is LCD monitor or video card randomly blacking out? 3

[torandson]

Hi,
Every once in a while my video screen goes completely black for a few seconds before returning to normal.

Typically, I am running SONAR 4PE (digital audio production software) when this happens. (Since the computer is a dedicated DAW, this is almost exclusively what I run on this system.)

What might be causing this?

I have an ATI Radeon 9600 video card and a ViewSonic VA721 flat panel display.

Is this most likely an intermittent (or potentially immanent) hardware failure, a known XP hiccup, a known hardware hiccup, or some kind of software glitch?

Does anyone have any information or educated guess about this?

--torandson

 

[edfair]

The light source in the monitor may be failing. And if so, it will probably get worse.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[StumblingForward]

First, do you know if the video card has been overclocked at all? I had a similar problem with the video freezing at random times for no apparent reason and it turned out someone had overclocked the card and that was causing the problems.
Second, do you have the latest drivers for your video card?

 

[torandson]

edfair,
Light source? I was of the impression that a TFT flat panel display created an image from a matrix of LEDs (transistors) (or some such semiconductor) in rows and columns. Thus, when I once read some user feedback about this unit I was encouraged by those who said their units had not a single "dead" pixel. This led (leads) me to believe that the light is generated on a pixel-by-pixel basis; thus, your comment is confusing to me.

Granted, a matrix of LED's would have a common supply and ground, and the failure of a single component in one of these could explain a sudden screenful of "dead" pixels, but your comment is worded in such a way that suggests a common light source of some sort, which is not according to my understanding--thus my confusion about your comment.

Could you please explain what you mean in more detail?

--torandson

StumblingForward,
I updated the driver last May and the unit is not being overclocked. I fail to see, however, the connection between video "freezing" (I assume that you mean the screen image ceases to be updated, but that an image remains visible) and the screen going completely black (unless my screen is "freezing" during a blanked-out vertical retrace or something). Would you mind if I asked you to either confirm or deny my take on your comments? And if you do mean that your screen image was visible but became unchanging, then I have to wonder how that relates to the problem I described. Since I am trying to determine if I should return this unit for exchange, it is important for me to have a good grasp of what exactly is happening from a technical perspective.

In other words, if there is a problem that I can remedy with some system setting, or a problem that is merely an occasional nuisance caused by some timing glitch, then replacing the monitor or video card is unwarranted and will likely not solve the problem. On the other hand, if I am dealing with a hardware problem, then I need to know which unit is failing, the video card, or the monitor.

--torandson

P.S. Assuming that I am dealing with an impending hardware failure, can anyone tell me if there is a way to neatly shut down my system if the monitor fails and I can no longer see the screen?

 

[wahnula]

Do you have another monitor to try with your DAW? Or another DAW to try your monitor with? Both would be best. This is a good troubleshooting first step, swap hardware out & see if the problem follows the hardware, narrows it down to PC or monitor.

 

[edfair]

Without paying real close attention to the model I thought back to another viewsonic with a flickering tube. It was LCD with passthru light.

Ed Fair
Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions.

 

[3dmap1]

I have a 17" LCD monitor at office that was doing the same thing. It was less than 6 months old. It would just go black and then come back on after a second or two. It would sometimes not come right back on so I could turn it off and then back on and it would be okay. It got progressively worse after a few weeks. It finally just put colored lines on screen, it was my display but stretched so I couldn't tell anything except that it was the screen I was looking at before it went out. We had another monitor that did the same thing and was same model as the 1st one but 3 months newer. Both were replaced under warranty and the new ones (knock on wood) are working good. Microtek 17" 710S.

 

[torandson]

3dmap1,
Thank you for confirming my suspicions about this monitor. Because the problem at present happens only rarely, swapping the monitors as a troubleshooting technique (which would ordinarily be a useful thing to do) as suggested by wahnula is not necessarily going be definitively informative any time soon.

The original box comes out of storage, and the unit (less than 90 days old) goes back for exchange, period.

Thanks.

--torandson