A Dell PC issue

[pipsky2008]

My dell desktop PC, Windows 7 screen has begun to come and go. When it decides to go, it could be whist watching a You Tube video or checking my email or my online bank account for example, it could literally be any usage.

When it 'goes', the screen will black out and the power 'on' button will turn from green to orange. If there is a sound track to a film, this will continue as normal.

The screen may return to the 'on', green light within seconds or may take thirty minutes or more to return to normal viewing. Often though, the screen will have minimalized and will require maximising when it does return

Curiously, this tends to happen at certain times of day and so there tends to be a pattern

I would be glad of users thoughts, could this be a screen hard wear issue or a graphics chip issue?

Many thanks

[se22cat]

Was there an update to your graphics driver? Have you looked under Power management if the screen is set to power down after a certain time? A lot of OEM's also have a bad habit of putting extra power saving options in the graphics driver properties that are not visible in control panel, so have a look there too..

[right-clicking]

Hello Troubleshoot with this!! Good luck. Right-clicking

http://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/SLN289659/EN

[DulwichFox]

To me it sounds like a problem with Overheating.. Very common with Dell Machines.

Possibly / Probably due to dust in the cooling fan compartment.

On some machines a grill can be removed to access the fan were it should be easy to remove

the fan assembly to assist cleaning.

Under no circumstances use a vacuum cleaner to try and suck out the dust

They are too powerful and could damage the fan irreparably..

There are compressed air canisters availably that can be used to blow the air away.

Not necessarily the best option. Great care needs to be taken to immobilise the fan blades.

This can best be achieved by inserting a cocktail stick through the grill.

Please feel free to PM me if you require further assistance.

DulwichFox

[KalamityKel]

Are you meaning the screen or the computer itself? Sounds to me more of a screen issue than anything to do with bits inside your machine.

Have you checked that the power cable is secure and not wobbly? Do you hear a buzz sound when you have a fiddle? If the connection is fine you could try seeing if the cable is at fault by swapping, if you have another, the lead.

[pipsky2008]

Thank you all for your advice and kind offers of help.

se22cat I'll work through your suggestion, thank you.

right-clicking Thank you very much, I'll certainly look at this.

DulwichFox

Thank you for your good advice and kind offer of further assistance. Yes, I have seen a You Tube tutorial on (my previous machine which was an Asus laptop), The person giving the tutorial claimed they cleaned the cooling system and cured the 'horizontal green bands' issue, which dealers can charge a lot of money to remedy . I will take your advice and have a look inside. Many thanks

KalamityKel

Well, I have yet to determine whether this is a screen issue or a screen manifestation of the an issue in the body of the computer. I have checked the cables and leads,they are all firmly fixed. I tend to agree with you, I feel this is a screen issue but the cause may be internal. I bought this system because I can get a new screen for not very much on ebay, screen function providing . Many thanks.

Seasons greetings

[se22cat]

I always suggest people build their own deck whenever possible, helps keep out OS bloat too.

I kind of think it is an OS issue; if it was the screen, your power switch LED wouldn't turn off, almost all the crap Hell produce have either onboard graphics, or a passively cooled graphics card. Agree with Foxy that it's always good form to keep your air cooling clean for efficiency and it's nice to replace CPU grease every year or so, but that's not made easy with the cheap and nasty solution that'd be in your system, and as you mentioned the sound still plays, am far from convinced it's a CPU overheating issue - though again, Foxy's advice is something I wish more people would pay attention to , along with a decent HD cooling setup...Your HD may well be a Seagate drive too, so keep it backed up as they have had some pretty horrendous product lines over the last 3 years or so.

[pipsky2008]

Hi all

Just to let all contributors know, the cause of the problem was a cable. It was taken out and reinserted, reversed.

Extraordinary..

Everything has worked perfectly since then.

[Loz]

Damn, I was just going suggest that. It had probably just worked loose. Monitors switch to standby if they don't detect a signal, and usually this is just detected on one of the pins (e.g. pin 19 on HDMI) so even though other pins were still connected and carrying the signal the monitor would think the computer had switched off.

See, IT helpdesking is more than turning it off and back on again. Sometimes you have to unplug it and plug it back in as well!

[pipsky2008]

Hello all

Not a Dell PC issue as such but are any of you experiencing a repeated request from google to agree to data protection terms?

I have clicked on agree previously but am receiving these requests every couple of days now and cannot proceed with google searches unless I click on agree . I am beginning to feel:

a)If I click on agree, I am allowing a virus in

or

b) much like a), in that I don't want to adjust my preferences and so by agreeing to maintain my preferences as they are, I may be allowing a virus in

Are any of you receiving these requests / demands ?

[DulwichFox]

I got this as well.. Not a Virus but Google privacy policy slammed by EU data protection chiefs

http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/oct/16/google-privacy-policies-eu-data-protection

Have a read. I must say I do not fully understand it..

DulwichFox

[pipsky2008]

DulwichFox Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I got this as well.. Not a Virus but Google

> privacy policy slammed by EU data protection

> chiefs

>

> http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/oct/16

> /google-privacy-policies-eu-data-protection

>

> Have a read. I must say I do not fully understand

> it..

>

> DulwichFox

Thank you Fox, I'll have a read