Monitor Acting Strangely

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While I am on the computer, my monitor will do this thing where it looks like the picture nearly died. Hard to explain, really. I checked the power cords, to make sure that every thing is tight. But it keeps happening. A sort of flicker. Can some kind computer whiz tell me what could be wrong? Do I need to buy another monitor? BTW, it's a Dell flat screen LCD monitor. I've had it since 2009.

From the symptoms, past experience, and without being able to examine the monitor in person, my first assumption is that the monitor LCD drive circuitry itself may be intermittent. My second assumption is a power supply or power supply cable.

Either replace the power supply, replace the monitor, or have the entire monitor/power supply system replaced.

Clarify please?

That was my first assumption, which of course proved wrong.

Your replacement of the power supply confirms my first assumption, although I would not rule out the video cable or the connectors themselves. Take a look at each connector and look for bent or missing pins. Straighten them carefully with a sharp tool - I use a dental 'scaler' (what the dentist scrapes the plaque off your teeth with). If you can replace the cable (DVI-I or VGA?) with a known good cable and the problem goes away, then the old cable needs to be replaced. If not, then it is the display itself, and you will need a new one.

Each LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) monitor has within it several chips responsible for translating the video from the computer into multiplexed scanning signals for the LCD. There is usually at least one 'master' chip with several 'slave' chips between it and the LCD. Replacing any of these chips requires a steady hand on par with a surgeon's.

Well I guess I may have to buy another monitor, since I am not about to try complicated repairs like this on my own. And of course my warranty has expired.

Could we have a picture?
It might be a graphics card problem (Doubt it, but its possibile)

A picture of what? I'm not sure what you mean?

Image of the problem when it occurs.

Well, that would be impossible to take a picture of. For starters, it lasts about a second, and all that happens is that the screen very rapidly flickers.

Wiggle the cords on the back of the monitor. Its usually the non power related cord. Newer monitors have detachable monitor cords but older ones don't - if I wiggle these I notice a lot of times they shut off and on. Also the actual POWER BUTTON ... on the monitor itself is sometimes messing up. Try tapping it softly a few times (not pressing)... then pressing it off and on.

My moms would pop out as if it where on a timer after a hour or 2.

My first impression was the computer was going into power save and turning off the monitor/you moving the mouse was turning it back on. (I don't know your level of computer experience - if this sounds insulting...) .. lol.

It's not the power cords; I checked on those and tightened them as much as I could. I even plugged the monitor into another outlet, in case it was that. The flickering still happens intermittently. The interesting thing, though is that when I watched a movie, it didn't happen once! It only seems to happen when I am playing games or surfing the web.

Any computer experts know why that is? Also, I haven't tried to see if it's the video card. I am waiting until my SO has some free time. He is more used to handling the hardware in a computer.

Are you sure its not the screen auto shutting off due to the computers settings?

What OS are you using. Media players usually keep the screen enabled and shuts off screensavers.

Last edited by Nim on 13 May 2011, 11:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

That was actually my own first guess, and I would definitely do some checking there before replacing a monitor. Yesterday, my own machine was doing some odd flickering from time to time, and I know (logically suspect) that was caused by something going on (or something that had happened) while I was doing some picture editing while a desktop-background "slide show" feature (Windows 7) was simultaneously running in the background and doing its thing every few minutes. So, I would guess there is something like that going on if all cables and connections seem to be fine.

The screen is not shutting off, just flickering as if it were about to. I am using Windows 7.

If you know how to do this (and it is really not all that difficult) ...

1) Go into your "Control Panel" and click (open) "Device Manager";
2) Click the little arrow if front of "Display adapters" (like when expanding a folder);
3) Right-Click whatever adapter/s you see there and click "Uninstall";
4) Without checking the box for "Delete the driver software ..." (if that checkbox *is* there), next *do* click on "OK";
5) Wait a few seconds for things to happen, and then "Apply" or "Close" or whatever else might come up, and then restart your machine.

When the system comes back up, it will/should reinstall your display drivers and hopefully fix your flicker problem, but it *will* install *something* so you can have a display.

Note: I can give you some screen shots if necessary to help with doing that.

Note: Even beforehand, and depending upon what brand of display card you have, it could be a good idea to go to the manufacturer's site and download the latest driver/software package for your system (display card and Win7).

However, and again: Win7 *will* re-install *something* when your machine comes back up ... and then you can update your driver/software package from there, if necessary.

Thanks! I will try this and let you know if it works.