Black screen

[RangerJ]

Past few days when my computer sits idle the screen goes black,always before a wiggle of the mouse brought things back, now I have to turn off and back on ,What causes this and how do I fix it?

 

[superdave1984]

You have to turn the monitor off and on or the computer? Could be it's hibernating and not waking back up.

 

[RangerJ]

Both stay on all the time, When I turn computer off to restart the monitor turns off with it.Got a fix? Thanks

 

[Jaymz9350]

Sounds like it hibernating and not waking up (maybe just turning off the monitor but i've never seen that lock up a PC) Either one will make the monitor go black and need a mouse movement or keyboard input to wake it back up. Do you know how to change the standby options? If not what OS are you running as XP and vista have a little bit different ways of getting there.

 

[RangerJ]

Sounds like it hibernating and not waking up (maybe just turning off the monitor but i've never seen that lock up a PC) Either one will make the monitor go black and need a mouse movement or keyboard input to wake it back up. Do you know how to change the standby options? If not what OS are you running as XP and vista have a little bit different ways of getting there.

Have XP and no I don't know how to change standby options. This problem has just started and has been doing fine previously.Any advice appreciated

 

[Jaymz9350]

Go to the Screen saver options. Right click on the desktop and select properties from the menu that comes up, select the screen saver tab and near the bottom (above the OK and Apply buttons) will be a button that says power or advanced (sorry can't remember exactly I'm on vista now) there should be options for when to hibernate/sleep the computer and when to turn off the monitor. I would set the hibernate sleep to never and see if the problem goes away (hibernate has always been hit and miss for me, I've only owned one pc where it always works and that's my current one)

 

[RangerJ]

Go to the Screen saver options. Right click on the desktop and select properties from the menu that comes up, select the screen saver tab and near the bottom (above the OK and Apply buttons) will be a button that says power or advanced (sorry can't remember exactly I'm on vista now) there should be options for when to hibernate/sleep the computer and when to turn off the monitor. I would set the hibernate sleep to never and see if the problem goes away (hibernate has always been hit and miss for me, I've only owned one pc where it always works and that's my current one)

Thanks for your reply. I tried what you said it's already set like you suggested. Thanks

 

[Jaymz9350]

The next step would be to look in the same place and see what the time to turn off the monitor is. If it's not already set it to never as well and see if it still does it. If they are both set to never then it's something I can't help with (This is why I reformat every 6-12 months because little things like this pop up after a while and I have found it to be easier and quicker to reinstall than to diagnose and repair)

 

[RangerJ]

Thanks, I set the monitor to never turn off, we will see if this helps.

 

[Mark_88]

I was going to suggest the monitor controls as opposed to Windows controls...you may have a setting within the monitor menu for sleep mode that you can shut off...or adjust...IIRC my LCD widescreen (that I don't have anymore) had adjustments for this...but older CRTs don't usually...

 

[RangerJ]

Well a trip to wallyworld and a new HP monitor and my issues are resolved.Thanks for the replies.