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FAQ & Answers
Tinkerer
Tinkerer
Tinkerer
I am still running this same installation of Windows since the April 2018 update came out. In the beginning, I had issues as you can read in my previous posts, but what finally seemed to do the trick after a long time of trying things was to change the Power setting in Intel Graphics Settings to Balanced, both for battery and for plugged-in. I should mention that before doing that, I had updated to the latest version of Intel HD 620 Graphics driver provided by Acer on the laptop's website. So, things were finally working correctly and the laptop wasn't crashing, no matter if I had put it to sleep earlier or if I was playing games with it etc. In addition, the laptop received a couple of bios updates from Acer during the summer, which I am not sure what they fixed (one fixed the spectre vulnerability, I checked it after the restart with a tool and it said that this pc is fully protected from spectre and meltdown, so that's a plus!), but I guess they also fixed issues that revolved around the laptop crashing! I was on bios V1.11 before this summer and the latest bios update that was released was V1.15. I don't remember when it was released, but my laptop has never crashed once with this update. The last thing I did is that I installed the latest graphics drivers from Intel's site, because they are newer than the one Acer provides for this laptop, and also because after a whole month of the laptop doing good with the Acer drivers, one day it crashed. It was somewhere in the middle of August. Since then I've installed Intel's newer versions (which can be found here: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/product/96551/Intel-HD-Graphics-620) and I haven't had a crash since mid-August. I'm now running the October 2018 update (yes I updated the day it came out, and I was very lucky to not encounter any problems with it), and thankfully it's been very stable. I hope things continue to be stable and normal for this laptop, which means that it was software problems all along and not faulty hardware! I mean, for it to not crash for so long, if it does happen again, it'll probably be something software related, because a hardware problem wouldn't take 2 months to appear again! I hope my response has been helpful to you! Feel free to ask any further questions if you want! I have email notifications on, so I'll respond sooner or later! Have a nice day 😊
Tinkerer
Tinkerer
Also about the bios version, make sure first what your current bios version is! Because I got the V1.15 version from Windows Update, I didn't have to download it from Acer's site, so you may already be on the latest version. In order to check that, search for System Information in the cortana search box and open the program called System Information. In the right panel, it'll say somewhere Baseboard Version and then it'll say in which bios version you are. It says V1.15 on mine so that's how I know that windows update installed this latest version. Hope this helps too! Ask me if you have any further questions 😊
Tinkerer
I did all you suggested but it didn't change anything, btw thank you for the information maybe it will be usefull for someone other. I do not know what to do, out of curiosity I am attaching the photo of my battery profile of the Intel panel, you have the same configurations?
P.S. I don't know why my last note was deleted.
Tinkerer
Something I should mention here, what tends to happen is after updating a driver, the laptop might crash one time and after that it gets stable. I remember that it used to happen after updating my graphics driver after a while. So if after you update it crashes once, see if it goes normally after that. And with everything in Balanced as I show below. I hope this helps!
P.S. A new bios update was released a few days ago too, it came to me from Windows Update, V1.16, but if it didn't come to you, you can download it from here: https://www.acer.com/ac/en/ID/content/support-product/7028;-; It's good to install these bios updates too because they hopefully bring some stability with them too!
Tinkerer
I updated the video driver, now I have settings like your screen and I don't know, I will update you soon if pc crashes or if nothing happens I will write you next week.
Just out of curiosity, you also show me the battery settings (normal, not from the Intel panel)? Or simply use the default mode with default settings?
I really thank you for the help you're giving me, maybe you understand what I feel every time that pc freezes.
Greetings
Tinkerer
Also, I've set this slider to this setting:
Which is the best one in my opinion, because the next one forces the CPU to be at 100% at all times, which is terrible for the battery and it could cause crashes, while the lower options limit the CPU, so they're ok if you plan to use the laptop on battery for longer time, but since I always have the charger near me I just leave it here, and the CPU can go from very low to max when needed.
One last thing that I also just remembered (things keep coming to me!) is that I use this program called Driver Booster, and it's basically the only good free program that I've found which searches the laptop for missing or old drivers and it recommends new versions of them, and it also installs them itself. For example, now that I just opened it in order to take a screenshot of it, it found a newer version of the audio driver and it's installing it:
The reason I recommend it is because it also installs important system drivers such as this Intel Watchdog Timer Driver and many others. You can download it from this website: https://www.iobit.com/en/driver-booster.php Just pay attention while you're installing it because it prompts you to install some other software from the same company too, but there are options to decline those offers and only install the main program which is what you'll need. I hope this helps too!
I know how bad it feels when this laptop is crashing, for a long time when I had no solution I just wanted to throw it away and buy a new one, but due to economic problems I couldn't and still can't, but thankfully after 2 years of its release, we've gotten all these driver updates that seem to be making good progress! I hope that after doing these, your laptop will stop crashing too
Tinkerer
things seemed to be resolved the first few days then it came back as before, maybe the situation has improved slightly but nothing more. Well, what about, I guess I will never solve my problem
Tinkerer
Another thing that changed is that Intel changed the way the provide drivers. I checked their website the other day and I noticed this: https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/28148/Intel-Graphics-Windows-10-DCH-Drivers After installing this new version of the graphics driver, it now changes to a modern driver that will be updated from the windows store from now on (at least that's what I've understood!). I guess that since it's a more modern driver and it supports the windows store (a.k.a. Microsoft store), it's better for windows 10 and more compatible with it. I installed this update too and it hasn't crashed since (the previous crash happened while on the previous version of the driver but it's the battery thing to blame I believe). So anyway, you can update your driver to this version too and just try to never do graphics intensive stuff while on battery power and see how it goes! I hope this helps!
Great advice. Also check for a Control Panel restore point around the time the issue returned just in case a Win10update might've gotten in there when you weren't looking and messed things up again. Jack E/NJ