Screen Dies While Playing Video Games - Aspire F5-573G

Hello,

I have recently started experiencing minor screen flickering while running video games on my laptop - a portion of the screen would begin flickering for a moment and then stop, which happened on random occasions .

The other day, after a more intense flickering session, the whole screen turned black and wouldn't turn back on (It did not disconnect, but rather ran a black backlight), while the laptop carried on running. The only way to get the screen to work again was to hard restart the laptop. It runs perfectly otherwise and this occurs only when running video games.

I have since:

- ran a factory reset for the laptop,
- made sure all graphic drivers are up to date,
- ran a system troubleshooter for the battery and graphic cards ,

none of which helped.

I own an Acer Aspire F5-573G.

Any help with finding the cause and/or solution is appreciated!

Accepted answers

ven98

It isn't a temperature issue. Did you install the drivers from Acer or Nvidia and Intel?

All comments

ven98

Can you post your system's specs?

If the issue happens during gaming only, I suspect it could be an issue with the dedicated graphics.

Vlalok

Here they come:

Model
     Aspire F5-573G
Operating System
    Windows 10 Home 64-bit
CPU
    Intel Core i5 @ 2.30GHz
RAM
    8.00GB Single-Channel Unknown @ 1063MHz
Motherboard
    Acer Captain_SK (U3E1)
Graphics
    Intel HD Graphics 520 (Acer Incorporated [ALI])
    4095MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 950M (Acer Incorporated [ALI])
Storage
    931GB Seagate ST1000LM024 HN-M101MBB (SATA )
    89GB KINGSTON RBU-SNS8151S396GG (SATA-2 (SSD))
Optical Drives
    Slimtype DVD A DA8A6SH
Audio
    Realtek High Definition Audio

ven98

I forgot to ask does the issue appear right after you start the game or it takes some time worth of gameplay before it appears?

Vlalok

It always takes 5-10 minutes of running time before it occurs. I have also found out that closing the program via Alt+F4 (blindly) and waiting a couple minutes sometimes makes the screen come back on and run normally.

ven98

Go to nvidia control panel>desktop and enable 'display GPU activity icon in notification area', then go to 3d settings and from preferred graphics processor select 'integrated graphics'. Run the game(you have to reduce the graphics, because you will be using the intel hd gpu) and make sure that the GTX 950M is shown as inactive. If the issue doesn't appear within the time by which it usually does, we can assume that the issue is with the GTX 950M. If it does appear again, then we are possibly looking at a driver issue, RAM issue or an issue with the integrated graphics.

Vlalok

I tried forcing the Integrated graphics preference and the issue occurred in about double the time (20 minutes), but it happened in exactly the same way.

ven98

Very interesting. Download HWiNFO and check the CPU temperature with both when 950M is active and inactive.

Also perform a battery reset:
https://us.answers.acer.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/34843/~/acer-internal-battery-reset

Vlalok

I performed the battery reset as suggested and ran the temperature meter. With the 950M on, it returned values around 60°C, sometimes spiking to 65°C. With the 950M off and running on the integrated graphics only, it returned values around 65°C, spiking to 70°C at times.

ven98

It isn't a temperature issue. Did you install the drivers from Acer or Nvidia and Intel?

Vlalok

All my drivers are up to date. What's worse is that the issue now began to occur even when no games are running and nothing but a battery reset helps to restart the laptop.

ven98

If that is the case, then the issue is within the hardware and I suspect it is in the RAM or the integrated GPU intel HD graphics. I can't tell what it is for sure unfortunately.

Why it could be the RAM?
The dedicated GPU(GTX 950M) has its own RAM called VRAM, but the intrgrated GPU in the CPU(Intel HD graphics) doesn't have its own dedictaed VRAM and instead it uses the system RAM as VRAM. As the issue persists during both situations when GTX 950M is active and inactive, then we can safely assume that the problem lies within the Integrated graphics. This type of issue can be caused by faulty VRAM(in the integrated gpu's case it is the system RAM) or the GPU itself.

Vlalok

Assuming you're correct, will replacing the faulty hardware suffice?

ven98

The CPU can't be replaced unfortunately, only the RAM can. Unfortunately, I can't guarantee that replacing the RAM will fix the issue.

I am not sure if that will work, but go to control panel>large small icons>administrative tools and open windows memory diagnostic and then select restart and run the test. Report if windows has found any errors in the RAM.

ven98

If in case there are no errors found, enter in the memory diagnostic tool and press F1 for options

For test mix select extended
Press tab for next and then for cache select defult
Press tab again and for pass count select 3, then press F10 to apply.

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