21.3" LCD display flickering

[Sushifiend3000]

Hello,

I'm using my Samsung 213T as a second display on my laptop for the first time and I've encountered an annoying flicker. After a day of troubleshooting I've discovered that it is exacerbated when mid-tone grays dominate the screen. It gets pretty bad if I set the desktop color to the dark gray in the upper right of the desktop Display Properties color selection palette (Windows XP Pro), but I can only see the flicker when other elements are visible, e.g. mouse pointer, windows, or icons - the flicker is undetectable when only the desktop is visible - and there appears to be some correlation between the severity and frequency of the flickering and the overall tonal value of whatever is being displayed, i.e. the more mid-gray pixels there are, the more it flickers. Additionally, it flickers far less frequently when it is used as the primary display and the notebook display is disabled, leading me to believe it is a power issue but I don't know whether it's the monitor or the notebook or the cable.

Just wondering if anyone else has experienced this on their 213T or other large LCD display, and if there is some kind of solution that doesn't involve an RMA.

Specs:
Sager 8790 notebook, 3.0 GHz P4 1GB RAM, Windows XP Pro SP1
ATI Mobility Radeon 9700 256MB to Samsung 213T via DVI
Notebook running on AC power
Drivers are current

Thanks,
Jerome

 

[Creston]

Originally posted by: Sushifiend3000
and if there is some kind of solution that doesn't involve an RMA.

I'm not 100% sure, but this does sound like a bad screen to me. Try reinstalling your graphics card driver for your laptop (if you have it available), it may just be a corrupt driver.

If that doesn't work, I'd call tech support, explain the issue, and get it RMA'd.

Creston

 

[Sushifiend3000]

OK, here's something bizarre. I reinstalled the graphics card driver and the Samsung driver, then had to step out and power everything down before I could check to see whether the reinstall solved the problem. When I came back the Samsung wouldn't even display an image. The power LED was on and steady, but no picture, whether I was using the notebook LCD as the primary display and extending the desktop to the external, or had the external configured as primary. Out of the blue I wondered if heat was the culprit, messing with the graphics card (after all, it is a Pentium 4 notebook) or at least the part that manages the DVI interface, so I put my notebook's fans on high via a function key and immediately the Samsung came on. It didn't wait until the temperature dropped - it just came on literally within one second of activating the fans' turbo mode. What do you (anyone) make of that? Is that the monitor, or the graphics card, or what?