Question Flashing black screen immediately after pressing power putton

[SilentStormSP]

Hi all,
I have been facing this issue for a while now, which is everytime after I shutdown my laptop and powering it on after about 10 seconds or restarting it, the display would immediately show a flashing black screen and with the hard drive light flashing non-stop. The only way to solve this is to force shut down my laptop and letting it rest for about half an hour then powering it on again, where there would also be the flashing black screen but only for a few seconds then going back to normal. Does anyone know how to fix this for good? Much thanks.

 

[onespeedbiker]

Try a cold boot. unplug the AC adapter, remove the battery and press the power button for 10 seconds, wait 10 minutes, then reinstall the battery, plugin the AC adapter if necessary and reboot. You should also disable fast start up. https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/4189-turn-off-fast-startup-windows-10-a.html

 

[SilentStormSP]

Hi,
Thanks for the prompt reply. But is what I mentioned, force shutting it down and letting it rest for 30 mins which also temporarily solved the problem the same as cold booting? Although my fast startup is enabled, it rarely fast startup, only fast starting once in a while, could that be a problem? Thank you.

 

[onespeedbiker]

The purpose of a cold boot is to clear your RAM of residual files. While waiting 30 minutes may flush the RAM, a cold boot is a more positive way as it drains the residual power in the power supply by removing the power source and pushing the power button. As far a fast start-up, with a normal shut down, windows writes the systems files that are stored in the RAM and clears the RAM of the files. With fast start-up, when you shut down windows, the files remain in RAM and the computer goes into a pseudo sleep mode, so when you start your laptop windows does not need to reload the system files. Disabling fast start-up results in the RAM being flushed, so a cold boot would not be necessary every time you boot your laptop; FYI fast start-up is also disabled when you chose to restart your laptop, rather than shutdown.

edit; you should do a RAM test https://www.memtest86.com/

 

[SilentStormSP]

Hi,
So does this mean that the flashing black screen issue is caused by a ram problem? Will the built-in windows memory diagnostics be sufficient to solve this problem for good? To add on, this issue occur time to time, especially after an update or patch to some applications. This is the 3rd time this has happened. The first and second time happened after an office update and the current one happened after a patch to a game. Also, the flashing black screen also occurs when I restart my laptop. Is there a way to fix this?

 

[onespeedbiker]

The built in memory checker works quickly but can miss some critical errors, memtest86 does much more in depth testing. It may not be your RAM, but if disabling fast start-up solves the problem, it means for some reason, either corupted data is being loaded in the RAM during fast start up, or the data is being corrupted after it is loaded.

 

[SilentStormSP]

Hi,
Although my fast startup is enabled, my laptop does not actually fast startup all the time, maybe some sort of a glitch. Is disabling it still going to help? As you have mentioned corrupted data, has this got to do with some recent updates or patches to my applications? If so how do I fix it?

 

[onespeedbiker]

Let me repeat myself. "With fast start-up, when you shut down windows, the files remain in RAM and the computer goes into a pseudo sleep mode, so when you start your laptop windows does not need to reload the system files. Disabling fast start-up results in the RAM being flushed, so a cold boot would not be necessary every time you boot your laptop".

IOW, you are disabling the fast start-up to make sure the RAM is being flushed when you shutdown so it doesn't affect a subsequent start-up. However the fact it does this with a restart also, points more toward RAM

 

[SilentStormSP]

Hi,
Thank you for your time. I have disabled fast start-up and will get back to you on whether the problem still persists. Once again, thank you for you help.

 

[onespeedbiker]

Keep in mind disabling fast startup is a work around an unresolved issue. Have you upgraded your RAM at all? What is the make model of your laptop.

 

[SilentStormSP]

No I have not