Dell Inspiron 2650 ?

[mrautiola]

Hello,
On my 2003 Dell Inspiron 2650 Laptop the screen will sometimes blink out. This happens when i am opening programs or websites. It does not do it often and does not do it when it is idle. Does anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks

[viperpa33s]

My parents just bought a HP a1340n computer and it does the same thing. It will blink every once in awhile when opening programs or the web browser. I think it has to do with the video card but I could be wrong. The computer comes with a ATI Radeon Xpress 200 with 256mb of shared memory.

I told my parents I would build them one but they couldn't wait. They are losing patience in there old age....lol

[GaryRouth]

Hi mrautiola

Can we assume that the screen returns after a moment, and everything works OK after that? Or is it an extended period of time with a blank screen? Or does the system hang completely and require a reboot? (I’ll also assume that no power-related settings are set extra low? [that the problem exists whether using the AC adapter or when running from battery])

If it’s just a brief “blink-out”, and assuming your notebook has at least 256mb of system memory, you can try the following Bios settings change (this from Dell support) - It has been mentioned as a possible fix in some of the Dell forums for various video related problems in your model.
_________________________
"Increase the AGP Aperture Size in the BIOS to greater than 64MB.


Restart the computer. When the large Dell® screen appears press the [DELETE] key repeatedly on the keyboard until the text Entering Setup appears.
When you enter the BIOS screen, press the [right-arrow] key once to change the page to the Advanced screen.
Now that the category Advanced is highlighted, press the [down-arrow] key once to highlight Video Configuration and press [ENTER].
In Video Configuration, press the [down-arrow] key once to highlight AGP Aperture Size 64 MB.
Press the [SPACEBAR] ONCE to change the value from 64 MB to 256 MB .
Press the [F10] key and then press [ENTER] to save your changes. The screen will go blank and the computer will restart."
____________________________

I've also seen mention of a Speed-Step fix available for that model at the Dell site. That could be factor.

Some of the 2650s have nVidia GeForce2 Go for the video – so another option would be to try updating the video drivers.

Just as a general suggestion = if the system has only 256mb of RAM (system memory), that’s generally a bit low for an XP computer that has a lot of background processes running. And most Dell’s have a fair amount of extra processes running at startup – they arrive that way at purchase. 512mb or better might cure quite a few sluggish behaviors. [running anti-malware scans to eliminate any invasive processes can help too – should the system have unwanted visitors].

Best of luck
. . . Gary