Monitor Not Responding while PC continues to Work

Hello everyone! First time poster seeking advice!!!

I play Final Fantasy XIV, As of YESTERDAY (this only started happening then) My monitor will completely go black, and stop responding. I'm unable to power it down via the button on the front, and have to manually unplug it from the back, and then back in, in order to get my screen back

During this time, i'm also running Skype and in a call, the call continues to work fine, and I can still hear the game running in the background (ambient noises and such)

What could cause this? Is the monitor dying out? I'm trying to pinpoint the issue before I go and try and buy a solution instead of buying a 'solution' and end up having it be something different!

I will also add, that I have tried updating graphics drivers as a precaution, they needed it anyhow, though it did not solve my problem. The monitor itself simply stops responding when I play this game. EVERYTHING else works! When i'm NOT playing the game itself, i'm able to do anything just fine without problems, no shut downs, no black screens, it works as if nothing actually ever happened. It is ONLY when i'm playing FFXIV

And as mentioned, everything cnotinues to run despite me not being able to see it, i can still talk and communicate that i'm having problems, it's just the monitor. I'm assuming if it was actual PC Hardware malfunctioning, IE: Graphics cards, CPU any of it, EVERYTHING would stop resonding and I would not be able to hear the game, or speak on skype, am i right?

Does anyone have any ideas as to what it could be? Should I replace the monitor? is it in fact the monitor just reaching the end of it's life? Any advice is greatly appreciated I can provide more specs if needed!

 

Welcome to Major Geeks!

Aside from the monitor power button issue, this sounds like a problem with the graphics card. Extreme gaming puts a lot more stress on the GPU (graphics processing unit, a.k.a. video card) than routine tasks (Skype, etc.) so it may be overheating or failing.

My initial thought is to run a GPU diagnostic test like this:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/video_card_stability_test.html

You may have to run it for several hours to detect a failure. When running it, set the "Power Options" in Control Panel so the monitor and hard drive do not automatically turn off and the computer can't enter "sleep" or "hibernation" mode.

Also, please post more information on your PC (make, model, GPU make/model and the version of Windows you are running). If you're not sure of all this, download and run Everest Home (http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/everest_free_edition.html) and it should give you the system info.

Hope this helps.

 

Hey! Thanks for the response!

I was originally assuming GPU too, though when it crashes, i'm assuming it'd at least crash the game, or cause it completely stop responding. Though when I unplug and plug the monitor itself back in, the game still runs fine as if it were never interrupted. I talked to someone at Geeksquad while I was at best buy today pricing potential monitor replacements and they said it sounds like it's definitely monitor related seeing as how no programs are being affected by it shutting off.

Strangely enough, it hasn't done it at all today, I left my game on in the laggiest location i could find, and it was on for roughly 5 hours during the time i was gone and it's still running perfectly fine, it hasn't shut off at all today..... so i have no idea

I did notice that this morning, I also uninstalled, and reinstalled the catalyst for my video card, putting on the BETA driver instead of the RELEASE driver, which i'd noted on other posts had helped since BEta drivers generally operate better for gamers. I also, when it installed that and I rebooted, had windows updates

i'm wondering if potentially windows updates had anything to do with it as it updates int he background. Whatever it is, today isn't happening - luckily enough, but i'm going to knock on wood and keep my eye out.

 

If it happens again and you have a friend who has an extra monitor they can part with for a few days, I'd ask to borrow it. If it cures the problem, it may be time to buy a new one.