Microsoft investigating Surface Book 3 ‘screen blackout’ issues
A number of Surface Book 3 users have been reporting random screen blackout issues for months.
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What you need to know
Since September, manySurface Book 3users have been complaining about brief yet frequent screen blackouts occurring randomly when using their devices. Microsoft’s support forums arefull of customersreporting the same issue, which involves the display randomly going black while in use for a number of seconds before coming back on.
My own Surface Book 3 has the same issue, and if Microsoft’ssupport forumsare anything to go by, it’s not an isolated bug. The company has issued a statement to Windows Central confirming that it is aware of the problem and is investigating, and that customers who are affected by the issue should contact support.
Microsoft’s statement:
We are aware that some customers have experienced a brief screen blackout on Surface Book 3 and are monitoring the situation closely. Customers impacted by this should contact Microsoft support.
It’s unclear if the issue is hardware related, as reports of the problem didn’t begin appearing until after the September firmware update. We’ve reached out to Microsoft for further clarification on the issue, and will update this post once we receive a statement.
Customers have experimented with installing different graphics driver versions to varying levels of success, but it appears nothing truly solves the problem just yet. Users have found that either tapping the screen or pressing one of the display brightness buttons on the keyboard will return the screen to normal if a blackout has occured.
Do you have a Surface Book 3 suffering from random screen blackouts? Let us know in the comments.
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Zac Bowden is a Senior Editor at Windows Central. Bringing you exclusive coverage into the world of Windows on PCs, tablets, phones, and more. Also an avid collector of rare Microsoft prototype devices! Keep in touch onTwitterandThreads
