GPU driver issue

[Rau]

Hey there! I have a Lenovo y560 from 2010. It has an AMD Mobility 5730 discrete gpu. Recently, XIV started doing this odd thing where it would freeze, flash a black screen, and then go back to normal. It wasn't a big deal, but it was really annoying. I asked around, and was told updating my GPU drivers would solve the problem, as someone who had the same issue reported it worked.

Unfortunately, Lenovo stopped updating Y560 drivers in 2011. I looked around AMD's website, and found their mobility verification tool. From my understanding, as long as that tool installed properly, I could use the 13.10 beta drivers(same page, scroll down) with minimal problems.

I thought it worked, but when I restarted, I would get to my log-in screen, and then get a BSOD. I freaked out, and booted into safe mode. I attempted to Uninstall the drivers using the Catalyst software, but the application would crash when trying to clear AMD drivers. I went to the device manager, and manually uninstalled the display adapter driver.
Tried uninstalling through Catalyst again, and it worked, and I managed to go back to old Lenovo drivers.


Anyway, does anyone have an idea as to how I can get the weird black screen issues to go away? Is there some way I can properly update my gpu with AMD generic drivers?

[Raist]

Check your Power Options. I use a controller on mine, and if I don't hit the keyboard for chat or tap the touchpad often enough, the standby timer kicks in briefly after a while.

Don't just go with the standard plans that show up in the branded power config panel. You will want to edit a plan's settings so you can get at the advanced settings screen---windows has a LOT of options available that may not show up in the default plan settings. I usually just run powercfg.cpl so I can always find them. The proprietary software <should> show it's profiles in there as well.

[Rau]

Do you know what particular option it would be?

I looked under powercfg.cpl's Advanced Settings, but I didn't see anything about keyboard inactivity.

I use an external keyboard and mouse, so that might be a problem, and now that I think about it, this DID start happening after I got my keyboard(3 days ago).

[Raist]

it's not a setting particular to your keyboard, it's you timers for putting devices into low power states (dim or turn off your screen, when to go into standby/sleep/hibernation, etc.).

It was a similar problem with XI too. Almost like Windows isn't aware of any input from you if you aren't using mouse/kbd... like it isn't tracking all of the players input or something. So, after windows thinks you've been inactive long enough, it starts putting things in a low power state.

Before putting everything on my laptop in an "always on" sort of configuration, I'd get the black screen after about 30 minutes of solo play...but when chatting up with friends it never happened. Now I can solo for hours with no screen blanking.