Laptop screen started flashing?

mdwh

Enthusiast
Hi,

I have a Recoil 2 where all of a sudden the laptop screen has started flashing - trying to Google for this finds a lot of results for "flickering", but to be clear, it's quickly flashing between normal and black (several times a second).

This started whilst playing a game (Warthunder) but now happens all the time, games or not, or even when booting (as soon as the PCS logo appears) or in the BIOS. An external monitor works fine.

I see some suggestions that flickering can be a driver problem, although I'm guessing this is a hardware issue given it happens as soon as it's turned on, but I thought I'd post here first in case anyone has ideas?

(It's about two years old, I have the silver warranty.)
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
I would contact PCS, to me that sounds like the backlight invertor may be failing from what you're describing.

If it's happening in the boot logo which is outside of windows then it's definitely a hardware issue.
 

mdwh

Enthusiast
Thanks for the response, I'll do that. I also note the problem goes away if the screen brightness is lowered to around 15% or less (and some interaction being on power - on battery, it only goes away at an even lower brightness). But obviously that still needs fixing, so I'll contact PCS.
 

mdwh

Enthusiast
Just to give an update: have done an RMA, unfortunately PCS say it turns out to need a motherboard replacement costing £800 :(

Need to decide whether to repair or replace, but I have been spending all day now looking over the shiny new RTX 3000 series laptops...
 

SpyderTracks

We love you Ukraine
Just to give an update: have done an RMA, unfortunately PCS say it turns out to need a motherboard replacement costing £800 :(

Need to decide whether to repair or replace, but I have been spending all day now looking over the shiny new RTX 3000 series laptops...
Ah, that's a serious shame....

I would replace to be honest, and I'd suggest avoiding any TongFang chassis.
 

FerrariVie

Super Star
Just to give an update: have done an RMA, unfortunately PCS say it turns out to need a motherboard replacement costing £800 :(

Need to decide whether to repair or replace, but I have been spending all day now looking over the shiny new RTX 3000 series laptops...
If you don't want to buy a new laptop, you could simply use an external monitor all the time and not the laptop screen. Even if you decide to buy a new RTX3000 laptop, you are probably going to need that external monitor for a month or 2 anyway :rolleyes:
 

mdwh

Enthusiast
Thanks for the tip. Unfortunately I do need a laptop, but I could maybe put it to some use as a remote-only machine. And yes that's true about the wait, thankfully I do have a spare laptop to keep me going in the meantime!
 
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