Weirdness with disappearing monitors on setup changes

[Mastiff]

Today seems to be the monitor day in the Mastiff house. I have another thread about resolution woes, but I thought this would warrant it's own thread: When I adjust something, like placement of the monitors to each other (I'm using two monitors plus the Surface's internal monitor in a three monitor setup) the two external monitors go dead. First I could only get them back by doing a restart, but when I force installed the latest beta of the Intel 520 drivers (to try some resolution stuff), I found out that there I could find the two external monitors in the drop-down list and get them to work from there. Which was nice. But still I find it strange that moving them (like going from side by side to top down setup) works as if I pull the plug. Does aybody have experience with something similar?

 

[Nuspieds]

First, can you tell me how you manually installed the drivers? Also provide the link where you downloaded them. The reason I ask is that I tried both the .exe and .zip and I was unsuccessful with both.

To your post, however, my monitors have not disappeared with rearrangement but just with a simple reboot. I'll be working fine, then for whatever reason I'll reboot, but then I'll lose a monitor or two (I have 3 externals).

 

[Mastiff]

Not that difficult. Download them from Intel's page:

Download Intel® Beta Graphics Driver for Windows® 7/8.1/10* [15.40]

You use WinRar (or Winzip if that should for some strange reason be your poison of choice) to unpack the installation file to any directory. It's just a zipped exefile. Then you go into the device mangarer, graphic card, choose to upgrade driver, search for the driver on your computer, "Let me choose", "Have disk" and point it to the Graphics directory of the Intel drivers. There should only be one inf file there, and the rest is pretty self explanatory.

As for the weirdness, I see you have a Surface Book. But I'm guessing they're using much of the same chipsets in these things, and there's something they haven't fully figured out yet. I'm guessing it will be upgraded and fixed in a while. It usually is. Just bloody annoying that I can't use my good monitor in the meantime!

 

[Nuspieds]

Thanks!

That's the procedure I tried because I used to do it on my SP2, but perhaps I may have downloaded the wrong drivers, so that's why I asked for the link. I'll certainly try again.

By the way, how are your two externals connected? Are you using DP daisy-chaining, USB, Surface Dock?

I'm using the Dock and it has a mind of its own, let me tell you. With the issues I'm having, I often have to troubleshoot with different connection configurations (e.g., DP daisy-chaining, using both DP ports on the Dock, using only one port, etc.). If you are able to, try some other connection configurations to see if you get any different results; sometimes just doing that is what has re-enabled output when I've lost a monitor or two.

 

[Mastiff]

I hope you managed to get that driver in. That's the thing that is really stopping me from using the Surface and the docking for target practice now... I specifically bought this thing for use as a triple setup, with the internal monitor as a nice addition to the two monitors I already had. With the driver I can at least get back the missing monitors, like now. I just got up and into the office (yeah, it's nine, but since I'm my own boss and worked until 1 a.m. yesterday I can have a lie in if I want to!), and now I had the internal monitor as primary and my secoundary external as the secondary. My primary external was nowhere to be seen. With the Intel drivers I could open the multi display setup and get them wher they should be with a set of drop-down boxes. Still you'd think it would remeber this from yesterday. My old Dell Precision M6500 (which I have been using since 2010, and that's a new personal best for me with at least three years!) never skipped a beat on Windows 7 with my dual monitor setup. Of course with Windows 10 it sometimes didn't really understand that it was hooked up to it if it came from sleep mode and woke up in the docking, but that was always fixed with a reboot.

I have only a pair of cheap Mini DP to DVI adapters so far, but I'm expecting a Mini DP to HDMI one of these days. I hope that helps. Daisychaining isn't really an option, I'm afraid. I don't have any monitors that supports it, and I think I have exhausted my budget for computing for a month or two with the Surface, the type cover and the docking. But maybe you will be able to reenable those missing monitors with the Intel drivers, just like me?

 

[Nuspieds]

I must have been downloading the wrong .zip file because this time it worked! Thanks for your good vibes!

I never permanently lose one or more of mine; it just sometimes takes a lot of effort at times to resolve. And this happens often, which is why I am so desperate to resolve, I am willing to install the beta drivers. I have the greatest fear when waking my SB from sleep because that's when the problem mostly occurs.

This morning, with the beta drivers installed last night, sure enough it woke from sleep with only the SB display and the USB-connected monitor; my two other DP daisy-chained monitors were blank. Power off/on sometimes gives Windows the jolt it needs to recognize and output to the monitors, but it didn't work in this case. Another fix that sometimes work is just to detach the SB from the Dock and then reattach; again, no luck.

I have a batch file that I created and used on my SP; it restarts all my Display Adapters so that my display configuration is restored to exactly what I had configured. I was hoping not to have to use this utility anymore with the SB, but that certainly was not to be the case. So I ran my batch file and my two DP monitors were re-established, but then I lost the USB monitor! Go figure!

I did some system checks and I found something interesting: The DisplayLink adapter (for the USB-connected monitor) was no longer appearing in my system. Even when I did a rescan for changes, nothing. Interesting. A reboot resolved the issue but I did some more research and the next time the issue occurs, I will try to install the adapter from the command line to see if that works; if so, I'll then add it to my batch file. If anything, that would save me a reboot.

 

[Mastiff]

I have finally found out at least something: There are different Display Port types in the docking and the unit. Because I can get 1920x1200 from a passive adapter in the DP on the Surface, but only 1920x1080 with the same adapter on the docking. I have an active adapter on the way, though. That should work on the docking, so I won't have to plug one display into the docking (a Samsung HD monitor) and the other one into the Surface (the expensive NEC 1920x1200). But I have also found that the only way to get everything working every time is to use the beta driver from Intel. The Windows Update driver doesn't work as reliably.

 

[Tsurugaya]

I get 2560x1440 on both ports using mDP cables.

 

[Mastiff]

Weird! Are those active cables? Or passive? Could you link to them, please?