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Solved Win10 rendered my SP3 unusable

VickiFL

Active Member
yes I'm sure Vicki is talking about installing it when it's OFFICAILLY released, she not talking about installing the beta ware... I think she's just confused when it will be released. Once it's officially released then I'm sure she can take it to the windows store to have all her gadgets updated to W10.

Exactly this, thank you. :)
 

AllTaken

Member
Hi guys,

I had Win10 installed on another machine I had laying around the office, and had minimal issues with it.

I installed it on my SP3 a few hours ago, and now the poor SP3 is a heaping pile of uselessnes.

The installation went ok, and I was taken to the setup screen where you pick your WiFi and sign in to your account. It then took me to the Start screen, and then at that point the screen would flash black every 15 or 20 seconds, and the keyboard and mouse were mostly unusable except for 2 or 3 second periods after a black flash. It would flash for 5 or 8 times or so and then just immediately reboot. I let it do that about 3 or 4 times before I figured it was hosed.

I really felt like if I could get to Windows Update and download new updates, it would fix the problem, but that is absolutely not doable in the regular Desktop/Start environment.

I made it into Safe Mode, and the machine ran beautifully then, but Windows Update isn't available in Safe Mode. As well, there were no restore points for System Restore to use.

What do you guys think, am I going to just have to wipe the whole thing and reinstall fresh, losing all my data?

All my important stuff is backed up, I haven't lost anything important.

I know what this is.

Between the black flashes (display driver crashing) try to right click the start button and choose device manager. Uninstall the display adaptor. Restart.

This should fix your Surface.

I just updated my Windows 10 build and had the exact issues you're experiencing, I realised back in Windows 8.1 I played around with Intel display drivers vs Microsoft update Intel drivers. Uninstall and restart solved all my problems.
 
OP
malberttoo

malberttoo

Well-Known Member
I know what this is.

Between the black flashes (display driver crashing) try to right click the start button and choose device manager. Uninstall the display adaptor. Restart.

This should fix your Surface.

I just updated my Windows 10 build and had the exact issues you're experiencing, I realised back in Windows 8.1 I played around with Intel display drivers vs Microsoft update Intel drivers. Uninstall and restart solved all my problems.

Thanks, this was definitely the issue. The machine always crashed before I could get the display driver to uninstall, so I did it in Safe Mode.

The driver that was there was the Intel 10.18.10.3282.

Something is a little messed up still though, because even though I have run through Windows update, which gave me a firmware update pack from the 15th and included the Intel 10.18.14.4029 graphics driver, my SP3 is still using only the Microsoft Basic Driver. I'm a little hesitant to get the driver from Intel.

As well, it says my Win10 build is 9841, is that what you guys have as well?
 

AllTaken

Member
The ISO is available online if you want to do it that way? Otherwise I'm in the same boat on build 9879, my display driver is stuck at Microsoft basic. I'm inclined to download the driver pack for the Surface that came out at the back end of last year, my last resort is a refresh keeping my files via Windows 10 recovery at start up.

http://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/download/details.aspx?id=38826

Does your sleep work or give you a black screen hang?

Let me know if you get a breakthrough.
 
OP
malberttoo

malberttoo

Well-Known Member
The ISO is available online if you want to do it that way? Otherwise I'm in the same boat on build 9879, my display driver is stuck at Microsoft basic. I'm inclined to download the driver pack for the Surface that came out at the back end of last year, my last resort is a refresh keeping my files via Windows 10 recovery at start up.

Does your sleep work or give you a black screen hang?

Let me know if you get a breakthrough.

Ok well, having told me that about your existing display driver, I may go ahead and do a clean install then. I have never used the Intel driver from their site, I've always used the driver that MS delivers through Windows Update. The only thing I've ever messed with graphics-wise, was early on, I used the Surface Tweak Tool (http://www.surfaceforums.net/threads/surface-tweak-tool-for-surface-pro-2-release.8219/) to try and adjust my black level. Watching shows and movies on the SP3, the dark parts were way too dark. The tweak tool didn't really do anything for me though.

You never tried installing Intel's driver directly from their site?
 

AllTaken

Member
Ok well, having told me that about your existing display driver, I may go ahead and do a clean install then. I have never used the Intel driver from their site, I've always used the driver that MS delivers through Windows Update. The only thing I've ever messed with graphics-wise, was early on, I used the Surface Tweak Tool (http://www.surfaceforums.net/threads/surface-tweak-tool-for-surface-pro-2-release.8219/) to try and adjust my black level. Watching shows and movies on the SP3, the dark parts were way too dark. The tweak tool didn't really do anything for me though.

You never tried installing Intel's driver directly from their site?

I did indeed, I was running a beta driver. I'm downloading the January 2015 driver pack for the surface pro 3 now and I'll give you the results in about 10 minutes. Might save you a refresh.
 

AllTaken

Member
Uninstall embedded firmware driver from device manager, just the top one of four. Immediately in Windows Update this will prompt a firmware update. This solved my issues and I'm back on the latest driver for Display.
 

JB 2.0

New Member
Hi

Had exactly the same tonight.

I fixed it by rebooting with 'volume down' held down.
Then I reset my settings.
When I went through the start up process I didn't select a previous setup. I created a new one. Same account but no settings and installs hanging around.

Black flashing has gone.

And now I have a funky windows 10 Surface Pro 3

Happy happy joy joy.
 
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