All external monitor issues

[leeshor]

There are so many threads on issues connecting to external monitors, it would be good to consolidate your issues in this thread

 

[Glenn.Q]

I have the strange problem that when I connect my surface to the monitor or disconnect it, the scaling often is wrong. Internal display is set to 200%. With the monitor it is set to 125% at a x1440 resolution. When I connect to the monitor while the surface is running, the scaling often stays at 200%, which is too big. Only logging off or restarting the device helps then.

 

[unni]

I have two issues.

My setup:

• Surface 4 Pro
• Surface 4 dock (brick style)
• Belkin Mini Displayport to HDMI adapter
• Asus VE247 Monitor - 1920 x 1080, 23.6"
• When docked, I use only my monitor.
• Tablet is at 200% scaling, monitor is at 100% scaling.

1. Fonts appear blurred when connected/removed from dock.
This happens with Outlook/Word 2016, Visual Studio 2015, Firefox, Opera and probably most other apps. Windows start menu, Explorer, Edge and store apps don't have this problem.

Assume that I am viewing a web page in Opera on my monitor. Then once I undock the tablet, fonts will look blurred on Opera. Its not just the text on the web page, even text on menu and other UI controls have this problem. Only way to resolve that I know of is to reboot. I have posted a screenshot here, but I am not sure if you can understand the difference from it.

2. Monitor rapidly turns on/off when tablet turns off
Update:
This issue was solved by using Cable Matters Gold Plated Active Mini DisplayPort to HDMI Male to Female Adapter Supporting Eyefinity Technology & 4K Resolution.

Original post:
I have my Surface 4 configured to turn off the screen after 5 minutes. When the screen turns off after 5 minutes, the monitor doesn't turn off. It tries to turn off, but something wakes it up immediately. Then it will show "no signal" and goes back to off. And this repeats. I have uploaded a video of the problem here.

When I connect the Belkin adapter directly to the tablet, it works fine. Monitor starts behaving this way only when the Belkin adapter is connected to the dock. When the monitor is doing this, the moment I undock the tablet, monitor goes off as expected.

 

[unni]

Noticed one more behavior related to my issue #2 above. Today, I was using the tablet docked with just the monitor. Then I powered off the tablet from Windows start menu since I didn't want the monitor to start misbehaving. Surprisingly, monitor was still doing its on/off toggling after Windows was shut down. It stopped only after I removed the dock connector from the tablet.

 

[Matt Vaughan]

Waking my SP4 from sleep, and on a good occasion my Dell monitor, connected to my Surface dock, won't wake up. Only fix is to reboot.

 

[Rift400]

A *possible* fix for some external display issues -

Setup -
1. Microsoft book
2. Dell P2715Q UHD monitor connected by mDP-DP via surface dock

Problem -
A few days ago the monitor stopped receiving signal.

Connected via dock - intermittently detected a display but did not pick up or allow me to set resolution etc.
Connected via mDP on keyboard - detected display and native resolution but no output

Process -
Attempted all the usual fixes -
1. Cursed at the machine and threatened violence
2. Cursed at Microsoft and threatened violence
3. Played with the various ports and wires
4. Updated firmware/drivers
5. Surfed forums and tried various fixes and work-arounds
6. Cursed at the machine and Microsoft again
7. Reinstalled windows
8. Inadvertently jiggled the tablet when reaching for something... problem solved

Please note that throughout the process I had attached/detached the tablet from the keyboard several times trying out various fixes. At no stage did this appear to fix the problem. It was only the final jiggle that sorted it out. There appears to be a loose connection between the tablet and the keyboard in my machine. I was wondering if any others had a similar problem/fix???

 

[unni]

Issue #2 I posted above was solved by using Cable Matters Gold Plated Active Mini DisplayPort to HDMI Male to Female Adapter Supporting Eyefinity Technology & 4K Resolution. Now the monitor turns off as expected.

Microsoft has a list of compatible monitors/cables/adapters here.

 

[BorisHristov]

I just bought a P2715Q and I have a major, major problem!

When I connect it to the Surface Pro (to the Mini Display port) I immediately lose network connection or at best I have a ping once on 10 times. If I disconnect the cable, I immediately get the ping back and the Wi-Fi is back...

Anyone with ideas? I have 30 days to return it....

Update: I believe it's the cable. (but why is it involved in the network connectivity at all!?) because when I start moving it the ping magically starts to come back...

Any ideas are welcome!

 

[jnjroach1]

I just bought a P2715Q and I have a major, major problem!

When I connect it to the Surface Pro (to the Mini Display port) I immediately lose network connection or at best I have a ping once on 10 times. If I disconnect the cable, I immediately get the ping back and the Wi-Fi is back...

Anyone with ideas? I have 30 days to return it....

Update: I believe it's the cable. (but why is it involved in the network connectivity at all!?) because when I start moving it the ping magically starts to come back...

Any ideas are welcome!

Sounds like the cable isn't properly shielded....

 

[BorisHristov]

Sounds like the cable isn't properly shielded....

Ok. Intersting. What does the Mini Display Port have to do with my network signal though?

 

[No_ax_to_grind]

i5/16GB/512GB SP4 running miniDP > DP to a Dell U3415-W no problem at full 3440x1440 at 60Hz. What I want, need to do is Picture-by-Picture between my SP4 and a client's Lenovo ThinkPad L440 running Win7 Pro. Regardless of which is primary input and which is secondary PBP, cannot get the SP4's output to scale properly at any resolution, including the desired 1720x1440 for full split screen. ThinkPad does it perfectly over HDMI - no skewing, no letterboxing. SP4, over miniDP>DP or miniDP > HDMI does one or the other dependent upon whether I run full on PBP or aspect ratio.

Right now I've compromised by plugging in my Miracast and running 1920x1080 in aspect ratio which gives me no skewing and about 2/3 of the screen with top and bottom letterboxing. I suspect this is because of DisplayPort or the Win10 drivers for the Intel Iris 520.

Thinking I'm going to have to go 4k UHD to solve this correctly.

 

[unni]

Ok. Intersting. What does the Mini Display Port have to do with my network signal though?

I remember reading a post within the last one month where he had a problem with bluetooth or wifi on his surface 4. Ultimately, it was due to interference from the lava lamp on his desk!