Screen Flicker At Startup

[dreus 0]

I have a Dell Inspiron5150 and my video card is an Nvidia Geforce FX Go5200. A problem that just came up recently has left me quite puzzled.My laptop monitor flickers to a black screen right at startup. Moments later, everything appears to be fine again. Although the issue doesn't seem particularly life threatening, I was wondering if anyone would know what would cause this and/or ways to fix it. I guess it's more of a nuisance than anything else.I initially didn't have this problem and only noticed it after deframenting my hard drive. I have already reinstalled the latest drivers for the vid card but have had no luck.Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

[ghostrider 0]

I initially didn't have this problem and only noticed it after deframenting my hard drive. I have already reinstalled the latest drivers for the vid card but have had no luck.

I'm not quite sure why this is happening but I do not think that your Video Card or the fact that you have a Dell Inspiron has anything to do with it. I have one possible theory as to why your computer screen goes black for a few seconds.

Fragmentation occurs when there is not enough space in a row to write a file to the drive. If this scenario occurs Windows (or whatever OS you use) will look through the FAT or MFT (depending on whether your use FAT32 or NFTS) and search for file entries marked deleted and then will overwrite that entry with the file. This causes the file to become fragmented (or in multiple parts) on the drive. Fragmentation causes the drive to read from many different parts of the drive which is much slower than reading it if the file is all in a row (no other files inbetween). Perhaps your defragmenter put some of your system files towards the end of your drive. This would cause the drive to have to go longer to read the same data. Did you use the Windows defragmenter? That is the one I use for all my defragmenting. If you didn't use that and want to get rid of this (considering that I'm right and this is actually the thing that is causing it) use the Windows defragmenter. If that doesn't work try reinstalling Windows and if that still isn't working reformat (save all your data first) and repartition your drive and then reinstall.

Hope I helped.

[dreus 0]

Thanks for your help ghostrider.Oddly enough, I tried plugging my LCD monitor from my desktop into the laptop and after hitting the function/display button a few times and watching my laptop screen flicker on and off, the whole 'screen flickers on startup' issue appeared to be resolved.Although I still find the whole ordeal rather bizarre, I'll just be happy with the fact that the annoyance appears to be gone now.Again, I appreciate your input.