Surface 4 Pro Dead Display or Black Screen of Death?

Hi Corbin,

Try to press and hold the on/off button for at least 30 seconds, this resets the Surface. These tablets respond a bit different to the power button than a normal PC. We have several Pro 4 tablets here, all with these symptoms every now and then. Surface tablets seem to have major issues with switching between power states, especially in combination with a Surface Dock. It’s more stable with the latest firmware of the Pro 4 and the dock, but still not responsive every now and then. The official Microsoft instructions give you 2 options:

1. Press and hold the power button until the screen turns off (about 10 seconds), then release the power button.Note
2. On some Surface models, the screen may immediately turn off when you press the power button. If this happens, continue to hold for the full 10 seconds and then release.
3. Press and release the power button to turn your Surface back on. You should see the Surface logo.

If that doesn't work, use this two-button shutdown process to make sure your Surface turns off completely:

1. Press and hold the power button on your Surface until the screen turns off (about 30 seconds), then release it.
2. Press and hold the volume-up button and the power button at the same time until the screen turns off (about 15 seconds), then release both.
   

The screen may flash the Surface logo, but continue holding the buttons down for at least 15 seconds.

1. After you release the buttons, wait 10 seconds.
2. Press and release the power button to turn your Surface back on. You should see the Surface logo.

Give it a go, hope this helps!

Eelco

I do the hold power/vol up routine like 5 times a day…anyone figure this problem out yet? I just did a reinstall of windows and wiped all personal/user accounts - still happening (actually more now). Do I need to do a clean install?

1. Press and hold the power button on your Surface until the screen turns off (about 30 seconds), then release it.
2. Press and hold the volume-up button and the power button at the same time until the screen turns off (about 15 seconds), then release both.
3. The screen may flash the Surface logo, but continue holding the buttons down for at least 15 seconds.
4. After you release the buttons, wait 10 seconds.
5. Press and release the power button to turn your Surface back on. You should see the Surface logo.

I’ve just had all these problems, the screen booted up at first, then dark bars across the screen before it went black. Tried re-booting, but not even the windows logo. You could just see the backlight fire up. I then saw it flicker to light again with a greyed screen showing a “system update” (maybe display driver?). I let it do that but then it was back to a black screen. Tried connecting an external display via the USBC connection, no joy there either. I went through the whole reset with the power button, also the power button+the volume UP for at least 30 secs. The only clue the surface was powering up or not was the tiny sounds you can hear from the hard drive ( very,very quiet) only hear it in a silent room and some screen backlight. I was about to give up, thinking the hardware had died, when I tried holding down the power button + the Volume UP button for at least 30 secs, maybe longer. I then left it for another 5 minutes. I then used the power button momentarily to turn on and the Windows logo appeared. It then reported that windows had removed a faulty driver from an update. The whole exercise was 90 mins !. But losing the display driver via a windows update causes a virtual blind fix, which is very difficult to know what’s wrong.