Averatec 2370 close lid video issue

I was playing around with Rmclock under Vista when I noticed that when I close the lid and open it backup, the screen was blank. At first, I thought it was a RmClock incompatibility, but after comparing the Power profile against the Windows's one by one, the problem turns out to be caused by the machine itself (probably the display driver).

The main difference between the RmClock profile and the standard windows profile is that when in the Window's profile, the display is set to sleep when you close the lid. On RmClock's profile, it is set to do nothing. Apparently, when you sleep, all is well. When you do nothing, the display goes out and never return.

To recover from the blank screen, press the sleep button, which cause the computer to go to sleep. Press any key and it resume from sleep and the screen is restored.

This appears to be a problem with the display driver. Perhaps they didn't update the driver properly when they updated it for Vista. When I close the lip on my Acer 3680, it does not blank out the screen and it does not have this problem. However, I have the latest video driver from Averatec and it does not solve the problem. I have google and notice a laptop owners with similar issues. They were solved either by a BIOS upgrade or a video driver upgrade.

Let's face it, Averatec is unlikely to update the BIOS or the video driver because they are a crappy company, so your two options are:

1. Set the profile so that when you close the lid, it goes to sleep or hibernate.
2. Do the sleep and resume workaround when you close your lid.

 

fortunately you do not have to depend on Averatec to release newer video drivers. They are available from nVidia. I am running version 100.65. There is a newer version, but it lacks a couple tweakable features, and this version seems to be pretty stable.

 

Jim, do you have problems with the lid closing and crashing your machine in Vista?

 

Nope. But I can't say never. This was a problem noted in BIOS R1.04 and the reason Averatec issued BIOS R1.05. Part of the reason I am so rarely affected is

A- that I routinely use an external monitor at both of my 'normal' work stations.
B- my built-in monitor is set to 'do nothing' when closed (in conjunction with 'A' above)
C- I never used sleep under XP as I found it too unreliable (I use it most of the time under Vista).

I have not been bothered at all with this issue using BIOS R1.09 (the Everex version). I just opened the lid, switched over from external to internal, unplugged the external moitor (and waited for Vista to recognize that), closed the lid, waited a few seconds, opened the lid, and no problem. I did the lid open/close about 4 times before responding.

My problems with the wired network adapter seem to have disappeared too.

 

Under 1.05, if you have the Lid action as "Sleep". It works properly. The screen goes into sleep mode.

However, if you set the lid to "Do nothing" and close the lip, the screen goes into never never land. The only way to recover without a reboot is to force a sleep and then return from sleep.

Judging from your response, I may have to upgrade to 1.09 after the warranty runs out. You haven't encounter any problems?

Paul

 

The only 'problem' I've run into is that the splash screen says Everex instead of Averatec

Oh, the the BIOS setup key is now Delete rather than F2 - the splash screen doesn't tell you this.

I can live with this.