My desktop randomly loses monitor signal while the computer itself stays powered on. The case fans continue spinning, and it does not appear to restart or shut down. This happens intermittently, and sometimes the RX 5700 XT's fans stop while other times they continue spinning normally.
My system has an AMD Radeon RX 5700 XT, Ryzen 5 3600, SOYO SY-Classic B450M motherboard, 16GB of DDR4-3200 memory, and an Acer eMachines AC650 650W modular power supply. I'm running Windows 11 Pro with AMD Adrenalin drivers. The graphics card uses one 8-pin and one 6-pin PCIe power connector.
After one failure, Windows eventually started in 640×480 resolution. Device Manager showed the graphics card as disabled or unable to start. Re-enabling it produced a driver/device-start error the first time, but worked when I tried again immediately afterward. The card then appeared to function normally. Temperatures do not seem unusually high; Adrenalin showed about 66°C before one of the incidents.
I have already reseated the GPU and its power connectors, checked the monitor cable and input, tried Windows + Ctrl + Shift + B, restarted the computer, and reset Adrenalin settings. I'm trying to determine whether the cause is a failing GPU, unreliable PSU or power delivery, a driver issue, or a motherboard/PCIe problem. What tests should I perform before buying replacement hardware?
3 Answers
Power-management settings are worth checking, but they sound less likely if the display disappears during normal use rather than after inactivity. Make sure Windows, the monitor, and the GPU driver are not putting the display to sleep unexpectedly, and test with another cable or monitor if available. If the issue happens under GPU load, that points more toward power delivery or the card itself.
The symptoms can also come from Windows or the graphics driver crashing, especially since the card later appeared with a low-resolution display and briefly failed to start in Device Manager. Try removing the AMD driver completely with a display-driver cleanup tool, then install a stable driver version. Also check Event Viewer or Reliability Monitor for display-driver, hardware-error, or PCIe-related entries around the time of the black screen.
The power supply is one of the first things I would test. A 650W rating is technically enough for an RX 5700 XT, but this particular unit may not provide reliable power under transient GPU loads. If possible, temporarily test with a known-good, reputable PSU rather than buying one immediately. Use separate PCIe cables for the GPU connectors if the replacement supply supports that, and avoid adapters.
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