Updated NVIDIA driver via Windows Update and now power management doesn't work

  • Thread starter Thread starter News Reader
  • Start date Start date
N

News Reader

Hi,

A week or two ago I ran Windows Update. I hadn't updated drivers in a while
so when it offered me a new NVIDIA driver, I installed it. The driver
version is now at 4.5.2.3 and dated as 7/28/2003. It also installed some
desktop display manager thing that runs in the system tray.

The problem is that now my power management isn't working. I have my screen
saver set to activate after 15 min. and I have the display set to go into
power saving mode after 30 min. and this was working fine before I updated
the driver. Now, it doesn't happen at all. The screen saver goes on, but the
display doesn't go into power saving mode.

Once or twice I went into the power management control panel, changed the
timeout to something else, hit "apply," changed it back to 30 min. and hit
"apply" again and I think that made it work temporarily, but after I
rebooted it didn't work anymore.

Has anyone else had this problem? Any suggested fix aside from resetting
this after each reboot? I suppose as a worst-case option I could run some
quick registry script on startup to change this value if that would help.

Thanks
 
Additional observations and a little more info:

Using the workaround of changing and then changing back the power management
settings and then not rebooting, I have the thing powering down after 30
minutes.

But it doesn't seem to be powering down in the same way it was before the
driver update. It seems to be powering down "less."

By this I mean that before, it would really power down -- the monitor LED
would go from green to orange and the monitor would really "click" (you'd
really hear the relay switching) when you moved the mouse or hit a key to
turn it back on again. It was pretty clear that the video board was not
sending *any* signal to the monitor.

Now, it still goes black, but the LED doesn't turn orange -- I may be
imagining this, but it does seem to change color, but just slightly from
green to yellow. Do some monitors have an intermediate setting between full
"on" mode and full powersave mode? And it still makes a noise when it comes
back up, but it is not that loud relay click -- I do hear the tube kicking
back in, but it's a quieter "click" sound. Could the updated driver be
sending a "just chill but don't turn off" signal whereas the old one really
sent a "shut off" signal? Or, more accurately, could the new one be sending
a low signal that lets it go black but keeps it on, whereas the old one
really sent *no* signal to the monitor in power saving mode?

Thanks
 
Back
Top