Windows 10 Dark screen on full RAM

WinFreak

Member
Not in safe mode, but in normal mode, the screen goes dark as soon as the 4GB RAM gets full, without warning. Sometimes even by just running the web browser.

How do I escape the dark screen without any reboot?
 
Hi

I'm not sure that this will work but you could try increasing your Virtual Memory.
Type Advanced System Settings in the search box on the taskbar...

Select the Advanced tab....
Select the Advanced tab again...

Click Settings and check what your virtual settings are set at, I always set mine at one and a half times as much as the real ram I have installed.
In you case that would be 12 Gigabytes.

In my case that's 48 Gigabytes.

If it's set to automatic try setting it to custom, and set it to 18 Gigabytes because the amount of ram you have is too low to start with. Set both the minimum and the maximum amount to the same setting.

Like I said, I'm not sure if this will help, but I see other people having this issue and no good answers.

You really need to have at least 8 gigs of ram to run Windows 10.

You should probably swap out your ram for a 8 Gigabyte stick. You don't say what kind of computer you have but it would probably cost you under $100.

Mike
 
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Yeah if you're peaking in the 90+% range on your RAM you really should add more. Windows will become very unstable and I've seen anything from not being able to log to program crashes including explorer.exe which appear as a black screen with a mouse pointer.
 
Yeah if you're peaking in the 90+% range on your RAM you really should add more. Windows will become very unstable and I've seen anything from not being able to log to program crashes including explorer.exe which appear as a black screen with a mouse pointer.
But why does it only happen on this PC and why not in safe mode?
 
Hi

In safe mode many Windows elements and actions are turned off, reducing the need for memory usage.
Do you have another PC that only has 4 Gigabytes of ram, that doesn't crash?

Almost all new PCs come with 8 Gigabytes or more now.

4 Gigs isn't enough to run Windows 10 unless you aren't using it for more than the most basic activities.

And it can depend on how your other hardware is configured and what it is as well.
If you don't have a video card and are using the video from the mother board for instance you are doing all the video processing with the ram you have on the card.

Most video cards now have more than 4 Gigabytes of ram by themselves now, reducing the load on the onboard ram.

Mike
 
Hi

In safe mode many Windows elements and actions are turned off, reducing the need for memory usage.
Do you have another PC that only has 4 Gigabytes of ram, that doesn't crash?

Almost all new PCs come with 8 Gigabytes or more now.

4 Gigs isn't enough to run Windows 10 unless you aren't using it for more than the most basic activities.

And it can depend on how your other hardware is configured and what it is as well.
If you don't have a video card and are using the video from the mother board for instance you are doing all the video processing with the ram you have on the card.

Most video cards now have more than 4 Gigabytes of ram by themselves now, reducing the load on the onboard ram.

Mike
I found out what caused it:

Too small swap file size. The SSD of the netbook is close to full, so no place for swapping.

My netbook runs surprisignly fast on Windows 10, but if no place for swapping is available, this black screen bug happens.
 
I found out what caused it:

Too small swap file size. The SSD of the netbook is close to full, so no place for swapping.

My netbook runs surprisignly fast on Windows 10, but if no place for swapping is available, this black screen bug happens.

Prevention is better than cure.
Please read this article about SSD Trimming (it should already be enabled in Windows 10 but just check):
Why SSD TRIM Support is so Important and How to Enable It

And watch this video about helping your SSD last longer:

 
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