Surface Pro 4 overheating and screen flickering

Question

I bought my Pro 4 in 2016 and I love it! Recently I've experienced screen flickering and like a second screen appears over the original. The computer also seems to be running quite warm>hot

Answer 1

Hi RayBishop3,

Thank you for reaching out Microsoft Community. We're sorry for the inconvenience this has caused you. 

We basically need to determine whether or not it's a hardware issue already and what we need to do to figure it out is to check if this display issue occurs in UEFI environment. If this occurs in UEFI, this simply means to say that your Surface device is already having a hardware issue and the best resolution we can suggest is to get a replacement for this unit, simply because hardware related problem can no longer be fixed by any troubleshooting.

Whenever the screen flickers, kindly access UEFI environment. You can follow the instructions provided in this link: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4023531/surface-how-to-use-surface-uefi.

When the device overheats, there could be some system files that are corrupted that keep on looping around and to address this issue, you can run the system file checker to check if there's any corrupted file that affects the device battery performance.

To run the system file checker, kindly type Command Prompt on the search box next to the Windows and run it as an administrator. Type sfc /scannow and hit enter. Let it load,detect and repair those corrupted files.

If it doesn't detect any corrupted files, you can download this in-place upgrade to re-update the Windows OS of your Surface device. This won't delete the files nor the existing applications you already have on your Surface. This will just re-update the Windows version and re-download those drivers that are corrupted. Just click "Download Tool Now" and hit Nextonce you see "Upgrade This PC".

If this answers your question, feel free to mark this post as an answer. Otherwise, don't hesitate tocontact support for replacement options if the screen flickering issue appears in UEFI.

Kind Regards,

Crest_Z

Answer 2

Hi,

I have exactly the same problem. Bought my surface in 2016 and 1 week from now, it started flickering.

It still occurs on UEFI envirement. Runned the system file checker and everything's alright. 

Is there any other sugestion?

Best regards

Rafael

Answer 3

I starting noticing the exact same issue recently.  Everything is working fine....then the SP4 starts getting rather warn.  A little black line appears about 1/2 inch from the top of the screen.  Then ghosting / very blurry.  Finally the screen starts flickering.  If i turn it off, everything cools back down and then it is back to normal.  Not sure if it was caused by the last update.  Going to see if i can roll it back.

Actually i just notices that a Surface - Firmware - 109.3192.768.0 was installed on April 14th.  I wonder if this is what broke things.

Answer 4

I have a similar problem with screen ghosting and then vibrating after using the computer for Zoom meetings for 3-4 hrs. I suspect the computer is overheating. 

Please help.