Surface Book 3 will not start, charger light is on

Question

My Surface Book 3 will not turn on. Screen black, no sound/lights when I hold down power button or power + volume up. Any suggestions about what could be wrong? 

Last night I went to bed with my Surface Book 3 (purchased July 2020) turned on and plugged in, as I do every day.  I had it plugged in via the USB C option, which I have been using for a few weeks.  This morning I woke up with only the Surface logo showing on a black screen and it wouldn't wake up.  I held down the power button for a while to turn it off, which it did, but then I could never turn it on again.  I removed the USB C cable and switched to the original power adapter, in case that was the problem.  Light on the power cord is on (where it connects to the computer) so it seems to be functional.  But I've left it for a couple of hours and still cannot turn it on. 

It is still under warranty but I have quite a bit of data I have not backed up from the past few months unfortunately and would really like to get it back.  I saw some stories here indicating that's impossible, so it would be nice if I could figure out what the problem is and get it working again. I didn't hear any sort of pop nor observe any visible problem, nor did I have any accessories plugged into the laptop at the time.  I would like to try detaching the screen but I'm not sure how to do that with it off.

Answer 1

Literally, the exact same thing happened to me.  The same date, overnight, just like you described.  I was charging using the surface port, however, not USB C.  I've tried detaching the screen using the keyboard button and it turns green, then quickly changes to red - no dice.  The usual tricks to reboot aren't working either (holding the power button for 20 seconds; holding the power and volume up buttons for 30 seconds).  I'm supposed to lead a committee tomorrow morning with files on the device that haven't been backed up.

This has happened before but was usually reversible.  I've had a bunch of other issues related to the display driver, GPU, charging, and am wondering if I made the wrong decision to purchase at this point.

EDIT:  Did you install the updated Intel display driver to fix the display issues?  I did.  Also, it looks like there were some firmware and driver updates dated yesterday, 2/5/21 and I'm guessing my device installed them automatically overnight, grrrr...  One of them is for UEFI - could this be causing the issue?

Link to 2/5/21 updates: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/surface-book-3-update-history-935a7b6b-2f6d-dbf9-b3ba-0ea61e187b2d

Answer 2

I'm glad to hear you weren't using USB C to charge it.  I was afraid that was relevant and I had somehow broken it myself.

I too have been having tons of issues with the GPU and display drivers.  Basically since I got it I had to turn off "hardware acceleration" for every application.  I kept thinking I should send it in for a replacement because there were so many issues but I didn't have a backup computer to use while it was gone.  Well now I do, because I bought a new one today since I need a computer, but I still don't want to lose my data.  Worst case scenario I'm going to send it in for warranty replacement (which I might do anyway even if I somehow get this solved).

I bet you're right about the updates!  That would make total sense timing-wise and the fact that it happened on the same day.  I can't make anything come on at all.  I have the exact same behavior with the screen detach button that you described as well.  I found a YouTube video showing how to detach it using a paperclip but I haven't tried it yet (I was afraid I might do even more damage and not be able to put it back on).  How to manually detach surface book screen - YouTube

I did install some updates last weekend that I believe included the updated display driver, but I had been holding off on installing updates for a while because it was not convenient to reboot, so I'm not exactly sure what all installed.  (But I did have updates set to install automatically last night.)

Thanks for posting.  I'm sorry I haven't figured anything out yet but I will definitely come back here if I do.  

Edit: Didn't know that video would show up in the middle of the post.  Wanted to add I've also tried holding power down for a long time, with and without volume-up button, nothing happens.  I was going to try tomorrow to make a USB boot drive, though I can't see how that will help since it doesn't seem like it's even beginning to try to start or to get to the point where it selects where to boot from. Hard to tell though since it is very quiet.

Answer 3

I was thinking the same thing about a USB recovery drive - seems useless if the device won't power on.  Hopefully, the updated display drivers (I think I saw 3 of them) will fix the display issues.  However, if the updates caused the issue, I don't see how MS can fix that remotely.  Wouldn't the computer need to turn on and boot in order to get the fix?

Answer 4

Ah I see, you were talking about the updated drivers in that same package.  No, I don't know if those installed -- I definitely didn't install them manually (last time I installed any updates was last weekend).  

I know, I'm concerned that this is impossible to fix since it won't start up.  I'm not sure who to go to because Microsoft warranty support seems mostly interested in just replacing the computer (which is better than nothing, because it was expensive, but still, I really want the data).  Sorry about your presentation tomorrow -- that's so frustrating.  I also am feeling depressed about all the data I have lost that I spent many, many hours on, and mad at myself for not backing it up.  

I'm also wondering if I shouldn't have turned it off this morning, if there would have been something that could have been done with it in a semi-on state (with logo showing), but it's too late for that apparently.

Unfortunately I don't remember if I changed any UEFI settings when I got the computer.  I was doing Android development and I remember thinking I had to make some changes to get the emulator to work, but it turned out I don't think I needed to (but I might have tweaked something and not changed it back).  Do you remember if you have any nonstandard setup?

Answer 5

Aside from the Intel graphics driver I downloaded to fix the screen issues, I changed nothing.  Just standard application installs - Office 365, Adobe Creative Cloud and Acrobat, Chrome... the usual.