Dark screen on laptop.

[Jonzjob]

I have a Novatech laptop and I have obviously done something to change the screen settings. When it should get to go to screen saver (I like the R.A.F. Battle of Britain squadron photos) the screen goes dark and the only way that I can bring it back to what ever I was doing is to move the mouse/touch pad/hit a key and then press Fn key, bottom left, and F11 together 2 times. The Fn/F11 combination usually toggles the screen between dark and normal.

I have had a look at the power settings and can find nothing there that may cause this. It is very frustrating because I used to be able to just move the mouse and the screen would come back to whatever I was doing.

Any ideas please?

[Pierre ZFP]

You haven't set the power functions to set the screen to turn off have you?

If you've set the screensaver to come on at say 10 mins, you might have the power save set for the same time

[Dick Smith]

I can't check this (no PCs at home) but have you somehow set the dual-output setting to an external source (I used that for projectors and had similar trouble at times)? I really can't remember where you have to go to change it, but it isn't obvious, as I recall.

[Wils]

Could try the good old system restore.

[Jonzjob]

Sorted!!!

Would you believe that the screen saver was the cause. I uninstalled the programme, reinstalled it and it was still a problem? When I tried another screen saver it was fine and when the screen went to the screen saver and I moved the mouse or anything it popped back to the normal screen. Tried the R.A.F screen saver I had the same problem. Sad because I liked that saver with some lovely photos on it.

Anyway the problem is solved, so thank you for all the suggestions...