Alt + Tab shortcut helps to switch between open windows quickly. But what if you see a black screen when using keyboard shortcuts? This is a common problem caused by outdated drivers, misconfigured system settings, and the monitor’s game mode feature.
If your screen turns black when pressing the Alt + Tab shortcut on a Windows computer, you’ve come to the right place. In this article, we will explore six ways to fix black screen when pressing Alt + Tab shortcut on Windows 10 and Windows 11.
1. Change the Display Mode of the Application (Game)
The black screen issue usually appears when exiting a full screen game. It may be due to an incompatibility between the game display mode and the display settings on your Windows computer.
If you see a black screen when using the Alt+Tab shortcut while playing a game in full screen, change the display mode of that game to fix the problem. To do that, go to the game’s graphics settings and set the display mode to Window.
If a black screen appears when using the Alt+Tab shortcut of other applications, run them in windowed mode and check if it makes any difference. Here’s how to do it:
Step 1: Right-click on the program and select Properties from the context menu.
Step 2: Switch to the Shortcut tab. Then, in the Goal field, enter -window at the end of the file path.
Step 3: Click Apply and then click OK.
2. Adjust your monitor’s refresh rate
Refresh rate refers to the number of times your monitor updates images per second. For instance, if you have a 120Hz monitor, it will update the image on the screen 120 times per second.
Configuring your computer at a higher refresh rate can help improve display quality. But if your monitor doesn’t support the configured refresh rate, you may experience problems like a black screen when using the Alt+Tab shortcut.
Therefore, if you have configured your monitor to a higher refresh rate, change it to the default setting to solve the problem. You can do that by following the instructions below:
Step 1: Press the Windows + I key combination to open the Settings application.
Step 2: Select System from the left sidebar and select Display from the right pane.
Step 3: Select Advanced Display.
Step 4: Click the drop-down icon next to Select refresh rate option and select 60Hz from the list. Note that you will need to choose a refresh rate that your monitor supports. But even if you have a 120Hz or higher monitor, choose 60Hz to fix the problem.
Step 5: Select the Keep Changes button from the prompt that appears.
3. Turn off game mode on your screen
Many monitors come with a built-in game mode feature that you can enable for better refresh rates, faster response times, FreeSync, HDR, etc. do more harm than good due to compatibility issues with your operating system.
When the screen goes black when pressing Alt + Tab, you can disable game mode on your screen to solve the problem. Here are the steps to disable Game Mode on LG monitors. If you’re using any other brand monitor, check out its manual to learn more about disabling game mode for the model you own.
Step 1: Press the physical button on the back of your display and go to Menu.
Step 2: Select Game Adjustment from the left sidebar.
Step 3: Select Response Time in the right pane and select Off.
Next, set Off for all other options in the right pane. After that, restart your computer and check if the problem persists.
4. Update Graphics Driver
The black screen problem when you use Alt+Tab can also appear due to corrupted or outdated graphics driver. To fix that, you need to download the latest graphics driver update.
The best way to update the graphics driver is to visit the website of the graphics card manufacturer (NVIDIA, AMD or Intel) and download the latest update. Alternatively, you can use Device Manager to update the graphics driver. Here’s how to do it on Windows:
Step 1: Press the Windows key to open the Start Menu, type Equipment management in the search bar, and then press Enter.
Step 2: Double-click Display Adapter.
Step 3: Right-click on your dedicated graphics driver and select Update driver.
Step 4: In the Update Driver window that appears, select the ‘Automatically search for drivers’ option. Windows will search for and download the latest available graphics driver.
Besides updating your graphics drivers, it’s also important that you have the latest Windows updates installed on your computer.
To update Windows, open the settings menu and select Windows Update from the left sidebar. Then, click the Check for Updates option in the right pane.
After downloading and installing the update, check if you still see a black screen using the Alt + Tab keyboard shortcut.
5. Disable full screen optimization
Full Screen Optimization is a Windows feature that automatically adjusts application display settings for best performance and stability. Normally, it works well with most programs; for others it may cause problems like input lag or black screen.
You will have to disable fullscreen optimization for that app that causes a black screen when you use the Alt+Tab shortcut. Follow the steps below to do that:
Step 1: Right-click on the problematic application and select Properties from the context menu.
Step 2: Switch to the Compatibility tab. Then select the option ‘Disable full screen optimization’.
Step 3: Click Apply and OK.
6. Change NVIDIA control panel settings
If you have an NVIDIA graphics card, you can use the NVIDIA Control Panel to fix the black screen problem. Configure Preferred Refresh Rate preferences from NVIDIA’s control panel application. Here are step-by-step instructions for doing that:
Step 1: Open Start Menu, type NVIDIA Control Panelthen press Enter.
Step 2: Double-click 3D Settings in the left sidebar.
Step 3: Select Manage 3D Settings.
Step 4: In the Settings section, click the drop-down icon next to Preferred refresh rate and select Application control.
Step 5: Click Apply.
That would allow apps to control the refresh rate and not let the GPU chip force it into the app.
Fix black screen problem
Black screen has been a very common problem with Windows since its inception. Don’t worry if you encounter a black screen when using the keyboard shortcut Alt+Tab of a game or full screen application. You can quickly fix this problem by following the solutions above.
Meanwhile, you might want to know what to do when Alt + Tab doesn’t work at all in Windows 11.
Categories: How to
Source: thpttranhungdao.edu.vn/en/
