topic Re: Browser page keeps going blank?! in Tech Help - Software/Hardware etc

Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Mon, 02 Sep 2024 11:15:29 GMT

I`ve been trying to start a new thread about this and can`t! Well, not quite as I`ve just managed to! but after about 20 minutes trying and need a bit of feedback around what may be causing my issue.

Problem: When I try to start a new topic, reply to an existing post or, reply to a PM message, I often see the page appear and wait until the cursor is flashing and the page `settles` and then begin trying what I want to say. But while the page is loading, it suddenly just goes blank? 🤔

I go back a page and try again, the same thing happens? I only managed to open this page by typing inside the box before the page is actually loaded fully and sometimes even that fails to work and it just goes blank again. Thankfully it worked this time or you wouldn`t be reading this!

I`ve also noticed this issue happening on another forum that I am not a member of so I can`t post on that forum, but it happens when I`m clicking on some topic of interest and the page goes blank on me again. So I can`t then read what`s been said. And it`s usually something that interests me personally which is frustrating.

I run Windows 10 Home and use the EDGE browser. Microsoft (in their wisdom) have recently been meddling with my screen and updating some features (I have that turned on in settings) so chances are when my laptop auto-updates or I run it manually, stuff is happening that I`m unaware of so could be related to that, but I`m not so sure.

Just wanted to throw this out to the more advanced techies out there who may be seeing this happen and know what`s causing it? It seems to be intermittent, but on some days it`s just damned annoying as it occurs more frequently.

Any help would be great.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

Dan_the_Van — Mon, 02 Sep 2024 11:53:31 GMT

If is ON try turning it OFF

Found in system settings of Edge (and other browsers) or just search for graphics within the settings screen

HTH

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Mon, 02 Sep 2024 13:09:06 GMT

You`ve lost me Dan, I`ve looked in Settings generally and can`t find the EDGE graphics you showed above? I know I`m looking in the wrong place. 🙄

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

Dan_the_Van — Mon, 02 Sep 2024 14:27:52 GMT

Look at the top right corner in the Edge app, three dots, then click on the cog wheel >Settings found near the bottom.

HTH

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Tue, 03 Sep 2024 13:15:01 GMT

Just had a look in there but all I see when I choose About Microsoft EDGE from the left hand column is a page with various Microsoft Edge Insider information saying `see what`s coming soon!` 🤔

I find this really annoying when I should be able to trace what this problem is if it means changing or turning something on or off in the settings and end up in a minefield of various pages trying to find the answer. Just wanted to know if anyone else has had this happen to them where they click on a page to open it to read something or want to reply to it and the page starts to load and then just goes blank? It does sometimes work at various times but usually happens when it`s not convenient. I`ve managed to reply to this post for example, but if I stay online for another ten minutes and try to reply to another post, I see this same issue happening again. And as I said previously, it`s also happening on another website I read posts on, so it`s not the PN forum that`s at fault.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

Dan_the_Van — Tue, 03 Sep 2024 18:41:01 GMT

Try this link edge://settings/system

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Thu, 05 Sep 2024 16:39:46 GMT

@Dan_the_Van. I`ve found the settings page that shows similar to the one you have posted. In the "Use graphics acceleration when available" it shows as ON. What does that mean exactly? And do you think this is why I`m getting these intermittent white/blank pages appearing? I`ve managed to reply again but I`ve not been logged in for a while so I`ll report back if this keeps happening before I attempt to turn this graphics acceleration to OFF.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

Dan_the_Van — Thu, 05 Sep 2024 17:51:14 GMT

@plusmouse

I have a couple of raspberry pi system which exhibited the issue you described but using Chrome (Edge is Microsoft badged chrome), the cure for those devices was to turn off graphics acceleration, hence my suggestion.

Graphics acceleration setting can be found on mainstream browsers, it's reckoned to improve display performance but some graphics hardware does not handle the feature

HTH

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 10:43:41 GMT

Thanks Dan, I appreciate your replies. I know where the graphics setting is now and if this blankety-blank continues, I`ll go straight in there and turn it off! I`ll browse around this and the other site where these episodes were happening and find out if it`s fixed itself or not. If not, I`ll change that setting.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 12:35:20 GMT

Update: Just tried turning that graphics feature OFF and it didn`t work. I visited the 02 mobile phone forum page and clicked on one of the posts to read it. The small screen buffering ring appeared and then BLANK! White page appeared again. 🤔 I have to say, that particular forum/community page has been acting like this for a very long time now so I usully expect it to start playing up, but now it`s happening on here too?

It seems to be a delay thing where if you try to view a page to read it or to reply to it, this page loading delay begins and then the screen just goes white. I go back a page and try again, same thing happens. I`ve managed to reply on here again but as I said earlier, it`s an intermittent thing. Does it with Private Messages too. But not all the time.

Think I need Colombo!

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

jab1 — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 13:00:04 GMT

@plusmouse I don't know if you have, but have you tried an alternative browser program, as suggested I think by @Dan_the_Van ?

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 15:40:58 GMT

@jab1 - No, I use primarily EDGE and before that, Internet Explorer (before I upgraded to Windows 10) a while back. I keep being prompted to switch to Chrome by Gmail but I never do. I tend to stick to what I know.

My laptop is old now (13 years-ish?) and Windows update is set automatically (it`s set to download those as soon as they become available) in Windows Update. But I think it was me who set it to do so.

Windows 11 is not compatible on this machine but recently I`ve notice my Home screen changes images on it`s own every other day and the search facility down in the left corner now has a random image within it (today it`s a seagull!), when that wasn`t there previously. So my laptop seems to be showing a tendency for random changes perhaps preparing, or elbowing me to towards a new laptop. Whether this has anything to do with the white screen issue, I really don`t know.

There`s a YouTube video of a guy showing users how to `fix` their White Screen by rebooting (holding down the ON/OFF button for something like 20 seconds and I remember trying this months ago when I was turning this laptop on and seeing a BLACK screen, but discovered I was trying to boot it up too quickly after turning it on at the mains. I haven`t had that problem since.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

jab1 — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 15:53:45 GMT

@plusmouse I gave up on Microsoft about 5 years back, although I do still have a working W7 machine, merely for a couple of 'easy to use' programs I haven't found good Linux replacements for.

Chrome is not the only alternative - I use Firefox across all my machines as they sync - I have a free Firefox account, so no matter which laptop/tablet/phone I use, I have exactly the same bookmarks on each device. Again, there are other browsers, but what you do is ultimately your choice.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

Dan_the_Van — Fri, 06 Sep 2024 17:19:55 GMT

@plusmouse

Pity it didn't resolve your issue, it had for me previously.

I will no longer be subscribed to this thread as this will be my last post on this forum for the foreseeable future, so I wish you luck finding the root cause.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Sat, 07 Sep 2024 17:24:41 GMT

@Dan_the_Van : Thanks for your help Dan and all the best. I`m sure I`ll stumble across a `fix` at some stage or end up circumventing it until I end up with a new laptop sooner rather than later.

@jab1 : I`ve had some advice about moving away from Windows recently, but to be honest, I`m still learning about Windows in many ways even after using it for over a decade, so to switch away and start fresh with another platform I`m not sure would confuse me even more! I do appreciate doing that can be a good move though. I`ll carry on `as is` and see how things go.

I did visit the 02 community again yesterday and decided to `google` this issue linked to that community and apparently, it`s still a big problem for the 02 app and `My 02` users. Someone just recently posted about this problem when they couldn`t access the 02 `app` and also on their 02 web account, so it does seem to be a continuing problem with that site. Some of the members even suggested using other browsers too and it failed to solve the issue. What a carry on when someone needs to access their account or use the 02 app and can`t even view the page!

I`m wondering if it`s s driver issue because when I was googling, some suggestions on the MS community were to reinstall a driver...or something....can`t remember exactly. But that`s as far as I got as I don`t need to be messing with that as my drivers seem to be up to date and working fine.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Sun, 29 Sep 2024 11:01:16 GMT

OK, so this pattern of events has continued to plague me mainly when attempting to reply to posts, but also sometimes just opening a topic to read it. The screen begins to load the reply page but then goes blank with the message "error code - out of memory". Sometimes (as it`s doing now) it doesn`t show this message and the page loads fine. But it`s becoming a nuisance due to the frequency of it. Especially when I`ve had some replies from members and can`t reply at that time due to theve events.

I did some more digging around this issue and some Microsoft community member posts and other sites are suggesting this was caused because of an EDGE browser fault during one of the updates. I checked the version I was using last night and it was version 129.0.2792.52 installed on September 2024.

The consensus is that this can be fixed by updating the EDGE browser to version 122.0.2365.66. So off I went to do just that and after my version loaded/updated, it shows as version 129.0.2792.65......so not quite the version shown above in bold. Maybe I need to wait until the 66 version comes my way?

I don`t normally update the browser manually as I have automatic updates set in the settings, so it`s not an area I normally pay much attention to but when I do get these updated versions downloading, once I reboot the laptop, I`m met with the screen and message that my Windows browser has updated and to start using it? I always click on the X in the task bar and just revert to the version I`m using so perhaps that`s where I`m going wrong? Or Microsoft are using these error messages to push Windows users to use their newer versions of Edge?

Apologies for the long winded explanation but that`s what`s going on and would be interested to hear if anyone else is having this problem or can shed some much needed light on it for me? When I google search it, it seems there are many other Windows users having the same problems and never finding a fix apart from someone mentioning that 66 version being the `fix`. Which as yet, I don`t have.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

jab1 — Sun, 29 Sep 2024 11:10:44 GMT

You obviously like edge, but there are plenty of other browsers out there...

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

jgb — Sun, 29 Sep 2024 11:11:44 GMT

Just checked my Edge version and it was the 129.0.2792.52 version. It has updated to 129.0.2792.65. I did not have the issue you report with the earlier version an, obviously since I am replying here, I do not have it with the current version. I am afraid I cannot help solve your issue.

However, you mention version 122.0.2365.66. This must be an old version judging by the "122" starting digits. I suspect it was an old post in the MS community forums.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

plusmouse — Sun, 29 Sep 2024 11:25:46 GMT

@jgb yes, I noticed that too. Really strange what`s going on. I`ve tried to reply to a few posts on here this morning and a moment ago to this one and was blanked out again. It`s very `hit and miss`. Given you had the version I was using ending with 52 and is now showing as 65 as of when I updated mine last night, this is still an ongoing `bug` I seem to be dealing with and hope it fixes itself because it`s doing my head in!

Where do I look to view all the versions my laptop has had please? Not that it will solve anything just curious.

@jab1 - Problem is, I prefer to stick to using the Microsoft browser as it`s what I`m used to. My laptop isn`t compatible with Windows 11 either (I`m using Windows 10 Home) 32 bit currently.

Re: Browser page keeps going blank?!

jab1 — Sun, 29 Sep 2024 11:35:26 GMT

@plusmouse I can't really help with Windows these days - I've been a Linux user for too long - but I was merely suggesting that there are other options for browsers if your current one is causing issues.