Sometimes your Windows system running device may get laggy or starts stuttering while using and the computer’s screen gets turned off & on again. It should also throw out an error notice something like “Display driver stopped responding and has recovered” in the notification area while playing any games. This is one of the most common issues that can happen which is also known as ‘Timeout Detection and Recovery’ (TDR). It basically understands that the graphics card has not responded for a specific time and restarts the display drivers to get back in normal again. Now, if you’re also facing the problem, check out this troubleshooting guide to fix it.
One of the most common reasons behind this problem is that some of the background running tasks are ruining the system performance by using a lot of GPU resources. Additionally, the display driver issue, dust or moisture on the graphics card, etc. Though it’s not alarming for the users to receive such error messages once in a while, if you start getting it quite often, make sure to check out all the possible workarounds mentioned below.
Fix: Video Card Stopped Responding While Playing Any Games
In most cases, affected Windows users mention that a defective or incompatible graphics card mostly causes such issues. Therefore, you should cross-check whether your graphics card is incompatible with the game requirements or have some physical damage or not.
1. Update Graphics Drivers
It seems that an outdated graphics driver version can cause multiple issues with gaming or screen-related problems. It’s always better to check for the latest driver update on your computer.
- Click on the Start menu > Type Device Manager and click on it from the search result.
- Double-click on the Display adapters to expand the list.
- Now, right-click on the dedicated graphics card > Select Update Driver.
- Choose Search automatically for updated driver software.
- The system will automatically search for the latest drivers. If available, it’ll automatically download and install the update.
- Wait for a while and your system will reboot automatically.
- Finally, check for the Video Card Stopped Responding While Playing Any Games error.
2. Reinstall GPU Driver
If in case, updating your graphics driver doesn’t help you or the graphics driver is already running on the latest version then make sure to uninstall and reinstall the GPU driver. Well, it may seem slightly unusual but may come in handy.
- Right-click on the Windows logo (Start menu) from the taskbar.
- The quick start menu will appear > Select Device Manager from the list.
- Double-click on the Display adapters to expand the list.
- Now, right-click on the dedicated graphics card > Select Uninstall device.
- Follow the on-screen prompts to completely delete the display driver from your computer.
- Restart your PC/Laptop and the Windows system will automatically reinstall the appropriate display driver on your computer.
However, if the system doesn’t automatically install the driver, you can do it manually. For the Nvidia graphics card driver, you can visit the Nvidia official site here. Otherwise, the AMD graphics card users can visit AMD official site here. Once you’re on the driver download page, select your respective graphics card model and get the most latest driver. Simply install it on your Windows and restart the PC/Laptop to change effects.
Must Read: How to Flash the BIOS on an AMD GPU
3. Increase TDR Timeout
So, the ‘Timeout Detection and Recovery’ (TDR) has a timeout period that detects the issue and reboots the display drivers if the Windows system gets failed regarding the graphics card responding issue. As the “Display driver stopped responding and has recovered” error message causes the system to try rebooting the display driver and throw out this specific error notice, you should increase the TDR timeout a little bit to get more time. To do that:
- Press the Windows + R keys to open up the Run dialog box.
- Now, type regedit and press Enter to launch the Registry Editor.
- From the left pane of the Registry Editor interface, you have to navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SYSTEM > CurrentControlSet > Control
- Next, click on the GraphicsDrivers from the left pane to show its content in the right pane.
- You have to right-click on an empty space from the right pane.
- Hover over your mouse cursor to New to expand the context menu.
- If you’re using a 32-bit Windows OS, click on DWORD (32-bit) value in the context menu.
- If you’re using a 64-bit Windows OS, click on QWORD (64-bit) value in the context menu.
- Now, enter the Name of the new registry value called TdrDelay and hit Enter.
- Double-click on the TdrDelay registry value to modify it > Type 8 in the Value data field and select OK.
- Exit the Registry Editor and restart your PC to check whether the issue is fixed or not.
4. Clear Background Tasks
It seems that a couple of background runnings tasks or programs are literally affecting the GPU performance and it causes a ‘Video Card Stopped Responding’ issue while playing any games. Needless to say that a video game demands enough graphics memory to keep running it smoothly. If in case, any other task or program is consuming higher graphics usage that means your system will start lagging or display-related issues will start appearing soon. Therefore, make sure to clear some of the unnecessary or higher GPU consuming tasks from your Windows device.
- Press Ctrl + Shift + Esc keys to open up the Task Manager on your computer.
- Now, click on the Processes tab > Here you’ll see plenty of tasks that are running in the background all the time. Some of them are consuming higher CPU/Memory usage than usual which will cause performance issues.
- So, you’ll need to select the task from the list by clicking on it. [Deep yellow color will be visible]
- Once selected the task, click on End Task to completely remove it from the processes section.
- Reboot your PC and check for the issue again.
5. Manually Clean Dust or Moisture from GPU
Sometimes it can also possible that some dust or moisture has been covered on the GPU which can cause overheating or connectivity issues with the cable. So, make sure to clean all the possible dust particles or moisture from the radiators and heat sink of your GPU card manually. Check out whether the GPU ports are cleaned enough and the cable is connected properly or not.
Note: Do this method if you’re aware of the process and make sure to turn off your computer then do it.
That’s it, guys. We assume this guide was helpful to you. For additional queries, you can comment below.