Screen Flashing Black

[cprice330]

My TV has randomly started flashing black while trying to watch TV. Tried a new HDMI cable and its still persisting. We did a software update right before this started happening. Any ideas?

[CRobGauth]

Software update on TV?

brand and model?

does TV have more than 1 HDMI input?

have you tried swapping that?

do you have more than 1 stb?

if you do, have you tried swapping them?

[BrownC]

We have had this problem before on our plasma tv but it has just started happening again. The screen goes black for a sec or two then the picture pops back on. Like every 4-5 minutes, very annoying! I switched the STB from the other room, tried a different HDMI cable and ports on the tv. The black screen started happening again shortly after. We called Verizon who sent a tech out. He determined that the signal into the box was just a little low (we had a splitter on the line) and he did some adjustments to make it stronger.

This time it's been happening and since we had the tech out already, I figured it must be the tv. The Geek Squad tech explained it's not the tv, it's the signal fluctuations causing the issue. Try watching video from another source besides the cable box. He said we should not see the drop outs.

End of story is that either the cable signal needs to be boosted (approximately $30 device) or remove any splitters on the line so you have a "direct" cable to the box. You want a strong, steady signal feed from the line into the house to the STBs.

Hope that helps.