If when you power-on your Surface device and it’s stuck on and won’t pass the black screen showing American Megatrends, then this post is intended to help you. In this post, we will provide the possible solutions you can try to help remediate this issue.

A configuration change was requested to clear this computer’s TPM

What you see as shown in the image above is a black screen with American Megatrends at the top. The screen contains configuration options for the Trusted Platform Module (TPM) settings.

It’s worth noting that this screen may appear after a recovery or reset of your Surface – it tells you that a TPM configuration change was requested.

Surface stuck on a black screen

If you’re faced with this Surface black screen showing American Megatrends issue, you can follow the instructions below to resolve the issue.

If you see the American Megatrends TPM screen on your Surface, do the following:

Note: You’ll need a Surface Typing Cover or another USB keyboard to complete this solution.

Press F12. (If you’re using a Surface Typing Cover, press Fn+F12.)

This will keep your current TPM settings, and your Surface will continue to Windows.

If Windows starts successfully, proceed to install the latest Surface and Windows updates to help prevent future problems.
If Windows fails to start and the American Megatrends TPM black screen appears again, contact Microsoft Support.

Trusted Platform Module (TPM) technology is designed to provide hardware-based, security-related functions. A TPM chip is a secure crypto-processor that is designed to carry out cryptographic operations. The chip includes multiple physical security mechanisms to make it tamper-resistant, and malicious software is unable to tamper with the security functions of the TPM.

Some of the key advantages of using TPM technology are that you can:

Generate, store, and limit the use of cryptographic keys.
Use TPM technology for platform device authentication by using the TPM’s unique RSA key, which is burned into itself.
Help ensure platform integrity by taking and storing security measurements.

The most common TPM functions are used for system integrity measurements and for key creation and use.