Hiall, Noobie Alert, I won a computer A YEAR AGO and have been unable to use it as LCD display is unreadable! The computer was built by TechTV/G4 cable show employees from parts from TigerDirect. Asus A8V Deluxe Via Socket 939 ATX Motherboard Athlon 64 4000+ processor nVidia xFXGeForce 6800GT videocard Ultra X-Connect 500W Modular Power Supply Ultra XL 1024 Mb PC3200 DDR 400Mhz (2 x 512 Mb) Ram Hitachi Deskstar 7K400 400Gb Serial ATA HD BenQ FP2091 20.1" LCD, 400:1 contrast, 16ms response, 1600x1200 Microsoft Windows Media Center 2005 w/ various other goodies When it arrived all the round modular cabling had fallen off connections (as VERY Heavy connectors on cables) and Videocard had come partially out of AGP slot. I didn't find this out for almost 2 months as my father was in hospital in ICU when it arrived and just didn't have time then to unpack and check it out :+( When I did after he died, etc I found that after reseating card and reconnecting cables that display went NG when had a problem activating Windows Media Center. Since computer wasn't online it gave me some code and I used a touchtype phone to enter it and said code was invalid. Tried several times. At one point I was in middle of this activation process and got a phone call and when I got back to computer it had gone to some "screensaver or powersaver mode" so had a blank screen which I couldn't seem to get out of (locked up?). Anywho, I eventually had to hard reboot the pc and from then on had a crappy display! On initial Dos-like boot screens where says biosname, Hard Drives Found, Memory, etc. before goes to a Windows screen it is now TOTALLY FILLED with random Ascii gibberish Around the "real" useful text, making it impossible to read load failures, drivers, etc as they're buried in it. When it gets to Windows load screen it has columns of dots for the full height of monitor spaced ~ 1/2" apart. LCD is OK as I hooked it up to my old computer and dispays fine, NG on xFXGeForce 6800GT using Digital or Analog inputs (but both would come from same source tho, so if card prob would make no diff as just stick an adapter cable in to get analog, no analog output directly out of videocard. Has 2 DVI output connectors but get output out of only one of them (and it's this crappy stuff), other makes LCD say "No Signal Found". I then had an aunt die, then I had a heart attack, ... So after a year I'm finally getting back trying to fix this big, black paperweight. Can't go back to G4/Tech TV as has been > 1yr so I'm on my own and mony is low as now on 13 scrips a month !! Anyone have any ideas what this can be and how I can fix it. I would rather not reformat hard drive as it may have unknown goodies on it that I'll lose ;+( But maybe operating system got trashed? Or maybe vid card died? Hopefully Thanx, manic49er
Hi Manic49er, If there is a support cd included with that computer you could try looking for a non-destructive recovery function which will reinstall all original windows files and drivers included on it. You said you have an old computer where you tested that LCD Monitor on right? Try using that pc to test the hardware from the newer pc, if your older pc supports S-ATA you can use it too read your harddisk or in the worst case, to save the possible "goodies" which are on it. In the same way you can also test your 6800GT. Just stick it into the older pc and verify if it works. I once had a similar problem, but the symptoms weren't completely the same. But my pc would get past boot, and during windows boot it got interrupted by error messages and telling me certain files were missing from disk. I eventually found out it was being caused by one of 2 RAM sticks which was corrupted / broken. Upon removing the corrupted / broken one windows booted normally. Hope this helps you a little on the way.
Thanx, but unfortunately that older computer has it's own sets of problems as it hung up in the middle of a Windows XP SP2 Upgrade and now is neither SP1 nor SP2 and it's System Restore Points are NG and ended up with vid problems of it's own (apparently whenever change a Theme all windows end up black within them an loose taskbar, Start button, ...). Takes hours and hours of clicking in black screen windows to get vid back. Loath to lose my only working PC (as long as I don't change themes) as I am addicted to surfing the net for freeware, emus, free addons to programs, ....! Really need to reinstall Win XP on that computer, but I would lose ~ 7 yrs of downloads (~250G, most of which are unbacked up due to sheer size and can't afford another HD to back that much stuff up onto ;+( But I'll have to develop a spine and take a chance I guess eventually or I've just got a big black paperweight and a crippled PC (as I like changing themes on my PC!). I assume the problems on the new PC could be due to - 1- Video Card NG 2- Motherboard Damaged by Dangling Videocard during shipping 3- Bad BIOS 4- Bad Memory 5- Corrupted Windows Media Center 2005 Installation I just have a problem when things are wrong with system this early in boo as can be so many diff things and I can't afford to buy replacements to check out. Thanx Anyways, manic49er
