Monitor going to sleep

[redvette]

Hi Gang

Off the top of your heads what would you point your finger at if your monitor says no signal going to sleep. ? MOBO, video card,????? Just not knowing anything else, what would you put your money on.? Fans crank up, everything seems normal, no smoke. ha ha ha Don't worry I will not hold you too your guesstamation, I just want to see how many agree with my idea.

Thanks........Gunny

[Cricket]

Exactly what is happening? Is the computer running okay and then the monitor loses the video signal?

How old is the monitor? What type is it?

How old is the computer? Is it home built or name brand? What are the complete specs?

Have you already checked to see if the video card is fully inserted into the slot?

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

Here we are again. ha ha ha Well this is the Gigabyte MOBO, and a new monitor, (I have tried two different ones). I power it on and I get this little box on the monitor saying no signal going to sleep. The Video card, (e-GeForce 7100GS) is new, a PCI express card. The MOBO is a used one, not knowing the history of, was told it was a good one. The card is inserted good, and the memory is too, double and triple checked it and the video card. Tried 2 different cables from monitor to the Computer. Same results. Like I said as far as I can tell every thing seems to come on, fans, etc.

I knew I should have given all the other information. ha ha ha

Thanx.........Gunny

[Cricket]

Try the out-of-case-troubleshooter and let us know what happens. You must remove the motherboard from the case when doing this...you're trying to determine if the motherboard is shorting out to the case or not.

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

Well I followed the procedure and it is the same thing, nothing. No signal to the monitor. So that tells me it is the MOBO or the Video card. I guess there is no way to narrow it down further, you just have to substitute now. A good Video card runs about as much as a MOBO, so I guess I will toss a coin as to which one I will try first. The thing that makes it a little more difficult is this being a PCI express card, cause I have a couple of known good older video cards. I was pretty sure it was one or the other, but doing this test really tells me it is one or the other, no doubts left.

Thanks.........Gunny

[Cricket]

If you have an older PCI video card you could use that just to see if the motherboard is still good.

Cricket

[redvette]

HI Cricket

Do you mean plug it into one of the reg PCI connectiions.??????? I was thinking of that. So if I do this and I get a signal to the monitor, that tells me the new video card is bad, and the MOBO is ok. What about the CPU being bad.???? Is this right, it is either the CPU, MOBO, or video card, as it stands now, being the MOBO is out of the case.

Thanks.........Gunny

[Cricket]

Originally Posted by redvette Do you mean plug it into one of the reg PCI connectiions.???????

Yes, plug it into one of the free PCI slots. Remove the other video card first.

Originally Posted by redvette I was thinking of that. So if I do this and I get a signal to the monitor, that tells me the new video card is bad, and the MOBO is ok.

Yes, if you get an image on the monitor the motherboard is okay and the video card is no good.

Originally Posted by redvette What about the CPU being bad.???? Is this right, it is either the CPU, MOBO, or video card, as it stands now, being the MOBO is out of the case.

Time to post the complete system specs for this computer...don't know which CPU you're using.

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

The CPU is a 3.2GHZ Pent D

Thanx.....Gunny

[Cricket]

I want to know the brand of the power supply and the RAM.

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

The ram is !G of Kingston PC2 5300 DIMM amd the power supply is an Antec 500W.

Thanx.........Gunny

[Cricket]

I'm working on a computer now that has 1GB of Kingston RAM (2 X 512MB) and it wasn't booting up. 1 of the sticks of RAM was bad and we're going to switch to Crucial RAM because of Kingston's recent quality control problems.

If you have 2 sticks of RAM you might want to try 1 stick at a time.

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

I hate to shoot down all the suggestions you are giving me. I know how that feels. I use to get this all the time when quizzing people about their car troubles. But I did try another stick and it does the same thing. No signal to monitor. I know what you mean by the stick not pushed into the connection good, that has been the case a few times with me.

So as it stands now, it can be the CPU, MOBO, video card. I am pretty sure the video card is ok, so I guess it boils down to the CPU, MOBO. I have made sure of a good bond between the CPU and the heat sink too. The board can use either the D or a Pent 4.

Thanx..........Gunny

[Cricket]

If it comes down to those 2 components then I would suspect the Gigabyte motherboard before I thought the CPU was dead.

CPUs are remarkably robust and don't seem to suffer the same death rate that other components do. Most times when a CPU dies it's from over zealous overclocking (too much vcore voltage resulting in a fried processor) or from heatsink installation damage (older exposed core CPUs)...I rarely ever hear of CPUs just dying from normal use...and I've been messing with computers for 10 years.

Cricket

[redvette]

Hi Cricket

Ya I think I have to agree with you. All the reading and what ever it does seem I read more on MOBO's going bad then CPU's. I guess if you had the knowledge and time you could find out which one it really is, that is bad. And the next best thing is to substitute. Seems such a waist to do it this way though. Oh well that is how it goes some times.

I will have to check out the for sale on here and of course Ebay and Craigslist.

Thanks and take care........Gunny

[andper10]

It would be a good idea to get a NEW motherboard. If you buy used you don't know if it is broken when you buy it, or if it ends up getting broken in the mail. Yes it is cheaper but you really don't know for sure what its history is. It could be that your motherboard doesn't support the Pentium D 9xx series CPU's (if yours is a 9xx) without a BIOS update. But I doubt that is causing the problem.

[redvette]

Yes I have to agree with what you are saying. I have had good luck on things like this, but just like every thing else it will catch up with you. This was not shipped I bought if off a local person, but even so this does not rule out getting a bad one. And with most of these electronic things, 99% of the time you cannot look at it and say it is bad.

Even with new things, there is no 100% sure it is ok. SO with used you are at a 50% chance. I bought the CPU and MOBO together. He said he was updating and did not have any use for this setup now. I do my research, but even with this, you can get a bummer. I wont say this will stop my used part buying but I have learned a few things from this. No more MOBO's with out seeing them work.

Thanks and take care........Gunny