...gah, signal out of range - all the time (including BIOS)

**sapi** · January 16, 2008, 01:56 AM

Hmm, well that was odd. I'm writing from an old computer that we happened to have lieing around, because my main computer has decided that, after a graphics driver crash in tf2 (screen went black, had to hard reset - it's happened before, with recovery possible), not to display anything

Even during the BIOS boot, the monitor displays 'Out of Range, H-frequency 65 KHz, V-frequency 56 Hz.

It posts correctly, and from what I can hear, almost appears to be booting correctly too.

The problem is, I can't see anything

I'm going to try it on this monitor now (will need to shut this down to do so, hence no results yet), and if that fails, I suppose resetting the CMOS won't hurt.

Else I'm forced to go for professional help

Any blinding flashes of insight, anyone?

--- (merged)

Well, that was even more odd.

The computer booted fine using this old CRT monitor, and I elected to go into safe mode.

I uninstalled the graphics driver, rebooted, and replaced it with the newest version that I happened to have sitting in my downloads folder.

However, now booting while not in safe mode (ie, off the nvidia driver) gives a BSOD naming nvlddmkm.sys (the nvidia vista display driver) as the culprit

Oh, and oddly enough, there are a collection of white dots displaying during BIOS boot, scattered over the black background in groups of three vertical 'lines'.

I guess my (only?

) next step is to see if the other monitor will accept the signal from this, working, computer.

The crash-on-boot with the nvidia drivers has me puzzled, though :S

Okay, for my third consecutive post (

I'll merge them in a second) I'll just basically summarise what I can thus far.

Connecting the graphics card to the monitor over DVI gives the 'signal out of range' error.

Connecting it over VGA works, but shows visible distortion in the BIOS (white dots/lines over the screen).

Installing the official driver will cause windows to crash on bootup, blaming the display driver.

Letting windows install its driver will do the same; the only one that works is the generic VGA one you automatically boot to.

Booting up the system in PCLinuxOS (over VGA, I happened to have a liveCD lieing around) shows a huge amount of distortion on the screen. Once it gets to the 'select keyboard type' screen, the monitor is covered by random distorted clutter, and I can only see anything at all by moving the mouse over part of the image (like when an application lags out, highlighting something makes it, but nothing else, show up).

I think my graphics card is dieing - can anyone suggest anything to the contrary?

**Freddie** · January 16, 2008, 04:41 AM

Originally Posted by sapi

Okay, for my third consecutive post (

I'll merge them in a second) I'll just basically summarise what I can thus far.

Connecting the graphics card to the monitor over DVI gives the 'signal out of range' error.

Connecting it over VGA works, but shows visible distortion in the BIOS (white dots/lines over the screen).

Installing the official driver will cause windows to crash on bootup, blaming the display driver.

Letting windows install its driver will do the same; the only one that works is the generic VGA one you automatically boot to.

Booting up the system in PCLinuxOS (over VGA, I happened to have a liveCD lieing around) shows a huge amount of distortion on the screen. Once it gets to the 'select keyboard type' screen, the monitor is covered by random distorted clutter, and I can only see anything at all by moving the mouse over part of the image (like when an application lags out, highlighting something makes it, but nothing else, show up).

I think my graphics card is dieing - can anyone suggest anything to the contrary?

So you are getting problems with both your CRT and LCD monitors now? You could try reflashing the BIOS on your video card I can’t guarantee this will solve your problems or guarantee the BIOS flash won’t go wrong and ruin your video card but it’s cheaper then forking out for a new one.

**sapi** · January 16, 2008, 04:56 AM

Originally Posted by Freddie

So you are getting problems with both your CRT and LCD monitors now? You could try reflashing the BIOS on your video card I can’t guarantee this will solve your problems or guarantee the BIOS flash won’t go wrong and ruin your video card but it’s cheaper then forking out for a new one.

The CRT shows the same thing as the VGA input on the LCD monitor; that is, a 'bad' image during boot, and crashing if I try to install a driver for it.

I might consider asking the guys at the computer shop to flash the BIOS if they find the vid card to be the problem (taking it there because I don't have a spare PCIE vid card to test this with, and because I don't actually have a floppy drive to flash it with anyway)

If it does come to replacing it, what would be the rough equivalent of a 7800gt in the current batch of nvidia cards? Synthetic benchmarks almost seem to suggest a 8600gt, but I've heard that doesn't hold up in real life performance. Would a 8600gts (256mb) be closer? (that's about as far as the budget stretches at the moment

)

I really shouldn't have let myself fall out of date with the graphics market

**Freddie** · January 16, 2008, 07:46 AM

If I were you I would take the time to upgrade rather then replace like for like, an ATI 3850 HD is reasonable money for the performance it gives, or perhaps a 256MB 8800GT. I would tear clear of ebay, buying a second hand video card is like walking through a minefield, they probably all been overclocked to within an inch of there life’s.

**sapi** · January 16, 2008, 07:49 AM

Originally Posted by Freddie

If I were you I would take the time to upgrade rather then replace like for like, an ATI 3850 HD is reasonable money for the performance it gives, or perhaps a 256MB 8800GT. I would tear clear of ebay, buying a second hand video card is like walking through a minefield, they probably all been overclocked to within an inch of there life’s.

Yeah, second hand was never really an option for me.

I'm not keen to upgrade simply because this system is CPU limited (with a 3500+) as it is