pc problem - moniter won't come on

blinky

looking at the replys i think theres a problem with the onboard graphics cards, by buying a agp card this would help fix the problem,

a new 4x agp card would cost around £15,

and a new motherboard socket a k7 (pc chips) costs around £20,

is is better to buy a new motherboard rather then getting a agp card????

i currently have got a pc chips motherboard and a amd athlon 1800 xp processer.

SOunds like your system isn't POSTing

No beeps could be a range of things.

A graphics card error should give a number of beeps (some it's 4, some it's 2 long followed by 8 short).

Possibilities:

1) Grounding out.

Test 1

Make sure there is no power to PC but it is grounded (power off at mains but plugged in). Disconnect everything non-essential from motherboard (hard drives, floppy, CD etc). Just leave PSU, keyboard and monitor installed. Even take out any PCI cards. And see if it posts. If it does, add back in one at a time and see if you get a failure (often you get no failures and the problem is gone).

Test 2

take the motherboard out of the case, put on non conductive surface e.g. motherboard box. connect up monitor, keyboard and powersupply (easier if you take PSU out of case). Then you need to very briefly short the two pins where the power button would connect. The fans should spin up.

TRy a PCI graphics card as well

Other possibilities include:

Try reseting the CMOS (instructions in manual)

Voltage regulators / capacitors on the motherboard have died. This is not uncommon these days. The demands modern processors put on the voltage regulators and capacitors is very high. The only way to test this is if all of the above fail. Is to test the CPU in another board (you've already tested the RAM, disconnection removes possibility of other components) .

In general when troubleshooting a system you should always take a scientific approach and do one change and then test - that way you know what has actually caused the problem.

Are you overclocking? ;D

PC Chips has a very bad reputation (ranging from fake cache chips on there 486 boards, poor build quality, fake speeds posted to virus infected utility discs). If you do buy a new board I would strongly recommend a better make. Even, ECS, PC Chips more upmarket brand is much better.

Usual good brands are Abit, Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, Epox.
I don't know what type of RAM you have (DDR hopefully) but the best DDR chipset is the NForce2. Places like Ebuyer, Dabs etc. often sell returned but fully working boards at a discount.

I don't like on board graphics either, even the most basic of cards would perform better. On board graphics generally shares the system RAM, which means everytime the graphics core needs to access it's RAM it's stops the system from accessing it (and most monitors have a 70+ refresh rate) - this has been proven in tests, with on board graphics the higher the refresh rate the lower the performance. If you buy a graphics card, look around in the 2nd hand market, even 1 or 2 generations back (1-2 years) you should be able to pick up a good card for next to nothing.

maj

hello,

first of all i would to thank you for all you replys,

i followed the steps by blinky, test 1, i removed all the leads for hard drive, floppy, cd rom, turned the pc on but did not work,

i then removed the cpu from the montherboard, reinstalled it, turned the pc on and the moniter worked with no problems, i then reconnected all the leads and the moniter is know working fine with no problems (fingers crossed).

please can any one tell me what the problem is and how i can avoid this problem in the future????

Joe_Bloggs

It must have been a cobweb or perhaps something else that it is intermittent and very difficult to replicate. Congratulations on solving the problem, you have the gift.
J_B.

maj

:-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ the pc did't last for long, and the problem was started again, i took apart the motherboard from the base unit ad after examing the motherboard i realsed the vga connecter has become lose from the motherboard

this is soildered onto the montherboard and has come apart. so looking at the whole problem the onboard graphics port has come aprt from the motherboard and proberly can be fix by soildern it back, finger cross maybe this would work if not i will need a new motherboard,

any advise on the mother board, i have a amd athln 1800 xp socket a processer and 512mb sd ram, not looking to pay much for one,

Joe_Bloggs

I am very sorry to hear of your PC problem. Good luck with your soldering efforts. Name and shame your board if you feel it is appropriate.
J_B.

blinky

Try the used section at https://www.dabs.com, 90 warranty.

I've used them before without any problems.

Tony_H_3

:-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ :-[ the pc did't last for long, and the problem was started again, i took apart the motherboard from the base unit ad after examing the motherboard i realsed the vga connecter has become lose from the motherboard

this is soildered onto the montherboard and has come apart. so looking at the whole problem the onboard graphics port has come aprt from the motherboard and proberly can be fix by soildern it back, finger cross maybe this would work if not i will need a new motherboard,

any advise on the mother board, i have a amd athln 1800 xp socket a processer and 512mb sd ram, not looking to pay much for one,

I'm glad you've found the problem, now you know that it is the onboard graphics, why not use a PCI or AGP instead. Make sure you disable the onboard in the bios.