Hi all,
I'm trying to build my own computer without my husband's help so I can learn stuff along the way. My first obstacle is that the monitor has no signal. The computer I am upgrading is my brother's old one and I played cards on it just last week before he gave it to me. When I brought it home and started it up (no modifications yet) there was 'no signal'.
It is not the monitor or the cables as I have tried them on another computer. I swapped the graphics card to another computer and that works fine too. Is there something else that could be loose? This is the stupidist problem to have, but I'm sure I'll learn some good jargon with your answers.

The obvious thing to do is:

Open the box (which you have done) and push anything that looks like a plug, card, processor or RAM into the socket.

Power on... does the fan go around? If not, check the fuse. If that's OK could be the power supply is bust.

If the fan goes around, can you hear the disk being accessed? If not then the computer is not running and just about anything could be at fault. Second guessing or remote trouble shooting any electronics is a waste of time. But at least you have checked the basics.

A word of caution.. "When handling static sensitive devices always make sure that you are grounded" and "Remove power before handling the electronics"

Good Luck

Note the "beep" pattern when the PC 1st boots. Also, does the monitor screen change (eg. bllink, lose sync, change shades of "black", etc)? If the monitor, cable and video card checks out with another system, see for a possible builtin video port on the MB. If there is no onboard video, did/can you try another expansion slot?

Good Luck

P2E

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raych

Hi all,
I'm trying to build my own computer without my husband's help so I can learn stuff along the way. My first obstacle is that the monitor has no signal. The computer I am upgrading is my brother's old one and I played cards on it just last week before he gave it to me. When I brought it home and started it up (no modifications yet) there was 'no signal'.
It is not the monitor or the cables as I have tried them on another computer. I swapped the graphics card to another computer and that works fine too. Is there something else that could be loose? This is the stupidist problem to have, but I'm sure I'll learn some good jargon with your answers.

---

Power seems OK as the fan spins and I can hear the hard drive whir.
The screen just clicks on with 'no signal', it is a consistent (irritating) message with no flickering. If I unplug it from the monitor port it goes to 'No connection'. I've pushed in everything I can, and I think I'm earthing myself (not totally sure, probably stuffed everything!).
Tell me more about the onboard video card bit, I think I have that.
I do remember a beep from the BIOS (is that what beeps?) but will have to go home and listen carefully to it and let you know. (Logging on from work).

If you hold down the F2 key when powering up you should enter the BIOS setup utility. This is a small piece of software (microcode) that is not on the harddisk. Your computer should power up into this utility which is nothing to do with windows. Be careful not to change any settings unless you KNOW that the particular setting is incorrect.

If you get to the setup utility, you will now know that the system is OK and it is either the windows software or the disk access that is at fault.

Check for the correct orientation of the IDE cable (DISK 40 way ribbon cable) on both the motherboard and the disk. Check that the disk has the 4-way(?) power lead connected. (Generally the leads on the disk drives cannot be connected the wrong way, but you never know)

Keep at it.

Assuming you get a single beep at bootup... you are probably NOT looking at a bad video card or monitor - maybe a BIOS setting. Since you are getting the messages/text on the screen says you are getting basic sync, high voltage is working and the video data is properly being "processed".

Is yor monitor plugged into a builtin or add-on (AGP, PCI) video controller card? Also, check to see if your system HAS a builtin (MB) video port! If you have 2 video ports, you should check your BIOS to enable/disable the correct video source accordingly.

Good luck mate (or is that matris?)... :confused:

P2E

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raych

Power seems ok as the fan spins and I can hear the hard drive whir.
The screen just clicks on with 'no signal', it is a consistent (irritating) message with no flickering. If I unplug it from the monitor port it goes to 'No connection'. I've pushed in everything I can, and I think I'm earthing myself (not totally sure, probably stuffed everything!).
Tell me more about the onboard video card bit, I think I have that.
I do remember a beep from the BIOS (is that what beeps?) but will have to go home and listen carefully to it and let you know. (Logging on from work).

---

Ok,
One beep from BIOS on startup. Pressed F2, no change to screen, however computer beeped (that sound when you are leaning on a key) but this time the hard drive did the extra higher pitched whir. At least I know the keyboard works! But no access to BIOS available.
Going to buy new IDE cable on the weekend to try that out.
I have a built in sound card, but no on board video card. There is only one brown coloured slot that the video card is plugged in to, so I assume I only have one video port? Or is the port different to the slot?
Geez, I feel so blonde.

Try F12, that may get you into the BIOS. My PC shows F2 for BIOS and F12 for SETUP. Yours may be slightly different?

Have you tried starting Windows in Safe Mode? I think that is hit and hold F8 key just after power on. That may get you access if the graphics card or monitor is being asked to display in a resolution that is not available.

No luck with the F12 thing, but then I unplugged my brother's two hard drives and plugged in my new one and hey presto! Working monitor. My BIOS set up shows as F1, so I'll know that for the future! Thanks for your help Colbtech & P2E.
My next problem is the 'PXE-E61 Media test failure, check cable'.
I have no idea what media it is talking about. I also have a disk boot failure.
Suggestions welcome, although I'll try reading the motherboard manual that my dad found yesterday, and doing an internet search. Thanks again guys!

Hi Raych,

Check the settings for the hard drive in the BIOS. As you have changed the type and size of the drive the original BIOS settings will be incorrect.

Raych,

Like I said, the problem is not the monitor... Unanswer'd Q's Is your video built into the MB? If not, did/can you try another video card a/o expansion slot? :confused:

For what its worth, the most common access for accessing the BIOS is by pressing the DEL key when the PC powers up... Oh & if that doesn't work, try CTRL-ALT-S, or CTRL-ALT-Enter, or CTRL-ALT-Insert, or CTRL-ALT-Esc, or F1, or F2, or F10... :confused:

P2E

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Raych

No luck with the F12 thing, but then I unplugged my brother's two hard drives and plugged in my new one and hey presto! Working monitor. My BIOS set up shows as F1, so I'll know that for the future! Thanks for your help Colbtech & P2E.
My next problem is the 'PXE-E61 Media test failure, check cable'.
I have no idea what media it is talking about. I also have a disk boot failure.
Suggestions welcome, although I'll try reading the motherboard manual that my dad found yesterday, and doing an internet search. Thanks again guys!

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These are BIOS access keys that I am aware of, try pressing these keys immediately after the POST beep...

DEL, ESC, Ctrl-Esc, Ctrl-Alt-Esc

Good luck,

P2E

PXE failure could be your Network card trying to boot up. I assume you don't want to boot from the network so remove any onboard network card from the startup sequence.

Disk boot failure probably means that the nice new hard drive you put in doesn't have any operating system on it - stick your software cd in now and make sure bios is booting from CD and you should be off!

Sounds like your problem with the graphics was the two hard drives conflicting with each other - probably both set to master!

Hey everyone my is Andrew and I have a problem similar to Raych: no signal on monitor, PC boots up with hard drive being processed, one beep, lights flash for a second and stop. I checked the cables and circuits on montherboard for damage but notting so far. I switched the monitor to another PC along with the memory, both worked. All of the fans spin. I have read the MB's manual and cleared the CMOS RAM but still no signal on monitor. I am also having problems with accessing the bios menu with no signal on screen. I need help!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Andrew1234

Hey everyone my is Andrew and I have a problem similar to Raych: no signal on monitor, PC boots up with harddrive being processed, one beep, lights flash for a second and stop. I checked the cables and circuits on montherboard for damage but notting so far. I switched the monitor to another pc along with the memory, both worked. All of the fans spin. I have read the MB's manual and cleared the CMOS Ram memory but still no signal on monitor. I am also having problems with accessing the bios menu with no signal on screen. I need help!

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Did you try another monitor to see if maybe the problem is the video adapter? If the monitor works on another PC that's most likely the issue. You might try swapping that out.

Two things to check:

When you cleared the cmos memory did you put the jumper back to how it was originally? - if you leave it on the clear setting you've got no chance!

Do you have more than one vga socket on this machine e.g. one built into the motherboard and one as a separate card. Have you checked the monitor on both?

Ok Scottgem I did try the montior on another computer which worked. And I also bought another video card, ATI 800XT, installed it and still notting. (no signal on monitor).

In regards to StuMegu's question; I did follow the MBo's manual by placing the cap on 2, 3, pins for 5-10 seconds and removing afterwards placing the cap back on default 1 and 2 pins then restart. As for the VGA sockets, I think there is a second on built into the motherboard aside from the APG port, but I haven't tried the monitor on that one. Perhaps maybe I may need another vga type adapter to attach my monitor to that socket.

PS: I am going to look for the other vga socket and install the monitor on that one to see if it works.

Do you have more that one VGA ports? If you are using an VGA adpater card, then you will have a port in one of the slots. If the video is on the motherboard, then the VGA port will be among the other ports like USB, parallel etc.

If you have onboard video, then you may need to disable that before using a video adapter card. Your motherboard documentation should tell you how.

Heya, I'm having somewhat the same issue. Recently my computer began to run slower while running games(know there is a hardware issue because it has happened before and I just reseated the RAM and Hard drive and for some odd reason, it fixed it), but now it happened again, I tried reseating stuff in the monitor, for some dumb reason I unlatched my intel processor and latched it back in, push more cables/cards in tighter, and when I attempted to start up my computer again, everything would run fine, except the monitor wouldn't receive any signal from the tower. It didn't have any error message, just was in standby mode. I also don't see the light power up on my laser mouse. I tried numerous things I read on other forums, but non worked (including taking out and putting back in the CMOS thing). All the fans are working and the green light on the motherboard is lit up fine. I know for a fact that the RAM and video card are fine(tried them on other computers). If anyone has ANY suggestions at all, it would be GREATLY appreciated.(btw I barely know the basics of the hardware on a computer)

I took out my CPU and on the processor chip, aboutg 8 of the gold pins were bent, 1 was broken off. If I rebend the ones that are still bent, would 1 pin being broken stop it from running?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Weophyte

i took out my CPU and on the processor chip, aboutg 8 of the gold pins were bent, 1 was broken off. If i rebend the ones that are still bent, would 1 pin being broken stop it from running?

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If not stop it completely, it would definitely not run well.

I suspect that your machine is not kept in a cool environment. Humidity is an enemy of electronics. That could explains why reseating the RAM and HD may have offered a temporary improvement.

Now, you probably need to replace at least the CPU.

C'mon folks... video card, cables/monitor works on a 2nd PC. I posted a question/suggestion in my reply posting (#3) almost 5 weeks ago. This suggestion has been REPOSTED 2 add'l times, by others...

If you don't understand the suggestion - ASK. If you do understand the suggestion - try & respond to the suggestion. If neither applies, take your PC into a shop & pay someone else to try it for you.

P2E

Hey Scott and StuMegu I have looked for the extra VGA port on the mother board but without any luck. My motherboard is ASUS P4C800 deluxe. I doubt there is any onboard video to disable however there is an option in bios which enabled can power on the video by setting it to standby,suspend, or shutdown. Since I haven't figured out how to enter bios, manipulating that option is meaningles.

I did some research about system failures on the website TomHardware.com and came to the conclusion that the power failure could have been the cause because of the symptoms being exhibited. So then I decided to buy and new power supply, Antec purepower 2, installed it, crossed my fingers and hope it will work, but to my dissapointment the montior displayed as it did before "no signal" on monitor.

PS: I AM STUCK, HELP!

Do you have a digital camera? If so, take a picture of the back of your PC and attach it to a post here.

Hello everybody
Same problem here. In fact, even worse.
I have a p4 Celeron 2 GHz, 512 mb ram, MS-6507 motherboard, 128 mb ati graphic card, 160 gb ide hdd, and a pci modem card.
All new, except the motherboard.
The problem in my case is that when I power up the system, I get lights on modem (pci), the fans (processor and graphic card) start spinning, power source is working, but I get no signal on my monitor. It doesn’t even say "no signal"
I have notice that the keyboard lights doesn't flash at all.
Floppy drive light goes on and remains on.
It looks like I got no signal to peripherals. What do you think?

If the floppy light stays on, you've got it connected the wrong way round. Remove the cable and test. If it works replace the cable on the floppy drive. The end with the twist in the cable goes at the floppy end!

Thanks for your quick replay. I have done this before(you imagine, I have tried nearly everything). If the floppy cable is improperly connected I do not get any lights. What really concerns me is the fact that the motherboard doesn't beep at all.

Just check that the internal speaker connection is still on properly.

The basic test of a system is mobo, cpu (inc. fan) & memory. Remove everything else (not including the case connectors like power switch, speaker etc) and check again!

If that system beeps OK, add the other components until you've found your problem.

If it doesn't boot, one or more of those three components is at fault (or the Power supply of course). If possible, swap these components with known good ones and try again.

Hi Stu,

This is exactly what I was looking for... Unfortunately the speaker doesn’t beep at all. At the beginning I have suspected that the internal speaker is not connected. In fact I have no idea where the internal speaker is (if this motherboard has an internal speaker somewhere - MS-6507 motherboard) I have always thought that the speaker that beeps is the case front speaker. In my case, that one is not connected as I couldn’t find where to connect it.
This is the motherboard, (MS-6507 motherboard)
This is the link to the motherboard:
http://www.msi.com.tw/program/produc...ail.php?UID=37
I have read the manual. It doesn’t say where that case speaker connector should be placed on the motherboard...

p.s. have we meet before (experts exchange)?

Hi, don't think we've met, although experts exchange is a brilliant site, I haven't posted there.

I've had a look at the mobo manual and also can't see any reference to the speaker connection. Either this means it is inbuilt into the motherboard or the manual is rubbish.

Does anyone else know about the speaker connection for this motherboard?

Without the speaker option, I would find a known good graphics card and try again. With the floppy light staying on I would remove it completely whilst testing.

Remove the ram and check the slot, once I had a similar problem and someone found a small sliver of plastic in the ram slot preventing the connection working.

You see... first I thought that my AGP card is not working. I have bought a PCI one to try it. Same result. I have removed aeverything except the proc and the rams.(mem's where tested before and they are fine - same with the processor). I have sent an email to MSI asking about that speaker connector 3 days ago. No reply so far...

Hate to say it but it sounds like your mobo is dead:eek:


Could be the other components of course, the only way to know is test in other equipment!

I see...
One more question.
How do you define the word "dead" when is about mobos?
You see, this one still has the lights on... the pci cards get the signal(at least the fan is spining on the graphic card... the modem card has the lights on... I thought that dead is... umhh... you know... dead?
(anyway, thank you very much for your help, Stu, you are a real gentleman)

Just to chime in quickly: a "dead" motherboard could be the result of a failure in the chipset(s) that are onboard. The power light would come on but the basic I/o functions would be dead.

Thanks Need,

It really could be anything on the mobo that has failed (I don't know enough about electronics to speculate) and the fact that this is the only "old" piece of equipment doesn't help. However it could also be the CPU is faulty, if the supplier is handy I would maybe ask them to check it out.

When I say dead, I just mean anything that can't be fixed with software, or jumpers etc.

Like I said, only real way to know for sure is to test in other equipment.

Hi,

I am also facing the same situation. My Computer is Acer 400MHz with 196 memory and has a CDWriter and a internal modem on PSI.
It worked well for more than 2,3 years without any problem and for 2,3 weeks I was out of my home and couldn't switch on that. After that time I switched on it and these was no signal on monitor. It doesn't say that 'no signal' on monitor.

I can hear the familiar sound of the CPU and fan is working inside fine. Then I removed the memory and reattached it. Then once System boot up. But when I was working there was a message saying an error and System restarted. ( I have Win98 Second edition )

Now the Initial Screen comes. ( The Screen with brand name ACER, and there is 'Press Ctrl+Alt+Esc to enter setup' message. When I Try to enter setup with these keys, it doesn't go to setup. The screen with the brand name remains as long as I keep the power on)

Now sometimes I can boot the machine. But after some time the error comes or a blue screen comes and it restarts. Sometimes there is no signal on monitor. Sometimes, the screen with the brand name comes and remains forever.

I am a software person, without much of (any) knowledge of hardware.

Please help.
:mad:

I would suspect the RAM in this case, but as stated before, it can be any of the components, CPU, Motherboard or RAM.

Consider looking for an upgrade to the bios for the motherboard and running a memory testing program such as the one offered by microsoft:

http://oca.microsoft.com/en/windiag.asp

Good Luck.

slrkman, try to change the battery. Should fix it.

Thanks a lot StuMegu and bicestertown.co.uk,

I don't know where the battery is. I can check for RAM by removing them and attaching them in another computer. Is there any way to check all those components like CPU and motherboard. (If you know a web site containing those details)

Thanks againg for your kind reply.

slrkman

I'm still looking for a good CPU and Motherboard tester, I've tried some but nothing has really struck me as good. You can get hardware testers that plug in to the PCI slot and perform tests! Maybe this is the best way to go for someone testing regularly but no good for one off's.

The only other way I know is to find another motherboard or cpu that matches the faulty set and swap till you drop!

Does anyone else have any good mobo/cpu testing programs?