Blank screen, need help disagnosing what's wrong

robucf4

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Feb 12, 2007
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Up until last night my PC was fine, last night I was playing WoW for an hour or so when I got a quick blue screen followed by a black screen. The PC was still running but my LCD had no picture, it was just black. I had to do a hard power off and when I powered back on no GIGABYTE Screen just a black screen. No message about chck cable, just a black screen. I can hear the CD ROM being accessed as normal for a plit second and some brief noise from the HDD. What I have done:

1. Check all connections.
2. Try a different video card. No picture, just a black screen.
3. Unplug every component, HDD, Wireless card, CDROM, etc. Still a black screen.
3. Reset bios, took out battery, shorted jumper with screwdriver head. Still a black screen.
4. Tried RAM in different slots, one slot, etc.
5. Reseated video card many times.

Keep in mind life was good for 3 weeks before the above happened.

At this point I think its the mobo, maybe? I would like some opinions before I RMA it.

Thanks, as always.
 

cutthroat

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I had the same problem once, just a few days after getting the board. It had some data corruption problems first, then the video just stopped. Turns out the motherboard was bad.
 

robucf4

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Thats what I am thinking, I mean if I disconnected everything but the video card, I should have at least seen something on the screen, but the mere fact I get no output on the LCD points to the mobo. Of course after the fact I see these boards suffer from boot issues. Some are fixable, some are not. I will RMA and get something else.
 

Alsone

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I had this problem recently and it was the motherboard.

I tried a new monitor and a new graphics card (RMA'ed th card back and kept the screen) but neither gave me a picture.

New motherboard solved it.

I suggest you try another screen (borrow one if possible) and a new DVi / D-Sub cable in case its cable failure, then if that doesn't work assume mobo.
 

jonisginger

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Look on the bright side - WoW sucks, maybe it was your PC just going "stop playing this game " on you.

Yeah if you've taken out everything with the same problem you can it must be the motherboard. I'm writing this and have forgotten whether your processor was running OCd or not, if so, was it at a high voltage? If so try another processor (somehow :S), but yeah I'm going with the previous guy - sounds like your motherboard.
 

jonisginger

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Yeah the cable and monitor aswell, and ur processor is running horrendously overclocked - and i know teh C2Ds are good for it, (dells new XPS runs at 3.73 x 4 (qx6800)), but if the cable and monitor don't do it, try and find another C2D perhaps? Only if u can be arsed, its v unlikely for the processor to ah heck off - same for RAM
 

robucf4

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I'd vote 99% MOBO. You get no beeps, correct?

Correct no beeps. All the fans would come on, I would hear the cd for a sec, then the HD for a sec, and that was it, no display. My LCD is fine, I use it as an external monitor for my laptop and it works. I don't think it was the ram, I tried them both one stick at a time, besides it booted the first time and ran for 1 month without an issue. CPU should be fine too, my OC was not that bad and the Freezer 7 pro kept temps way down. Idle 25 C, Load 40C.

in any case, I sent it off to Newegg for a refund, I will get something else maybe that MSI P6N, not sure yet. I guess I will find out if it was the mobo next week :cry:

Thanks for the replies.