Monitor not receiving signal from MB

[blitzjg]

Hello everyone,

I recently bought components to build my first tower on my own. Other than a few minor hiccups, and nothing happened like static from what I could tell, i was compulsive about grounding myself on the PSU. After testing it out for Fan operation I decided to hook it up to my monitor to hopefully work on installing Windows. So far almost every power-up has begun with a 2-second power-up, quick shut-down, followed by another power-up that stays powered on.

I can't get a signal to my monitor. I know my monitor works because I am using it on my older PC, but when I plug either the VGA cable or a DVI cable into my new comp's MB the monitor goes to sleep...

I have looked at multiple FAQs and guides regarding installation and normal troubleshooting solutions for this kind of problem but to no avail. One thing I have to fix when I get home is the Mount for the heatsink and fan, I turned the clips (or whatever they are called) the wrong direction... but I don't see how that would explain this problem...

Another concern I had was the SATA cables from the SSD HDD, and DVD drives being in the right ports, but I also don't think that would explain this problem...

The only other things I can think of are my video card not being in correctly, being in the wrong PCI slot, not being compatible with my MB, or I fried an important component at some point.

Please I have spent a lot of time trying to figure this out and would love some help. Also I tried taking out one and both RAM sticks...

Here are my components:
Mushkin Enhanced Chronos Deluxe MKNSSDCR120GB-DX 2.5" 120GB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)

Western Digital Caviar Black WD5002AALX 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal Hard Drive -Bare Drive

Corsair Carbide Series 500R Black Steel structure with molded ABS plastic accent pieces ATX Mid Tower Computer Case

ASUS P8Z68-V PRO/GEN3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard with UEFI BIOS

XFX HD-695X-CNDC Radeon HD 6950 2GB 256-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.1 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card with Eyefinity

Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz (3.7GHz Turbo Boost) LGA 1155 95W Quad-Core Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 3000 ...

CORSAIR XMS 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)

HP 24X Multiformat DVD Burner Black SATA Model 1270i LightScribe Support

CORSAIR H100 (CWCH100) Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler

CORSAIR Enthusiast Series TX750 V2 750W ATX12V v2.31/ EPS12V v2.92 80 PLUS BRONZE Certified Active PFC High Performance Power Supply

 

[nna2]

it really dosent care what port your sata drives are plugged into

my first guess, have you tried both your gfx card and your onboard gfx?

 

[blitzjg]

ok from my limited wealth of knowledge I believe it is my gfx card. I was able to get it to BIOS and install windows with the gfx card out... and also with it in and only 1 6 pin power cable...(a bad idea?) when both 6 pins are in, I cannot get a signal to my monitor though...

Should I try a different slot? I think I have 3 available...

 

[nna2]

yes try a different slot, and make sure there both labeled PCI-E just in case

 

[blitzjg]

Ok so what I did was leave it in its slot, in BIOS I went to advanced mode and under Onboard Devices Config I was able to change PCI Express X16_3 slot (Black) bandwidth from Auto mode, to X1 mode, which occording to the MB manual is the only mode which enables all slots...

My card is plugged into slot 1... does this mean its getting reduced performance? After doing this change though, I was able to plug in the second 6 pin power cord, and get it to load with the DVI cable in the video card port! Yay!

 

[nna2]

if it shows slot one as X8 i would probaly switch to port 3

 

[blitzjg]

I finally determined that in BIOS I needed to set my PCIe3 slot to X1 instead of auto... according to the manual Auto and X4 for this PCI slot mean that PCIe1 and 2 are disabled. The manual recommends though for a VGA card of x16 to be placed in the PCIe1 slot... but from what I can tell this means I am not getting full speed since there seems to be a discrepancy in the manual regarding the slot to use for optimal performance.

And Ironically the Black slot that would solve this problem is too close to the bottom of my motherboard so my graphics card cannot fit in that slot... Is there a way to tell if I am getting reduced performance from the slot its in?

 

[nna2]

2 x PCIe 3.0/2.0 x16 (x16 or dual x8) *1
1 x PCIe 2.0 x16 (x4 mode, black) *2

according to this the top two are pci-e 3.0
that may be the issue

 

[blitzjg]

can you elaborate? That whole thing confused me and I'm not sure how to determine which my gfx card should be or is compatible with...

 

[nna2]

hmm, well i was thinking that because the top 2 pci-e ports are 3.0 it might cause complications but that dosent seem to be the case... is it possible for you mobo to be mounted higher?