Monitor displays blank screen and sometimes Check Signal Cable error

[Fixhotep]

Problem: Monitor goes blank and blinks between "Analog" and "Digital" at times, and sits at "Check Signal" other times.

Windows XP Home SP2
Samsung 931B using DVI @ 1280x1024
EVGA 7900GS KO
Gigabyte GA-965P-S3
C2D E4300
Enermax Liberty 500w

Monitor will go blank at random times (not just at boot up). It seems to be checking for a signal. If this happens while my PC is up, it will freeze the PC. However, if the monitor goes blank during or before boot up, my PC will actually boot up and not freeze while the the screen remains blank.

When the screen goes blank while my PC is up, the fan on my 7900gs accelerates and does not stop. However, the card is just warm, not hot. The card gets MUCH hotter during COD4 and HL2EP2.

Once blank, the screen does not return back to normal without rebooting. Even then, it usually stays blank.

This just started happening a month ago, and was intermittent. However saturday (I just started playing HL2 Episode 2) it became chronic.

Nothing has ever been overclocked. And it hasn't happened yet while in safe mode.

Checks performed:
-Power monitor and PC off and on
-Tried the 2nd DVI port on the 7900GS
-Tried VGA cable instead of DVI in both graphics card ports
-Uninstalled and reinstalled graphic driver
-Uninstalled and reinstalled monitor driver (both digital and analog)
-Reseated graphics card
-Tried different resolutions
-Samsung monitor check succeeds. The "Check Signal" shows accurate colors
-Holding the "Menu" button while screen is blank says it's fine
-Pressing the "Source <-" button on the monitor does not correct the problem
-Made sure all other drivers are up to date
-AVG, Spy-Bot and Ad-Aware did not find anything
-It's not the monitor. I swapped my wifes CRT and the problem still happens on her CRT.

any help or ideas are appreciated

thanks

 

[scotsfilmmaker]

I have fixed PC's in the past with this problem. Generally, its related to the motherboard not detecting the graphics card. So, You need to get a cheap graphics card. You didn't say if you have an AGP or PC-express slot. If you still get the `Check Signal error` then the motherboard is fried. I`m actually fixing a PC right now with this very same problem! Waiting for 2nd graphics card to test! lol

 

[Alison_88]

I had this about a month ago. I fixed it by removing the card and giving everything a good spray with a can of Dust off, followed by a spray of contact cleaner. I live in a humid country and I think the card gets oxidation. Hope this works for you.
Alison

 

[vnalec]

Hi there guys,

In response to the question. Having had exactly the same problem using a ASUS P5E Deluxe Motherboard using a 9800GTX 512mb PCI-E graphics card, I tried cleaning the terminals, removing and re-inserting the card and swapping the lead to the second terminal I had no luck. The solution to my problem came about by a d-sub lead with a dvi adaptor on the end of it. I connected the d-sub lead to the d-sub terminal on my Samsung SyncMaster 2333 and then used a dvi adaptor to connect the other end to my video card. As I had it before, it was a dvi lead running from the monitor dvi terminal to the dvi terminal on my graphics card. This leads me to believe that the issue was not with the graphics card at all, but with either the dvi terminal on my monitor or the dvi lead i was using before.

I hope this helps 8D