Monitor Recieving No Signal

Alright, i tested this older pc before i sent it to my brother. Put xp-pro on it, disabled the onboard card for the pci card, installed basic drivers for the card. It booted up fine here and i sent it off.

Now he has it and when he got it the cord to the main drive was off. He connected it after trying to boot up once and had a no show. We've ran over the checklist to make sure all the wires were connected right inside for everything. They all are in the right places on the motherboard and on the hard drives, cd-drives, etc.

The monitor is just blank though. You can hear the pc booting up and see that it has activity but it won't send any info to the monitor. Hes tried 3 different monitors and tried plugging each of them into the onboard card and the pci card. Nothing shows up. Just a blank black screen.

The onboard card if i remember card is an S3graphics prosavage 32mb and the pci card is a 9100 radeon pci series card with 64mb. The monitors are multisync monitors.

Hes been waiting on this awhile since his older pc was crap so this is a big letdown for him and me. Since we like to game together. I would apprectiate any suggestions.

 

You say the onboard video was disabled, so there's no surprise there when he plugs the monitor into that one. Make sure the PCI video card is properly seated. I am assuming when you say the "cord to the main drive was off", you mean that rough handling in shipping dislodged the IDE cable to the hard drive-- maybe the video card suffered the same thing, just not as apparently.

 

Also check if he had connected the monitor cable to the PCI Video Adapter and not to the integrated one.

 

Yes, rough handling in shipping made the IDE cable come off to the hd but he put it back on after the first time he tried to bootup and it failed.

I thought the same thing about the video card coming loose to and had him try that. We went ahead and checked all the other cables at the same time to be safe. I know the card is getting power. He told me its little fan comes on when he boots the pc.

It just drives me nuts because it worked before it was shipped and now it doesn't there. Makes all the noises and that fun stuff but monitor gets no signal at all.

Edit for post below at same time: Yes, he had it plugged into the right one. As i said we went ahead and tried both just to check and see.

 

Also try connecting the monitor to both the video connectors and check which works.

If he has connected it to the PCI card then try connecting it to the integrated one and enable it. Check if it gets signal.

Edited: Sorry for the simultaneous logs.

 

Wat type of monitor is he using? If its a flat panel monitor and has DVI compatibility then try changing the mode of input from the OSD buttons.

 

No, its not a flat panel or a newer monitor. Its old but it does work because it worked with the even older pc he had. Its a from what he told me. A CRT monitor and the brand he told me was Multisync.

We have tried both the pci plugin and the onboard plugin.

 

Try removing the PCI video card and then connect it to the integrated. Then try rebooting to check if there is a problem in BIOS settings.

 

Strange twist of events. He removed the card and everything but it still didn't work. Tried a couple other things again and nothing. He goes to sleep for a few hours and then i call him wake him up and i'm going to have him try some new things. Boots up like nothing was wrong at all.

Now i need to make a thread on his sound because it doesn't work. I'm convinced the pc gods just don't want him to have a decent pc.