My monitor no longer gets a signal from my graphics card

[Rucker25]

Hello, this is my first time here.

A few days ago I decided to try and upgrade my performance by updating the drivers for my graphics card. I'm using a GeForce 8400 GS. I updated to the newest nvidia driver, 186.18. Downloaded and installed as normal and everything went fine. However when it asked me to restart, I did. All of a sudden, my monitor no longer receives a signal. The fans on the card and everything seems to be working as normal. I decided to unplug everything and clean the computer out. That seemed to work, as I got everything up and running again. The next morning though, the problem returned, no signal from the video card to the monitor. I'm running off of the onboard video right now and it works fine. I don't have another computer to test the card in, or have another card to test in the slot. Is it possible that the new drivers fried my card or messed something up? I tried uninstalling the drivers and reinstalling them, and used driver sweep to clean out anything old that was causing conflicts. There appeared to be a problem with several users where they could at least get the windows logo and then when the driver loaded the screen would lose signal, but I get absolutely nothing when I turn the system on.

 

[Rucker25]

Sorry, forgot to post specs

Intel Pentium D 2.8 Dual Core
GeForce 8400 GS
4g Mushkin Performance Gaming Ram (3574 Usable)
Windows XP
Direct X 9.0c
Phoenix Award BIOS v6.00PG

 

[evongugg]

Welcome to the forums!

Go in the bios and change the video card from onboard to PCIe.
Start windows in safe mode.
Report your results again.

 

[Rucker25]

Thanks for the quick reply. I checked my Bios, and it is set to the PCIe slot. However, if I even have the card plugged into the slot, I can't get anything from my onboard video anymore. I get the same no signal message from my monitor, even though my monitor is connected to the onboard.

 

[Rucker25]

Another update: I read on another site that switching the jumper on the mobo and taking the battery out could solve the problem. I tried both of these and neither worked. I have a feeling it's either my mobo or the card itself, but I have no idea which one.

 

[montyuk]

when you put the 8400 in, it disables the onboard graphics, which is why the onboard graphics didnt work when you tested it.

i would say reseat the 8400, test connecting your screen to both (?) connectors on the back of it.

does the card require any extra power plugged into it?

try using your original drivers again.

 

[Rucker25]

It has 3 connections on the back, the normal blue monitor plug, as well as DVI and S-Video. Unfortunately, I do not have a DVI or S-Video cable to test it with. There is no extra power required for the card. I'd try my old driver, but I don't remember what it was, and since I can't seat the card and get a connection, I can't check my driver history that way. I've already tried to system restore to before I updated the driver, but that didn't work either.