how do I disable my onboard video?

[jen26butterfly]

I'm a little far from there - southeastern PA.

Well, I tried the jumper procedure, with help from a friend, and it still doesn't work. Tried both of my available PCI slots, nothing on either, I still get "no signal input" on the monitor.

My friend says he'd like to borrow my system for a weekend sometime and do a really thorough job of checking it out... unfortunately with him, "sometime" usually means 2 or 3 months from now, arg! But he may be willing to give the card a try at least.

 

[jen26butterfly]

if by "blank" you mean when I get "no signal input" - that is what I have always & forever seen if the monitor was powered on but the computer was not. Normal.

Here are the combos I have tried and the results:

Sis620 onboard
removed video GeForce monitor
via device jumper card plugged
manager: disabled: inserted: into: result:
------------- ------------ ------------ ----------- --------
no no no onboard normal
**this is the normal configuration, pre-vidcard purchase.
no no yes onboard no signal input
no no yes GeForce no signal input
yes no yes onboard no signal input
yes no yes GeForce no signal input
yes yes yes onboard no signal input
yes yes yes GeForce no signal input
yes yes no onboard no signal input

All the times when the result said "no signal input", there was NO bootup. Power-on, yes, but no beeps or anything, no checking from drives, etc.

So, I don't know if any of this makes a difference... basically, no matter what else I change, if I stick the card in, I get no signal input.

????

 

[jen26butterfly]

oops, crap, those were supposed to be nicely formatted columns... across, they are supposed to be "Sis620 removed via device manager:", "onboard video jumper disabled:", "GeForce card inserted:", "monitor plugged into:", and "result:"

sorry!

 

[ekÆsine]

no what microbell means is if you had correctly disabled the onboard video than if you plug your monitor to the onboard video now you would get no picture on your monitor because the onboard video is disabled. if you get picture with the onboard video than that means you did not disable the onboard video properly.

 

[jen26butterfly]

I'm at my wit's end...

the monitor is fine, I'm using it right now. As I said, everything works if the new card is not in.

my friend suggested to flash the bios, but I'm wary of doing that (everything I've seen says if the system is working fine, don't do it)... do you think it might help? the version I'm currently using is from 6/99, whereas the update looks like it's from 1/00.

 

[fiezk]

Look at the update specifications. If the description of your bios update does not contain info about a fix for this, then don't flash.

 

[jen26butterfly]

ug. I never should have bought a "CompUSA" computer!! I happened to talk to a friend's husband who is a major tech-head, and he said he had the SAME issue trying to put a different card into a CompUSA machine... in the end, he said the conclusion he came to is that ONLY video cards made by ATI will work on these crappy systems, b/c ATI is somehow partnered with CompUSA.

Luckily, another friend happens to have a 32-Mb pci card by ATI that doesn't have a home, and said I could have it for free and he's even willing to install it for me.

 

[kboy]

Good Luck!

 

[trebor]

hey jen, by southeastern pa do you mean around Lancaster area. If so you could try that video card in one of my systems. That way you will know if it is the card of just your system does not like it. cheers.

 

[jen26butterfly]

Okay folks, get a load of this:
Last week, I *did* flash my bios, had no trouble at all. Still couldn't get the GeForce card to work though. I was going to give up on it, but my friend convinced me to take it back today to exchange for another of the same card, in case it was just a defective one...
I get this one home, and I do my thing (disable onboard jumper, plug the card in, plug monitor into card), and power on the computer... and it actually started to boot!! I believe it booted almost to the point where the windows desktop actually comes up, and then the system powered itself off!!!
What the hell??