Black screen during boot

[Duder1no]

My PC has developed an issue lately that did not occur before: when I turn on my PC and during boot up the screen is black, I can hear the PC doing the normal boot up, single BIOS click as usual, the keyboard light turns on, the monitor indicator light turns from red to blue too but the screen remains black, so what I have to do is turn the PC on and off again several times until finally after 4-5 times of doing this the monitor finally displays the “Windows is logging on” screen and then finally the WinXP logon screen, when this happens I cannot see the BIOS screen, only the WinXP logon screen when it finally does display information.

It seems to me as if something has to warm up for the display to work correctly cause after several cycles of turning it on and it finally displays correctly and also I’ve noted that once it is ok if I restart the PC the display works correctly right from the start, that is I can now see the BIOS screen and then the logon screens normally.

I have no idea if this is OS or Hardware related so if anyone has any suggestions as to how to fix this I would really appreciate it.

Monitor: Viewsonic VX2235wm LCD Display
Video: MoBo Onboard Video - Intel(R) G33/G31
CPU: Intel E1500 @ 2.20GHz
OS: Windows XP
BIOS: Award, Version P07
Motherboard: Foxconn G31-MXP-K.

 

[stargazr]

Check your video connections.

If you shine a flashlight on the screen can you barely see the image? Does it change at all when you turn your computer on?

You need to narrow down whether it's the monitor or video card related. Do you have extra components to test on your system?

Also what video card, CPU & PSU do you have?

 

[Neutralman]

I've had the same problem for over a year now. During that time, bought a new monitor, new ram, total reformat multiple times, updated video card driver. So far nothing has fixed the problem. Only force restarting multiple times can I finally get a display.

Nvidia GTX 260 video card
Intel 920 - 2.66ghz processor
PSU - Corsair 650 Watt

 

[Puppies04]

Could be a bad psu, do you have a spare to check it out?

 

[Modelworks]

Turn off and unplug the pc, remove the battery, short the cmos clear jumper on the board for a few seconds. Remove jumper, replace battery, plug in pc and in bios load setup defaults.

The bios may have a stuck bit somewhere from hardware changes. I had to do this a couple times over the years because of changing out hardware often.

 

[Duder1no]

Video: MoBo Onboard Video - Intel(R) G33/G31
CPU: Intel E1500 @ 2.20GHz

Unfortunately I don't have extra components to test on my system, I will give the BIOS reset a try this weekend.

Any more suggestions?

 

[Duder1no]

Ok today I noticed a "Checksum invalid" message at the BIOS screen and according to the Award BIOS FAQ this is due to a faulty battery:

" If the battery charge runs too low, the CMOS contents will be lost and POST will issue a "CMOS invalid" or "CMOS checksum invalid" message. If this happens, you may have to replace the battery. Contact your manufacturer for assistance. After the battery is replaced, the proper settings will need to be restored in Setup.

So I will get a new battery and try to change it but the problem is how to remove the battery because it has 4 different individual plastic hooks holding it down so it's a hassle to open 2 or more at the same time, any advice?

 

[AnonymouseUser]

So I will get a new battery and try to change it but the problem is how to remove the battery because it has 4 different individual plastic hooks holding it down so it's a hassle to open 2 or more at the same time, any advice?

You just push the metal clip outward and it should pop up. The battery is just above the yellow PCIE X16 slot.

 

[Duder1no]

You just push the metal clip outward and it should pop up. The battery is just above the yellow PCIE X16 slot.

Awesome, thank you very much.