blank screen with blinking cursor

saddy

Member
Oct 11, 1999
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tried to search for similar problem online but never really found one like mine. so here goes..

this is a MSI K7N2-FSR board.

was playing videos as well as looking at jpegs when i notice that the videos were showing black spots here and there on the image and that the jpegs had green spots that will increase in number if the pic is left in view. eventually, the computer hang.

hit the reset button.

now, the screen only shows a black screen with a blinking cursor on the top left corner.

i have disconnected the hard disk, any usb devices, network cable, sound card, as well as some fans. still doesn't solve anything.

prior to this blinking cursor episode, the system would BSOD if there were more than one piece of ram (had 2x256 on it all along). if only slot 3 was occupied, there would be no problems. as long as either slot 2 or dual channel was enabled (even if slot 1 and 3), the com will fail.

so i believed the ram slots were failing.

threw in just a new 1gb ram into slot 3 on its own, and it still BSOD. i suspect it's cos the 1gb is double-sided and hence took up 2 rows as compared to the 256 which only took up 1 row. anyway, moved that piece of ram to slot 1, and all had been well for a few days, until that video and jpegs problem. and now eventually, the blinking cursor.

is my motherboard dying? or is it my video card? when it was working, i don't see any artefacts when in normal windows environment, only when i viewed pictures or videos.

anyone who has similar experience, please kindly help!