Date: 08/09/07 (Computer Geeks)    Keywords: no keywords

    Hey all,
    After gaining experience from upgrading my pre-built computer part by part, I decided to build my own custom machine this summer. Last week, I purchased all the parts while making sure they were compatible with each other, and I just finished putting the entire machine together today. I fired up the machine in anticipation, and while there were no angry motherboard beeps besides the single startup beep, nothing was showing up on the screen. I thought maybe I had plugged the monitor into the wrong socket since the graphics card has two, but I still didn't get anything on the screen through the other socket. My monitor, which is a CRT from 2003, acts like there is no signal coming at all and flashes its "Check cables. Monitor is working" message. The motherboard shows four green lights on the back, which according to the manual means all is well.

    Here is what hardware I have in my computer right now:
Motherboard: MSI P6NSLT Platinum (this motherboard does not have an onboard graphical chip)
Graphics Card: MSI 8600GTS (nVidia chipset) for a PCIe x16 slot
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E6550
RAM: Four sticks of G.SKILL 1GB (DDR2 800)
Power Supply: APOWER pure black 680W SATA ATX power supply (DC Outputs: +3.3V @ 45A, +5V @ 50A, +12V @ 22A, -12V @ 0.8A, -5V @ 0.5A, +5Vsb @ 2A)
Other things: CD/DVD writer, 250GB hard drive (SATA), PCI internal wireless card, a side fan

    I tried...
1. reseeding graphics card and booting: No video
2. reseeding RAM and booting: No video
3. disconnecting DVD burner and and wireless card and booting: No video
4. disconnting hard drive as well and booting: No video
5. Removing all but one stick of RAM and booting: No video
6. Removing all RAM and booting : long beep from the motherboard and the four LEDs on the D-Bracket flashed red on all of the LEDs but on #2 (at least through this, I knew the motherboard could detect some problems). No video
7. Using a different power supply (A RAIDMAX 450W power supply) and booting: No video
8. Using a different VGA --> DVI connector: No video.
* my monitor is VGA, but both of the sockets on the graphics card are DVI. The card came with the DVI --> VGA adaptors.
9. Looking at the case remorsefully for 15 minutes and booting it: No video. :( If only things worked this way.


My case innards looks like this right now: http://img172.imageshack.us/img172/350/dsc08319ah5.jpg
The two sets of yellow, black, and tan wires are connected to two power plugs and go into the reddish graphics card.
The red bar in the middle is the RAM. The black and silver thing that says "AVC" is my heatsink,
and under it is a layer of thermal grease and my processor.
The hard drive (bottom left) and DVD drive (bottom right) are disconnected.

    Anyway, half a decade ago I had purchased a computer, and I had a similar problem and the way I solved it was by buying new CRT monitor. I know the choice nowadays would be to buy an LCD, but the kind of stuff I do requires a degree of color accuracy and clarity... CRT > LCD argument aside, this time around I don't have enough money to get an LCD.

To sum it up.. , are newer graphics cards (ones that have come out in the ast year) incompatible with older (+3 ears old) CRTs?

Source: http://community.livejournal.com/computergeeks/1094710.html