eMachines monitor not working!

[Stlsportsfan2316]

Last night I turned off the monitor, turned it back on (because I'm nuts), and then turned it off. This morning when it was turned on, it went to the screen it goes to when the hard drive CPU is off but the monitor is on. Yet -- the bottom hard drive had been turned on. I have no idea of how to fix this! Does anyone have any ideas of how to fix this error??

[honvetops]

   "I am no techie but;  here I would turn everything off, then unplugg- everything from back of puter. Wait 3 minutes..  plug it all up again, turn on, then pray* if no good wait for a pro's response~

[Monty72]

Are you useing a video card? Or intergrated grafix's? If you are useing a video card make sure it is in there good and the monitor cable is in good and tight.

[GX1_Man]

The original poster gave some pretty vague info which needs to be clarified.

The computer seems to start OK, but the monitor does not work?

Does the monitor light up as usual or does it look like in standby mode (amber light, etc.)?

What happens if you try another monitor on that PC and thatmonitor on another PC? Let's try to rule out some variables.

What kind of monitor is this and how old? How about some details about the machine as well and the video component?

See below.

[Saviour]

Based on the vague information you submitted, it sounds like it just may be your Power Options settings.

Go into your Control Panel and check what your power scheme is for your monitor, hard drive, standby and hibernation.

Personally, I use an "Always On" power scheme, so the above settings on my computer are set to "Never", however, this may not be suitable for you.  It depends on one's individual preferences.

If all else fails, look for a loose power cable connection on the back of your monitor, as well as the PC.  Before you fool around with any cables, please make sure the system is powered "OFF".

Hope this was of some help.

[Dyra]

Replying here instead of starting a new thread. It sounds like the OP and I have close to the same problem. I have an eMachines T3624. Tonight my daughter was playing and the monitor suddenly switched itself off, going to the screen that tells you the monitor is working correctly.

That screen only comes on if the tower is not turned on. Except, the tower WAS turned on and seemed to be running normally. I'm knowledgeable enough to troubleshoot some problems, but this one is beyond me. I can't troubleshoot from the actual computer because, well, obviously, I can't access things I can't see.

I tried all the obvious things, making sure all connections were good and seated properly, shutting down the comp for an hr or two(I thought something may have overheated). We haven't changed or added any hardware/software, except for windows updates in the last 8 months.

I've never had a single problem with this comp, for all the bad things you hear about eMachines, it's been a great one. I would really like some ideas on what this might be and ways to narrow the problem down more. I really doubt it's the monitor as it works enough to tell me it's working. But what do I know?

Thanks in advance.

Editing to add: Hope I can make some sense here (and hopefully not hijacking this thread). There are two different places to plug the monitor into the tower. Where it was plugged in at was the place we have had it since day 1. So I unplugged it from there and hooked it into the other place. That worked...kind of.

Upon starting, big red x in the tool bar, asked me if I wanted windows to automatically correct color settings and depth (the display is totally whacked). Checked yes, nothing happened as far as I could tell, display still messed up. Went to Display Properties to change the resolution, can't. It is stuck on 640x480 and the lowest color quality 4 bit.

Went to troubleshooting, selected the appropriate reference. Wants me to check if I have the correct monitor selected for use, all it has to select is default monitor and I can not select "Properties"(still using the same one we bought the system with). Moving on to "No, this didn't help me"

Wants me to check for drivers and update them. No way to select for updating drivers, but it does tell me the device is working properly. Next, please...

Does Windows support my display adapter? Yes, yadda yadda, so on and so forth. Wants me to check hardware acceleration and change it to "none" Again, nothing..

Is my BIOS out of date? Okay, go to Intel website to check on updated video BIOS and find out Intel no longer provides support for the video card we bought 1 yr ago...nice. I have e-mailed eMachines about updated INF for the monitor and the latest system BIOS. Not expecting much help there. The support site doesn't even have a search feature. /boggle

Beyond that, troubleshooter is unable to solve my problem.

I check windows updates, and there are no updates for my computer. I finally figure out how to get windows to check for updates for my video driver, no help.

So I go back to I cannot install my monitor(grasping for straws here) and it takes me right back to the second step of this whole thing which I cannot complete because the option is not there.  After that it takes me back through all the options I've already tried.

Is there anything I missed? I can not figure this out and it's going to drive me nuts. The comp runs fine except for the crazy graphics.

[Saviour]

Dyra,

First of all, thanks for the detailed info.

Last week I was working on a PC (eMachine W1700, in fact) that had a similar problem.  This issue began after downloading an updated driver from Micrsoft Update.

I couldn't adjust the settings in the Display Properties, so I decided to "rollback" the driver.  Didn't help.  So I went to eMachines product support page and downloaded and re-installed the driver for the video card that came with the machine.

SUCCESS!!!  Haven't had any problems with the video since.

I did some research and found the support page for your system here:

http://www.emachines.com/support/product_support.html?cat=Desktops&subcat=T-Series&model=T3624

I hope this info can be of some use.

UPDATE:

Dyra,

The system specs on your Model eMachine came with an "onboard" video chip (Intel 845GV video driver).

The drivers you find at the support page I listed above are for the machine you specified in your original post.

Please note:  You stated that no hardware has been added since you got the machine.  That being the case, there shouldn't be two places to plug in a monitor, unless...a video card was added later to this machine.

Can you please verify this?

[Dyra]

Okay, I messed with this thing for hours last night, and feel like a noob, in every sense of the word. We haven't added any hardware in at least 8 months, but shortly after we got the comp, we did add a new vid card to it. After troubleshooting this thing for about an hr, I remembered setting it up when we moved it and hubby had me plug the monitor in somewhere else than I thought it should go. Which is why I was able to switch ports.

Even after moving it, the graphics were screwy and after messing with it about another hour or two, AFTER I had done all the trouble shooting steps, I was just looking around and realized that the onboard graphics card was disabled. I re-enabled them and finally got decent graphics back out of it, not what I was used to, but do-able for the time being.

I believe that the video card we added to it has gone ca-put. The comp will not even recognize it is there. It has been suggested to me to take the Nvidia card out, dust it off, and try to see if it will work, we will try that later. What baffles me is why will the comp not recognize the other card. Is it completely burnt out? Is there anyway to tell for sure or is it just process of elimination?

It has also been suggested to me to remove the integrated card from the hardware manager and reboot to see if it will recognize the Nvidia card. Is that even safe to do? I'm worried that I will make things worse by doing that and end up having to wipe the drive and reinstall.

I appreciate the response. I did update the drivers for my Intel card, no sense running outdated, even if I'd rather have the Nvidia working. I really wish I had remembered the Nvidia card sooner, would have saved me some time, effort, and confusion, lol.

Any tips on getting the Nvidia working or finding out if it's a bust would be appreciated. We tried reinstalling the drivers from the disk it came with, but since the system doesn't recognize it is there, that was a no-go.

Thanks