I was reading some old messages about problems with display, clicking,
etc. Now I have the same problem. I suspected the monitor, but now I
think it might be the 9800 Pro.

What happens is my monitor goes entirely black, but the power light
still shows it's getting power from the video card. It goes amber if
the signal is missing.

So far, the only thing that temporarily fixes it is rebooting,
sometimes more than once.

I'm going to try underclocking but I'm thinking about returning the
card. This is a built by ATI retail card.

Anyone else had this problem?

"Jim Davis" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:(E-Mail Removed)...

> What happens is my monitor goes entirely black, but the power light
> still shows it's getting power from the video card. It goes amber if
> the signal is missing.

install latest ati catalyst drivers from ati (or use the omega ones)
and ENABLE the "VPU" control...and ATI reporting (so get popup).
(video processing unit...the video card cpu)

the vpu control will put monitor/card into software mode if a
hardware error or endless looping occurs in the video card...
so may get black screen for few seconds then shifts to software
drivers/rendering, saves desktop data and can work/debug error.

then from what learn/see...you can fix or decide what to do.

--
'Seek and ye shall find'
NT Canuck
http://ntcanuck.com

Are you running a game like Far Cry when that happens?
Or is it just randomly happening? If it is random, you
have a bad card. If it is happening in Far Cry, dl the
1.1 patch and start over. Or drop back to the previous
episode ( not the previous control point ) and when it
loads, hit ~ to drop the Console window, and then
type \map <the name of the next episode>, and you'll
load and continue on. I think the black screen is being
caused by corrupt control points due to so much
restarting .. resulting in stack crashes. Reason I think
that, is ... like the other poster says, the VPU resets ..
if you will wait out the VPU reset, and the desktop
comes back, look down on the task bar and reopen
Far Cry .. guess what? ... it will continue to load and
run fine :-) It is obviously a minor bug, and I'm sure
patch 1.1 or 1.2 will fix it.

johns

On Fri, 7 May 2004 10:40:10 -0700, "johns" <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote/replied to:

>Are you running a game like Far Cry when that happens?
>Or is it just randomly happening? If it is random, you
>have a bad card. If it is happening in Far Cry, dl the
>1.1 patch and start over. Or drop back to the previous
>episode ( not the previous control point ) and when it
>loads, hit ~ to drop the Console window, and then
>type \map <the name of the next episode>, and you'll
>load and continue on. I think the black screen is being
>caused by corrupt control points due to so much
>restarting .. resulting in stack crashes. Reason I think
>that, is ... like the other poster says, the VPU resets ..
>if you will wait out the VPU reset, and the desktop
>comes back, look down on the task bar and reopen
>Far Cry .. guess what? ... it will continue to load and
>run fine :-) It is obviously a minor bug, and I'm sure
>patch 1.1 or 1.2 will fix it.
>
>johns
>

seems my monitor is tits up

oh well, 6 1/2 years is about all you can expect :-)

> oh well, 6 1/2 years is about all you can expect :-)

It sure is. That is like a miracle. Were they even making
monitors 6 1/2 years ago ? :-)

johns

> What happens is my monitor goes entirely black, but the power light
>> still shows it's getting power from the video card. It goes amber if
>> the signal is missing.

Probably the screensaver in BIOS (power management ) is active.