Monitor goes into standby mode during boot up

[TVeblen]

When I boot my box (cold boot or warm) the monitor works normally during
BIOS screens and right up until after the Windows XP splash screen
disappears. Then there is a pause in the boot process, the monitor power
button changes from green to orange, a 10 second or so delay, then the power
button turns green again and the rest of the boot goes normally. I'm trying
to eliminate this minor annoyance.
The graphics card is an Asus branded Radeon 9800 Pro with 256MB. The MB is a
P4C800E-Deluxe. There is no on board video.

When I first built the system I hooked it up to a MAG 720v CRT monitor via
the analog connector on the card. There were some issues getting the monitor
to work with the Radeon. I had to set some non-native resolutions and
refresh rates on the monitor. The delay occurred with the MAG from the
get-go. Obviously, the event occurs because the display is changing from
default 480x640 at boot to the preset display resolution when Windows loads.
I figured it was a MAG related problem and knowing I would upgrade the
monitor eventually, I ignored it.

So yesterday I upgraded. I moved a Dell 1901FP LCD digital that I have been
using on another system for 2 years and hooked it up to this system via the
DVI-D connector fully expecting the boot issue to disappear. No luck. Still
does it. This delay does not occur on another XP system with an ATI Radeon
9200SE card, either with the new LCD monitor or did it with the old 1901.

I have:
Installed the monitor drivers.
Updated the video driver (way back, during MAG days). (*see next post for
additional driver issue).
Checked to see that the resolution and refresh rates are native to the
monitor and the card.
Changed the resolution and refresh rates to other native settings.
In BIOS, toggled the PnP aware OS option from Yes to No, and from No to Yes.

Other than this boot delay, everything works fine with the video.
Anyone have any ideas on solving this annoyance?

 

[JAD]

make sure that you did not set the AGP apeture too high in the bios.

When I boot my box (cold boot or warm) the monitor works normally during
BIOS screens and right up until after the Windows XP splash screen
disappears. Then there is a pause in the boot process, the monitor power
button changes from green to orange, a 10 second or so delay, then the power
button turns green again and the rest of the boot goes normally. I'm trying
to eliminate this minor annoyance.
The graphics card is an Asus branded Radeon 9800 Pro with 256MB. The MB is a
P4C800E-Deluxe. There is no on board video.

When I first built the system I hooked it up to a MAG 720v CRT monitor via
the analog connector on the card. There were some issues getting the monitor
to work with the Radeon. I had to set some non-native resolutions and
refresh rates on the monitor. The delay occurred with the MAG from the
get-go. Obviously, the event occurs because the display is changing from
default 480x640 at boot to the preset display resolution when Windows loads.
I figured it was a MAG related problem and knowing I would upgrade the
monitor eventually, I ignored it.

MAGs can be weird that way, If you set a odd 'USER' setting in the OSD of
the MAG it will react strangely when windows boots.

 

[TVeblen]

make sure that you did not set the AGP apeture too high in the bios.

Whoosh! Over my head. I would not have, and don't recall changing any
apeture settings in the BIOS from defaults.
What is the proper setting? (RTFM?)
I'll take a look.

MAGs can be weird that way, If you set a odd 'USER' setting in the OSD of
the MAG it will react strangely when windows boots.

But will the MAG make a change to the OS boot sequence? Something I can
change?

 

[JAD]

Whoosh! Over my head. I would not have, and don't recall changing any
aperture settings in the BIOS from defaults.
What is the proper setting? (RTFM?)
I'll take a look.

If the bios as the option it should be set = to the video cards ram (up to
128) If you didn't touch it its probably OK.

But will the MAG make a change to the OS boot sequence? Something I can
change?

boot sequence....? Nooooo I'm not sure thats what you mean. You mean 'How'
it boots in regards to the monitor's disaply? Yes. for instance in the
monitors OSD[on screen disply] (the way you can adjust brightness, contrast
geometry, etc) if you set it to something like screen size of 640x480 at 60
mhz and then windows boots to a screen size of 1024x768 @100mhz is some
instances it will cause the mag to lose the video signal and you get an
error of something like -video settings are out of range- something along
those lines.

 

[Conor]

Other than this boot delay, everything works fine with the video.
Anyone have any ideas on solving this annoyance?

Forget it and live with it. Mine does the same on a 7800GT. Windows XP
for me has done it over three motherboards, four graphics cards and two
monitors.

 

[Paul]

Whoosh! Over my head. I would not have, and don't recall changing any
apeture settings in the BIOS from defaults.
What is the proper setting? (RTFM?)
I'll take a look.


But will the MAG make a change to the OS boot sequence? Something I can
change?

That is probably the ATI SmartGART figuring out what AGP transfer
rate to run the card at. AFAIK, the ATI driver software tries some
hardware settings, just before the desktop appears, and the hardware
interface may cause a crash at that point. The software recovers,
adjusts the settings, and tries again. Do you see any brief flashes
during the 10 seconds ? Open the control panel and the SmartGART
tab, and see what mode the software has decided to use. If not
everything is enabled, that might explain that SmartGART was not
successful on its first attempted settings.

Paul

 

[TVeblen]

make sure that you did not set the AGP apeture too high in the bios.

JAD- I found the "Graphics Apeture Size" setting in the BIOS. It is set to
64MB. Is that normal for the Radeon with 256MB?
Thanks

 

[TVeblen]

That is probably the ATI SmartGART figuring out what AGP transfer
rate to run the card at. AFAIK, the ATI driver software tries some
hardware settings, just before the desktop appears, and the hardware
interface may cause a crash at that point. The software recovers,
adjusts the settings, and tries again. Do you see any brief flashes
during the 10 seconds ? Open the control panel and the SmartGART
tab, and see what mode the software has decided to use. If not
everything is enabled, that might explain that SmartGART was not
successful on its first attempted settings.

Paul

Hi Paul. There are no flashes. The screen goes dark (power save) then comes
back on. On the SMARTGART tab the "Current Speed" is 8X. 4X is highlighted.
1X and 2X are grey. Fastwrite is ON. Current status is ON. That is all the
settings for the Radeon.

Also: on the OPTIONS tab "disable quick resolution feature" is unchecked.
"Reduce DVI frequency on high resolution displays" is unchecked. "Alternate
DVI operational mode" is checked.

In BIOS > Chipset Settings:
Graphics Adapter Priority = AGP/PCI
Graphics Aperture Size = 64MB
Spread Spectrum = Enabled.
ICH DElayed Transaction = Enabled

Thanks

 

[JAD]

for now, until you get things sorted, then you could try 128 but don't use
256 if you have that option.
Its fine where it is, and now that I think about it, after rereading, it
would probably have little to do with your specific problem.

 

[TVeblen]

Yeah, methinks you are right.
This is interesting: http://www.tweak3d.net/articles/aperture-size/

 

[David Maynard]

When I boot my box (cold boot or warm) the monitor works normally during
BIOS screens and right up until after the Windows XP splash screen
disappears. Then there is a pause in the boot process, the monitor power
button changes from green to orange, a 10 second or so delay, then the power
button turns green again and the rest of the boot goes normally. I'm trying
to eliminate this minor annoyance.
The graphics card is an Asus branded Radeon 9800 Pro with 256MB. The MB is a
P4C800E-Deluxe. There is no on board video.

When I first built the system I hooked it up to a MAG 720v CRT monitor via
the analog connector on the card. There were some issues getting the monitor
to work with the Radeon. I had to set some non-native resolutions and
refresh rates on the monitor. The delay occurred with the MAG from the
get-go. Obviously, the event occurs because the display is changing from
default 480x640 at boot to the preset display resolution when Windows loads.
I figured it was a MAG related problem and knowing I would upgrade the
monitor eventually, I ignored it.

So yesterday I upgraded. I moved a Dell 1901FP LCD digital that I have been
using on another system for 2 years and hooked it up to this system via the
DVI-D connector fully expecting the boot issue to disappear. No luck. Still
does it. This delay does not occur on another XP system with an ATI Radeon
9200SE card, either with the new LCD monitor or did it with the old 1901.

I have:
Installed the monitor drivers.
Updated the video driver (way back, during MAG days). (*see next post for
additional driver issue).
Checked to see that the resolution and refresh rates are native to the
monitor and the card.
Changed the resolution and refresh rates to other native settings.
In BIOS, toggled the PnP aware OS option from Yes to No, and from No to Yes.

Other than this boot delay, everything works fine with the video.
Anyone have any ideas on solving this annoyance?

That's not a "boot delay." It's just XP setting up the display card.

It starts off at power up in VGA mode so the BIOS works and then XP has to
set it up for Windows operation.

 

[TVeblen]

That's not a "boot delay." It's just XP setting up the display card.

It starts off at power up in VGA mode so the BIOS works and then XP has to
set it up for Windows operation.

Understood. But this is an unusual delay. Thing is, I used this main board,
video card, and monitor together in another build, so I know they are
capable of playing nice together. Something has changed and I want to figure
out how to change it back.

 

[TVeblen]

When I boot my box (cold boot or warm) the monitor works normally during
BIOS screens and right up until after the Windows XP splash screen
disappears. Then there is a pause in the boot process, the monitor power
button changes from green to orange, a 10 second or so delay, then the
power button turns green again and the rest of the boot goes normally. I'm
trying to eliminate this minor annoyance.
The graphics card is an Asus branded Radeon 9800 Pro with 256MB. The MB is
a P4C800E-Deluxe. There is no on board video.

When I first built the system I hooked it up to a MAG 720v CRT monitor via
the analog connector on the card. There were some issues getting the
monitor to work with the Radeon. I had to set some non-native resolutions
and refresh rates on the monitor. The delay occurred with the MAG from the
get-go. Obviously, the event occurs because the display is changing from
default 480x640 at boot to the preset display resolution when Windows
loads. I figured it was a MAG related problem and knowing I would upgrade
the monitor eventually, I ignored it.

So yesterday I upgraded. I moved a Dell 1901FP LCD digital that I have
been using on another system for 2 years and hooked it up to this system
via the DVI-D connector fully expecting the boot issue to disappear. No
luck. Still does it. This delay does not occur on another XP system with
an ATI Radeon 9200SE card, either with the new LCD monitor or did it with
the old 1901.

I have:
Installed the monitor drivers.
Updated the video driver (way back, during MAG days). (*see next post for
additional driver issue).
Checked to see that the resolution and refresh rates are native to the
monitor and the card.
Changed the resolution and refresh rates to other native settings.
In BIOS, toggled the PnP aware OS option from Yes to No, and from No to
Yes.

Changed the graphics apeture up to 128 and down to 32.
When I uninstall the ATI drivers and software and the card is running in
standard VGA the system boots normally.

 

[Conor]

Changed the graphics apeture up to 128 and down to 32.
When I uninstall the ATI drivers and software and the card is running in
standard VGA the system boots normally.

Precisely. It is Windows XP setting up the graphics card as previously
explained.

 

[David Maynard]

Understood. But this is an unusual delay. Thing is, I used this main board,
video card, and monitor together in another build, so I know they are
capable of playing nice together. Something has changed and I want to figure
out how to change it back.

You might want to broaden your scope of investigation as I suspect there's
something else causing the delay at the same point in the process the
display is being initialized.

 

[TVeblen]

You might want to broaden your scope of investigation as I suspect there's
something else causing the delay at the same point in the process the
display is being initialized.

You are right. Someone in another group gave me this:
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33758908&page=1&pp=30

Seems that the 9800 series cards have some kind of problem with the
Analog/DVI switching. Possibly. In any event the symptoms are exactly the
same, so I'm on the right track. Fortunately, I found this before installing
the Catalyst drivers. Many posts from people who lost functionality
completely after the upgrade. There are some benefits to being a slow,
methodical, PIA!

 

[TVeblen]

Precisely. It is Windows XP setting up the graphics card as previously
explained.

I'm with you, Conor. It works, and I'm leaving it alone (as far as permanent
system changes are concerned).
But it ain't normal. And I'm an OCD - PIA - cranky old MF too! So I will
continue to try and figure out the why. Beats the hell out of watching TV.

Funny story: I had a hernia operation years back. I was at home recuperating
the next day and my wife comes home and looks and my balls were the size of
a grapefruit and dark purple. She says: "you better call the nurse. That
doesn't look good". So I call and explain my symptoms, and the nurse says:
"Oh, that's normal".

 

[David Maynard]

You are right. Someone in another group gave me this:
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33758908&page=1&pp=30

Seems that the 9800 series cards have some kind of problem with the
Analog/DVI switching. Possibly. In any event the symptoms are exactly the
same, so I'm on the right track. Fortunately, I found this before installing
the Catalyst drivers. Many posts from people who lost functionality
completely after the upgrade. There are some benefits to being a slow,
methodical, PIA!

Well, the huge post at the tail end of that thread indicates it's a bad
EDID code from the monitor and not a card/driver problem at all. And that
it happens with both Nvidia and ATI cards, which would make sense if it's a
monitor EDID problem.

 

[TVeblen]

Well, the huge post at the tail end of that thread indicates it's a bad
EDID code from the monitor and not a card/driver problem at all. And that
it happens with both Nvidia and ATI cards, which would make sense if it's
a monitor EDID problem.

Yes, quite an informative post. Very well written. I love the part about
needing to buy an Nvidia card to fix a Dell/Samsung problem. So I've been
reading up on EDID and looking for a more automated fix to edit the EDID.
That guy who posted the solution was on a mission from God! I don't know if
I've got that kind of patience. But it is good to get confirmation that the
problem I'm having is not just in my head! And good to know the ATI cards
can self correct.
One thing bothers me though: This delay problem happened with both the MAG
CRT analog monitor and the Dell LCD Digital. If the EDID is stored in the
firmware on the monitor, why would the Dell, which has always been connected
to DVI, get the same h line analog corruption?