Sudden resolution problems

[UserNexX]

No, I don't mean I need a "sudden resolution" for my problems .

Well, hello gentlemen, I just registered because it looks like you could solve a problem a friend of mine just experienced.

Last night his comp was alright, then he turned it on this morning and got a black screen when it came to load desktop. We suposed it to be something resolution related, and starting it on safe mode proved us right, we uninstalled gpu drivers (currently Nvidia's latest version (197.45) , he's got a 8600GT, btw) and put in the first version the gpu came with (15X.XX, pretty old). Since that old version used a lower base res, it worked.
Then, when we installed back the 197.45 version, we got a black screen again, as that version already uses a higher base res.

PS: Obviously, that 197.45 version of drivers worked fine with his rig until today, also he has no internet access (so malware is unlikely) and runs on XP SP3.

Any kind of advice would be great, thanks in advance.

^^

 

[wii-ste]

I suspect that this is not a resolution issue, but a problem with output selection. That is the output port that the card uses. Does the card have a TV output port? nVidia's cards (especially the 8 series) have a habit of outputting to the TV port rather than the monitor port.

If this was a resolution issue, the monitor will normally alert you to this through the OnScreen Display, usually saying 'Out of Range' or similar. Having said that, if it is the output port, the monitor should display something like 'No Signal'.

Does the monitor display anything at all? Does it go into standby?

 

[UserNexX]

His monitor displays a "No signal" message when trying out higher resolutions, but works perfectly with lower ones. I mean, when using those old drivers that you have to manually select res with he has no problem (as long as doesn't try to set his older resolution, which his monitor handed perfectly 'till today).
Problem with newer drivers is basically that they instantly change res to max supported one, making his monitor display the No signal message and giving no change to set the smaller one.

I hadn't thought about the output port, but if that'sthe cause it'd mean it has worked for a year+ with it wrongly set and that for unknown reasons it suddenly decided to start porting higher resolutions only to TV output. That's kind of bizarre, to be honest.

 

[wii-ste]

I hadn't thought about the output port, but if that'sthe cause it'd mean it has worked for a year+ with it wrongly set and that for unknown reasons it suddenly decided to start porting higher resolutions only to TV output. That's kind of bizarre, to be honest.

Bizarre yes! But it has been happening on the 8 series for a while under certain circumstances after installation of a new driver version (I often had to move my old CRT TV closer to the PC so I could connect the S-VIdeo cable after updating the driver).

As far as I remember my drivers don't set the highest resolution after install, but use the native resolution of my monitor. If you can get the monitor driver (usually just an INF file that sets the capabilities in the registry) this might help to get the nVidia drivers into the right resolution.

 

[UserNexX]

Aaah yes, human stupidity never ceases to amaze me. He formatted recently it seems to be, and he didn't install whatsoever driver which somehow (magically to my understanding, indeed) reacts to... erm.

Well, truth to be said, I'm not very sure what was actually going wrong by not installing that driver, but it was obviously the cause of all these problems as installing it made him able to put in the newest drivers with no problem. Mistery solved, gentleman; or sort of, indeed solved enough for him.

Real thanks for your help, I'll smack my friend for you .

^^

 

[wii-ste]

I can't approve your use of violence - but yes please do that lol

Glad you got it sorted!