Another monitor problem

[Zifnab]

An old thread on my monitor (http://www.eyesonff.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31761)

After that my monitor seemed to be fine for awhile. But now a similar problem has come up. Today my monitor was fine, but I turned it on tonight and something strange happened. Halfway through booting up, my monitor seemed to shut down, and all the lights on it started flickering (for contrast, brightness etc) and when it booted up the monitor was once again making the low humming noise it made in that thread. I've rebooted 4 times now, and exactly the same thing happens (though once the lights didnt flicker). The settings seem to be less then optimal, as the screen is flickering yet again. Also there seems to be a pause from the computer while the screen goes blank while the lights flicker. Help! :(

[crono_logical]

Try turning the monitor on before Windows gets booting - I read about this a long time ago where older Windows occasionally forgets what type of monitor is plugged in if it boots and tries to initialise the display while the display is off. Seems strange even to me, but it was something in a technical computer magazine, so yeah :p

[Dr Unne]

Windows ME and everything before it was like that for me too, if I left my monitor off and turned on my computer and let it boot, it'd use 640x480 and the lowest color depth available and refuse to let me change it. Windows XP doesn't have that problem though.

[Zifnab]

That's weird, I tried both of your advice for luck (I shut down the computer, but didn't turn 'off' the monitor) and it booted up with optimal refresh like normal.
The strange thing about my monitor is it seems to turn itself on rather then anything else. It has two lights, one which is to turn it on/off, and one on my speaker which comes on when the monitor is 'in action' if you will. If I simply turn it on the monitor wont do anything other then have the light turned on on the power button. It's not until the monitor wants to display something (and I turn on my computer) that the other light will shine, and the computer will hum etc.

Just curious, if I had to get a new monitor, how would I go about installing it? I'm useless at these things so I'm guessing I'd need to install drivers also, somehow.

[crono_logical]

Monitors are easy to replace - easier than keyboard and mice in fact, since you can remove one and plug a new one in with the PC running, and should be fine assuming you do it in a resolution both monitors are capable of.

It's basically plug in the video cable between the monitor and computer, plug in the power from monitor to a free wall socket, and it's ready to go :p

You can install drivers if you want, but usually it's not worth it unless it's a huge screen that can do 2048 x 1536 120 Hz or something fancy, since the drivers really only tell Windows what resolutions the monitor is capable of - most monitors are fine with the default "Plug and Play" monitor driver installed.