Old Compaq not Working

[Djas00]

My cousin has a compaq computer from 1999. Don't know much about it except that it has 2 hard drives ( IBM 9GB and Quantom 5GB), it also has 64 MB of RAM. That is about all I know about it. It seems to have a problem when you try to turn it on. When you flip the power switch the computer turns on and you can hear it boot up but you cannot see it on the monitor. I've tried to hook several video cards to it but still nothing. Does anyone have an answer to this problem?

 

[n2gun]

first thing is to check the cable from the monitor to make sure a pin did not get bent. Have seen this on a few occasions.

Also are you getting any beeps when booting?

Try to get as much info as you can and ket us know.

 

[fastfingeredfool]

My old Compaq has had the same problem before also. Strange things seem to happen in there for no apparent reason. Just opening the case to see if something came loose and putting it back together has had good results (???). If it's like my Presario 7470, the video is on software (no card) which needs disabled if you're using a card. Do you get anything if trying to boot up in safe mode? Does the monitor work on a different computer?

 

[Djas00]

The monitor works and I cannot boot in safe mode because I can not see anything it is doing! I cannot see any problems in the computer.

 

[n2gun]

do you see anything at all when it first starts booting. You should see the post page(First page) if not it may be a video card prolem. Also have you tried a boot disk?

 

[Triple6]

boot disks and safe mode don't apply here. You said your monitor works, did you try it on another system? Are you sure its booting up and not just powering up. If its booting it should beep at the end of the post, check your floppy, and boot from the harddrive. you should see the lights blink and here all the sounds. If not try a new power supply. If it does its likely the video but you say you tried that. is the old video onboard? As something to try. Clear the cmos(via jumpers), or try booting with only video, ram and cpu after reseating both the ram and video.

 

[Djas00]

I just realized the video cards I hooked into the computer do not work. I am going to try some more