This is driving me crazy. Normally I wouldn’t bring a computer tech question here but I’m getting somewhat desperate.
I’m the closest person to on-site tech support in the satellite office where I work.
I’m trying to configure computer’s for our group. I have remote tech support but it’s limited. If I can’t fix my problem locally, I’ll have to ship the computer back to our home office.
We just ordered two new identical computers. Each is pretty hefty on power – Duo processors operating at reasonably fast rates, 4 GBytes of Ram and identically built. The plan was for each computer to run two monitors (26” and 19”) from both of the motherboard DVI and VGA ports.
So here’s the problem -
On computer 1 monitor 26” is set to 1920X1200 from the DVI port and Monitor 19 is set to 1024 X 768 – everything works just fine
Computer two – can’t get the 26” monitor to go above 1024X768 (on a 26” monitor this makes icons look like clown decorations)
Called our remote tech support and he said to adjust the computers properties for “performance” - did that – still no luck
Bought a dedicated graphics card, disabled the motherboard video drivers and hooked up ONLY the 26” monitor to it first via the Cards DVI port then the VGA port – still no luck
Switched 26”monitors with the computer 1 and 2 just to see if it’s the monitor acting up – monitors are both proven to be OK
So for some unknown reason computer 2 just doesn’t want to let a 26” monitor to go to a high resolution.
I didn’t mention it earlier but while trying to adjust the settings for higher rez the monitor just blinks a focused flash of the chosen resolution every five seconds or so until the test part of the setting process times out.
My first thought was that on the problematic PC, the 26" monitor had been set to mirror the 19" monitor, thus it got the identical resolution, however since you tried using a dedicated video card with the same results that sounds less likely.
Can you give us some details?
Operating system?
Make/model of the major components (including the mobo and the video card you tried)?
Type of monitors - I assume LCD (since you are using DVI port for one) but the resolutions you mention are below the native res for those size monitors.
On the display settings for both machines/both monitors, what’s everything set to? Provide as much info as you can note down.
Couple of dumb questions:
a. Have you actually confirmed that the machines are identical (same mobo, etc)? Wouldn’t be the first time a manufacturer changed components midrun.
b. What happens if you switch the 19" and 26" monitors on the problematic PC? Help, hurt, no change?
c. I know that some video cards with dual outputs will only use two monitors if they have the same resolution (I found this out by surprise on the machine I just built), might be worth digging around in your documentation.
This was my first thought. If it won’t work with the other PC, monitor probably has an issue, if it will you may have some other driver weirdness requiring you to strip out all th edrivers in safe mode and get a good clean reload of the drivers. Might want to check manufacturer site there may be a known issue with a patch or driver update to correct it.
I just realized that it wasn’t too bright of me to post this question when I won’t be back in the office till Monday - I’ll try to answer your questions as best I can remember. My apologies for my foolishness.
Windows XP
2 vid card - ATI Radeon card with 128 MB of mem - sorry forgot the model num
Computers - MPC , won’t know the MOBO untill Tomorrow or monday
The monitors are ACER LCD monitors. The Video card setup software is capable of identifying them by model number. Sorry, I don’t have them memorized.
I apologize for not having all of the necessary info. I’ve set the monitors to the lowest refresh rates (60hz ) to rule out any problems with that. Other than the computer itself set to performance mode to save memory and the resolution settings I’m not sure what else I can give you now. Should I note memory alocationas well as driver info? Is that helpful?
Re your stupid questions (which I don’t think are stupid - I’m very grateful for your interest in helping)
A - I suspect that there may be a MOBO difference or some other but I haven’t confirmd that. My tech guy tells me that they are identical.
B - Yep, I switched them. The 19" isn’t capable of 1920X1200 so there’s no help there and, of course, the 26" does just fine at 1024X768
C- The Radeon claims to be able to handle separate resolutions on two monitors and computer 1 has no problem doing that on its MOBO graphics ports. (Also, I tried putting the 26" on as the ONLY monitor and could adjust neither the MOBO nor the card to 1920X1200
The monitor checks out fine on computer number one. We have 5 total 26" monitors in the office and trying one of the other 26" on computer 2 was a no go.
The thing that scares me about tearing out and reloading drivers is I’ve already disabled the existing MOBO video drivers and installed the ATI drivers that came with the card. Are there other hardware drivers which could affect the monitor?
This will probably turn out to be a bad monitor. You can get the money to buy a new one by firing that tech support guy – none of the ways I can parse “adjust the computer’s properties for ‘performance’” has anything to do with monitor resolution.
Well, you could argue that with fewer pixels to refresh, less computational effort is spent refreshing them (whether by the GPU or the CPU).
Mind you, I’m not claiming that this argument is either a) valid b) convincing or c) anything other than a load of horse manure - but you still *could *make that argument.
I tought it was the monitor too -
Except for my test where I took the “good” monitor on computer 1 which worked just fine in 1920X1200 and watched it fail on computer 2. I also took the “bad” monitor on computer 2 and watched it show 1920X1200 on computer 1.
As for the tech - he’s stretched pretty thin and basically handles cookie cutter applications for accounting business needs. My shop is engineering and crunch intensive. (we analyze and trade commodities) so all of my computer needs could be on the edge of his comfort zone. I throw problems at him that he may not ever have dealt with.
Dervorin Your comment is pretty close to what my tech told me. He said that the MOBO GPU might have been at its limit and by turning off features like cursor shadows and the like it may perform better. He noted that computer 1, which is my computer and is used to code VB and run some crunch intensive Excel macros, was adjusted for performance wile computer 2 was left in the “let windows decide what is best” mode. He suggested that may be why two identical computers had different results.
Here’s something I forgot to mention that lends support to the tech’s comments. Before I ran out to buy a graphics card I made the performance adjustments and was able to get 1920X1200 mode on the 26" monitor as the 2nd screen. The few icons that were on the blank background were fine and perfectly focused. As soon as I dragged a window from screen 1 onto screen 2 - poof. the screen went blank with its “every five second” burst of a 1920X1200 flash of screen. that’s what convinced me that my MOBO GPU was at its limits.
He wasn’t available Saturday morning when I put the Graphics card in so he isn’t yet aware that the problem still exists.
As far as refresh rate goes that shouldn’t be an issue - LCDs don’t really have one (unlike CRTs), just leave them on 60hz.
Minimize the amount of stuff that’s plugged in: Start with the 19" LCD and put it first on the DVI port, then put it on the VGA port. In each case check the Display Properties-Settings tab and make sure that XP has recognized the correct size and resolution range (for a 19" I think that’s 1280x1024 - the little slider that lets you adjust resolution in the Settings tab should show that as the maximum resolution since you can’t push an LCD past its native resolution).
If that’s OK then try the same thing with only the 26" LCD. I don’t have one handy and I don’t think that I’ve seen a 26" in 4:3 so I assume that it’s a Widescreen (16:9) monitor? If so then the native res is about 1920x1200. Again, see if the Settings tab under Display Properties correctly identifies the monitor’s size and thus max res.
If neither monitor is correct per above, try changing the cable that you are using with one that is known good (works on another computer).
If that doesn’t work it’s probably something on the PC itself (especially if those same monitors work right on another machine) - video drivers, GPU, etc.
Those settings involve graphic bells and whistles like dropshadows on moving windows and menus sliding in and out instead of just appearing. If that tech is worth a shit he would know that.
Wait a minute - googling AL2616W turns up a bunch of non-US sales sites and one troubleshooting forum where the problem is - getting 1920X1200 resolutions on the monitor. Still doesn’t explain why one PC can and the other PC can’t do it. Nor does the thread seem to reach a resolution.
I’m going to rattle my off-site tech’s chains a little and see if he has any other solutions.
Of course it was two problems at once. Resolving just one problem still made the monitor unworkable.
Problem 1 - conflict between a graphics driver and an application which controlled the graphics. On computer 1 - was a graphics media accelerator driver which I was used to initialize conditions for the monitor. Apparently this ap was damaged on computer 2. (I was unaware it was even on #2)
Problem #2 - Bad DVI cable.
My remote tech abused me for putting in a dedicated graphics card which he didn’t ordain. Found out the graphics card works just fine when you have the correct DVI cable.
But the graphics card isn’t necessary if the ##@% DVI cable is working. I yanked the card and the tech reloaded and reconfigured the monitor remotely. He’s not too happy with me for putting in the video card. I’m not to happy with him for ignoring my request for help over a week ago.
