Topic: Black Screen on start up

[tower.1963]

Evenin all,hope you help with problem I have.Built system from pile of spares MSI MS6119 mobo,P3 550,GeF2-32mb GFX,384mbPC100,10Gb samsung HDD,Asus CDRW,Sony DVDRom,300wPSU generic,Win xp OS.At first all was well,then switched on today and met by black/blank screen.All drives(CD,DVD,HDD)seem to power up,as do case,psu & cpu fans.Have swopped checked monitors and swopped GFX card for 1xAGP Sparkle GFX card,but can`t vouch for it. Suggestions please,I`m thinking dead GFX card and/or motherboard....or is it something else??

[Sandra]

Hi "tower.1963" and welcome to Pals  
Do you not get any post beeps at all ?
If the CMOS battery is as old as the mobo/cpu then theres a good chance that its the battery.
Try replacing that and clearing the CMOS with the clear CMOS jumper, dont forget to set it back in the normal run position afterwards and try that  

[tower.1963]

Thanks Sandra,
Sorry should`ve said,replaced CMOS battery 6 months ago when last used mobo,and no post beeps.But thanks for advice will investigate further tommorrow.
regards tower

[Simon]

This sounds like a similar problem to the one I have in this thread, only mine is intermittent.  Have you tried reseating all the components, as was suggested to me?  I don't know if it will work yet, as I haven't been able to get to the machine in question.

Oh, and  

[tower.1963]

ok,checked battery + reset cmos + reseated all components and guess what...started first go.
many thanks guys(and girls)help very much appreciated.
 tower