No image on monitor until windows

Hey,

i have a 260 GTX that i bought second hand very cheap. When i bought it the problem with it was that it sometimes didnt show image until windows. Usualy that didnt pose a problem, exept when i wanted to go to bios i had to restart a few times. Now it will never show picture before windows, no matter how many times i restart.
The GPU is GV-260C-896I REV 1.0 Gigabyte. PSU is 600W Corsair. Both 6 pin connectors properly connected to graphic card. I tried with 2 different cables, DVI - HDMI and VGA - VGA, i tested seperately ofcourse. I tested with another graphic card and there was no problem - picture appeared right away.

Other hardware: abit ip35-e, 2x2gb ddr2, E6400@3.4Ghz
OS: windows 7

 

Try the other dvi connection mine does that if I have it on the second connection or should I say did when I had it.

 

I have only 1 DVI on the back. I tried DVI and VGA, besides that i have HDMI and that is all.

 

Really?What model 260 is it?Mine had the 2 DVI and a HDMI connections.

 

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125291

Could it be that bios drivers somehow arent compatible with this gpu ? And when windows starts and his drivers kick in, suddenly picture appears ? Still, i dont understand why in the beginning, i did see image if i restarted like 2 or 3 times. Now, no matter how many times i restart, there is no picture until windows. I tried resetting cmos, changing bios settings, etc. Nothing works. Otherwise graphic card works as intended, i stress tested it, etc.

 

What monitor do you have?

Some monitors take a good 10 seconds to display a picture, ie you wont even see post on some.

 

I have HP w2207h and on other graphic cards it displays right away. Also, it is not a matter of time, it is a matter of when it loads into windows. For instance if i go into bios right away with DEL, it will never show image, no matter how long i wait. Otherwise it shows it when it comes to windows, meaning at about 50 seconds.

 

Download GPU-Z and check the bios revision.

Checked Gigabyte website and see 2 bios updates one for hynix memory and one for samsung

F2_C 0.17 MB

NVIDIA Source BIOS Version:62.00.50.00.02
ECLK/MCLK is 650/1400/1000MHz
Samsung memory
Fix certain of monitor compatible issue.

F11_C 0.16 MB

NVIDIA Source BIOS Version:62.00.4C.00.01
ECLK/MCLK is 650/1400/1000MHz
Hynix memory
Fix certain of monitor compatible issue.

 

I will do that. Just wondering, what is the chance of bios flash failing .. i have only 1 PCI card and i am not sure it will work with my monitor, the last time i did it, it didnt. Which would make it hard to save, would have to get a working PCI graphic card first. What tool do you advice me to use ?

 

My two older mac pro's used to do the same thing. Nothing I ever found out to fix it.

 

use nvflash, put it on a bootable win98/dos usb stick.

Flash is pretty safe there, on windows it can be finicky sometimes. If it fails and you have a spare card, youll be ok, just make sure to dump the default bios from gpu-z beforehand.

 

The reason i asked is because my motherboard double boots when you turn off the computer. And i remember reading somewhere that someone messed up flashing ( mb or gpu i forgot ) because of that double booting. win98/dos usb stick ? Why not a normal bootable usb stick ?
Now i just have to figure out why my monitor wont show picture with that pci card i own. It said something like monitor cannot display, set the resolution to 1680x1050 60Hz. Yes i am sure 15 year old PCI card can do that. I am wondering what resolution it is trying to output though.

 

I think we might have a problem. It says bios version of my gpu is 62.00.50.00.02. So i already have the latest bios update ?

edit: Hmm i think that bios update has the same version. I checked a site with gpu bios and i found two different bios, with same version name but different date.

edit2: i just remembered something. I will need PCI card to flash my card since i see no image until windows. Meaning i wont know what and when to press

 

You can always blind flash, pretty easy. Just gotta know how to boot to the bootable usb first, then type the command

 

Sounds doable, but i think i will wait until tomorrow and try on an old CRT monitor.

 

Well that old PCI card wont work on my old CRT monitor. Also i tried using my old monitor with my gtx 260 and its not working either. Now i have to find another PCI card before i can flash bios.

 

Then do it within windows if you dont want to blind flash.

 

I flashed it from within windows and i am happy to report that this solved my problem. Maybe SOLVED should be added to title so this can help others with the same problem. Thank you very much for your help Agent-A01 )

Looking at the size of this card and the heat it is emiting though, now that the card is fixed, i am thinking of selling it and replacing it for something smaller and less hot. I bought this card second hand for half a price because of this defect, now i can sell it at full price, which is still almost nothing, but twice as much )

 

No problem, a 750Ti would be a nice upgrade

 

If i would upgrade right now i would simply switch gtx 260 for something like 5850, 6850 .. but maybe i should wait a while and then change my whole rig and get something like 750Ti. With E6400 i think cpu will be a limiting factor