E510 Goes Black When Desktop Comes Up

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for a
while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back out
last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied OS
disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset the
password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to orange
(power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the mouse light
goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going. Thinking it may
have been a problem with the discrete video card, I removed it and set
to use the onboard video. Same problem. The problem also exists in all
Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing stays
on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my password,
but as soon as I do, everything goes out either immediately after
hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop comes up. I've tried
a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA

Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for a
while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back out
last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied OS
disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset the
password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to orange
(power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the mouse light
goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going. Thinking it
may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I removed it and
set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The problem also exists
in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either immediately
after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop comes up.
I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I took a
video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two frames
that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

On Saturday, December 10, 2016 at 4:26:36 PM UTC-5, Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for a
while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back out
last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied OS
disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset the
password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to orange
(power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the mouse light
goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going. Thinking it
may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I removed it and
set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The problem also exists
in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either immediately
after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop comes up.
I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I took a
video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two frames
that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

Can you start up the E510 in safe mode (F8)? Once in safe mode, change the resolution there. Apparently it was originally used with a different monitor.

I usually remove Windows login passwords with this:

http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/

You can download and run it from a CD (obsolete), floppy (even more onsolete) or a bootable flash stick. Download the latest ISO and use RUFUS or YUMI to set up the flash stick.

Ben Myers wrote in
:

On Saturday, December 10, 2016 at 4:26:36 PM UTC-5, Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine
for a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it
back out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell
supplied OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method
to reset the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going.
Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video card,
I removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The
problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop
comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two
frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

Can you start up the E510 in safe mode (F8)? Once in safe mode,
change the resolution there. Apparently it was originally used with a
different monitor

Yep,it was running an ATI Radeon card with a digital 19" LG TR1933
monitor. My son set it up to play games. I tried the ATI/LG monitor,
but still no luck..

I usually remove Windows login passwords with this:

http://pogostick.net/~pnh/ntpasswd/

Thanks, Ben

You can download and run it from a CD (obsolete), floppy (even more
onsolete) or a bootable flash stick. Download the latest ISO and use
RUFUS or YUMI to set up the flash stick.

Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for a
while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back out
last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied OS
disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset the
password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to orange
(power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the mouse light
goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going. Thinking it
may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I removed it and
set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The problem also exists
in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either immediately
after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop comes up.
I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I took a
video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two frames
that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

Safe Mode gets you in (F8),
but I don't know what to do when you get there :-(

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...safe-mode.html

The thing is, there are a couple different places
in the Registry where display resolutions are held,
and I don't have a good technical reference web page
to offer you on the topic.

Even if you uninstall a video driver, the resolution
info is not removed or corrected. So trying a video
driver won't help. But it's the only obvious
option to try.

Paul

Paul wrote in news
Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for
a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back
out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied
OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset
the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going.
Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I
removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The
problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop
comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two
frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

Safe Mode gets you in (F8),
but I don't know what to do when you get there :-(

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...safe-mode.html

The thing is, there are a couple different places
in the Registry where display resolutions are held,
and I don't have a good technical reference web page
to offer you on the topic.

Even if you uninstall a video driver, the resolution
info is not removed or corrected. So trying a video
driver won't help. But it's the only obvious
option to try.

Paul


On this particular Dell model:
F2 is Safe Mode, etc
F12 is Setup

.. I was able to get into Safe Mode, and the desktop came up, I right
clicked on an empty spot on the desktop and left clicked Resolution, and
the Resolution applet came up. I was able to set to 1280 x 1024,
default refresh. I was able to roam all over, and the desk worked fine.
But, when I restarted, it went dark at the desktop. Back to Safe Mode,
I was able to see the proper resolution was still active.

Think I'm ready to System Restore to July 2015.

Boris wrote:
Paul wrote in news
Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for
a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back
out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied
OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset
the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going.
Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I
removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The
problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop
comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA

I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two
frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?
On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

Safe Mode gets you in (F8),
but I don't know what to do when you get there :-(

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...safe-mode.html

The thing is, there are a couple different places
in the Registry where display resolutions are held,
and I don't have a good technical reference web page
to offer you on the topic.

Even if you uninstall a video driver, the resolution
info is not removed or corrected. So trying a video
driver won't help. But it's the only obvious
option to try.

Paul


On this particular Dell model:
F2 is Safe Mode, etc
F12 is Setup

. I was able to get into Safe Mode, and the desktop came up, I right
clicked on an empty spot on the desktop and left clicked Resolution, and
the Resolution applet came up. I was able to set to 1280 x 1024,
default refresh. I was able to roam all over, and the desk worked fine.
But, when I restarted, it went dark at the desktop. Back to Safe Mode,
I was able to see the proper resolution was still active.

Think I'm ready to System Restore to July 2015.

I'm surprised the OS hasn't erased that restore point.

There is supposed to be some time limit on them.

Since the machine has been sitting in storage, there
is probably no harm done by using the last restore
point it made before sitting on the shelf.

And using System Restore, is a good way of getting
a non-corrupted copy of the Registry. That's one of
the benefits of System Restore points.

Now, one problem is, if you do it from Safe Mode,
you cannot undo it again. If you want a "safety solution",
use your Macrium Reflect CD and back up the drive
to an external drive. If you don't like what the
System Restore did to the machine from Safe Mode,
you may need to reload from the backup. Not that
things can get any worse than they are right now...

Personally, I'd rather fix the Registry, except
I wasn't able to find any decent documentation
on the registry locations.

Paul

In article , lid says...

Boris wrote:
Paul wrote in news
Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for
a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back
out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied
OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset
the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going.
Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I
removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The
problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop
comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA

I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two
frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?
On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

I thought the idea was to enter safe mode and select the lowest res
allowed. Then boot back into normal mode which should also load that low
res and then up it to what you want, e.g. set it to 800x600 in safe mode
and assuming you then get a screen under normal mode try upping res
until it stops working. If it's not what you expect at that point you
can diagnose further. I've had to do that a few times years ago mucking
with video cards and monitors before hardware worked itself out.

You might also try deleting the video driver under Device manager in
safe mode and see what happens when it redetects video card when booted
normally.

Boris on 2016/12/10 wrote:

Paul wrote in news
Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine for
a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought it back
out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the Dell supplied
OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe method to reset
the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...otten-windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still going.
Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video card, I
removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same problem. The
problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter my
password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the desktop
comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular two
frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

Safe Mode gets you in (F8),
but I don't know what to do when you get there :-(

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...safe-mode.html

The thing is, there are a couple different places
in the Registry where display resolutions are held,
and I don't have a good technical reference web page
to offer you on the topic.

Even if you uninstall a video driver, the resolution
info is not removed or corrected. So trying a video
driver won't help. But it's the only obvious
option to try.

Paul


On this particular Dell model:
F2 is Safe Mode, etc
F12 is Setup

. I was able to get into Safe Mode, and the desktop came up, I right
clicked on an empty spot on the desktop and left clicked Resolution, and
the Resolution applet came up. I was able to set to 1280 x 1024,
default refresh. I was able to roam all over, and the desk worked fine.
But, when I restarted, it went dark at the desktop. Back to Safe Mode,
I was able to see the proper resolution was still active.

Think I'm ready to System Restore to July 2015.

Presumably you elected to keep the resolution instead of just test it.
Do you know what is the maximum resolution of your LCD monitor? That
should also be its native resolution and what you you want to use.

If Windows' safe mode lets you log in okay, disable all startup programs
and test booting Windows into normal mode and logging in. You could use
msconfig.exe to disable startup programs. You can select them one by
one or just use the option to start up cleanly. Could be you have a
startup program causing the problem.

VanguardLH wrote in :

Boris on 2016/12/10 wrote:

Paul wrote in
news
Boris wrote:
Boris wrote in
09.88:

I have a Dell E510 that has been running Windows 7 Ultimate fine
for a while. I put it on the shelf in October 2015, and brought
it back out last night. I forgot the password, so I used the
Dell supplied OS disk, went into repair, and used the sethc.exe
method to reset the password:

http://www.howtogeek.com/96630/how-t...our-forgotten-
windows-
password-the-easy-way/

This worked, but now the monitor power light goes from green to
orange (power saving mode), the keyboard lights go out, and the
mouse light goes out. I can hear the power supply fan still
going. Thinking it may have been a problem with the discrete video
card, I removed it and set to use the onboard video. Same
problem. The problem also exists in all Safe Modes.

Funny, though, as long as I don't enter my new password, the thing
stays on. That is, it will sit there forever asking me to enter
my password, but as soon as I do, everything goes out either
immediately after hitting Enter, or a few seconds after the
desktop comes up. I've tried a different monitor, too, but same
problem.

Any ideas?

TIA


I noticed thatthere was a (probably) monitor generated message that
flashed very, very quickly just before the monitor went black. I
took a video of it with my cell phone, and watched the particular
two frames that had the message:

"Cannot Display This Video Mode
Optimum Resolution 1200 x 1024 68mHz"

How in the world do I change this if I can't get into the desktop?

On an LCD monitor, the OSD is supposed to display
"Out of Range" when the resolution or refresh is wrong.
A typical "problem" is the Refresh getting set to 150Hz
by a corruption of some kind. The normal LCD refresh is
60Hz.

*******

Safe Mode gets you in (F8),
but I don't know what to do when you get there :-(

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials...safe-mode.html

The thing is, there are a couple different places
in the Registry where display resolutions are held,
and I don't have a good technical reference web page
to offer you on the topic.

Even if you uninstall a video driver, the resolution
info is not removed or corrected. So trying a video
driver won't help. But it's the only obvious
option to try.

Paul


On this particular Dell model:
F2 is Safe Mode, etc
F12 is Setup

. I was able to get into Safe Mode, and the desktop came up, I
right clicked on an empty spot on the desktop and left clicked
Resolution, and the Resolution applet came up. I was able to set to
1280 x 1024, default refresh. I was able to roam all over, and the
desk worked fine.
But, when I restarted, it went dark at the desktop. Back to Safe
Mode,
I was able to see the proper resolution was still active.

Think I'm ready to System Restore to July 2015.

Presumably you elected to keep the resolution instead of just test it.
Do you know what is the maximum resolution of your LCD monitor? That
should also be its native resolution and what you you want to use.

Max resolution is 1280 x 1024, and I was able to set that and maintain
that.


If Windows' safe mode lets you log in okay, disable all startup
programs and test booting Windows into normal mode and logging in.
You could use msconfig.exe to disable startup programs. You can
select them one by one or just use the option to start up cleanly.
Could be you have a startup program causing the problem.

The machine will now start up ok in normal mode. I've disabled the four
start up programs, but still same problem.

I decided to reinstall the OS again. I formatted the hard drive and did
a clean install. Same problem.

I suspected a hard drive problem, so I booted into the Utility
Diagnostics. It gave me an error 7, which is hard drive, but Dell site
tells me that that utility is only good for 80GB and smaller drives, and
one always gets this error on larger drives, But, I guess it could
still be a valid error.

I was able to get FireFox installed, but the problem persists when I got
to Dell dot com. That is, the machine shuts off. Ironic. (

I was able to install SP3 from a CD I had. It installed successfully.
I then began to get automatic updates show up in the system tray. I did
an Express Install, but it shut down. I tried a Custome install, but it
shut down. I kept trying Express installs, because IE8 was in there,
but it shut down again. Another try at Express install worked, but when
I said Restart, it installed them all but shut down when finished.

I rebooted, and a few more Auto Updates showed up and were installed
successfully.

I launched FireFox, cruised around for a while alright, but when I went
to Dell dot com, it shut down. Sometimes FireFox will open to it's home
page, and when I begin to type in a URL, the machine shuts down
immediately.

I suspected bad memory, so I tried the same type (DDR2) of known good
memory, but no luck.

I wonder if the power supply is flakey, but I doubt it because the
machine will stay on overnight if I don't do something to cause a shut
down.

THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THE MACHINE "SHUTS DOWN"

This is not a normal shut down. The machine doesn't give me a BSOD or
lock up when it shuts down, What happens is that the monitor goes black,
which indicates no incoming signal from pc, and the keyboard lights go
off. Both the processor and power supply stay on, and the green light
on the motherboard stays on. The network light (amber) stays on.
Again, all of this indicates no signal to peripherals, even though
everything indicates the machine is on. If this was just a video
problem, I'd expect the keyboard lights to stay on. Hmmm...if there's a
CD in the CD ROM, I can't open the CD ROM.

The hard drive indicator light stays solid green, and doesn't blink with
activity. By the way, it never shows activity, even when I can hear
activity during file copying.

The green light on the motherboard stays green. The power supply fan
spins, and I can feel the hard drive is on, but hear no head movement.

During POST, the front panel diagnostic lights blink out the numbers,
but don't stay light once POST is done.

There are no suspicious logs in the event log.

Before doing any trouble shooting, I cleaned out the pc very good,
unplugged all connectors, memory, and boards, and plugged back in, and I
applied new thermal heat paste to the processor. The heat sink only
gets luke warm to warm to the touch. The macine has stayed on for hours
during formats and reinstalls of the OS.

The CMOS battery is almost 11 years old, but I'm not loosing time.

I was just letting the machine auto download more auto updates, and it
shut down. I didn't touch it.

I was also just able to install Belarc Advisor from a USB drive, and it
did it's analysis, but when I went to maximize the results window, it
shut down. I just rebooted, clicked off the Belarc analysis again, and
when it was presented on screen, I was able this time to maximize.

I suspect thewrong chipset/video driver. I've tried the one that came
with the Dell CD, and two different ones that show up for my service
tag, each time on a clean OS install.

This one's really got me.