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Today I managed to knock my son's pc monitor off his desk onto the floor - it's no longer working! Not my finest moment but I obviously need to get him up and running again. It plugs in using an HDMI cable. I have a spare monitor that uses an older style 15 pin cable but when I plug it in, the pc isn't 'seeing' it. Any ideas what I need to do to make it work? Thanks
Does it see it at boot? By that do you see any of the power on screens before windows loads?
Trip to PC world, or Amazon. They aren't expensive.
Does it have a graphics card? And where are you plugging the spare monitor in to, the graphics card or a socket on the motherboard? If it's a motherboard socket, it could be that the motherboard socket is disabled if there is a graphics card plugged in, it could also be that there is no graphics on board the processor, or the drivers might not be there. Do you know what processor it is?
And do you have a spare/small TV with HDMI on it, that'll do as a temporary monitor.
you can get adaptors for hdmi to either dvi or vga, depending what you have on yr spare
@nixie when it boots up I don't see anything. When the monitor is powered up I get a message saying check signal cable and when I connect to to the pc I get the same message.
@sobriety Its plugged into a port on the motherboard with a monitor symbol adjacent to it and it has a separate graphics card. This is why I'm surprised it's not working
I will try and buy an adapter tomorrow
Thanks all
If it has a separate graphics card, the monitor needs to be plugged in where the cards ports are, not where all the motherboard sockets are, including the monitor ports.
It must be into the card so the sockets away from the main board.
Its plugged into a port on the motherboard with a monitor symbol adjacent to it and it has a separate graphics card. This is why I'm surprised it's not working
This is exactly why it's not working. The presence of an external card will disable the onboard video. You'll have to remove the card for it to work, and if he's a gamer then he won't thank you for that. Might be a temporary option if "up and walking" is better than nothing.
For the price of an "adapter" which will convert digital HDMI to analogue VGA and actually work in any sort of meaningful manner, I'd be replacing the monitor instead. Any screen that only has VGA inputs is going to be awful by modern standards; I have one, it's attached to a ZX Spectrum.
You’re working on the assumption that you’ve damaged the monitor, but the fact that it’s displaying an image (no signal) suggests that it may be the PC of the cable connecting them. Does the PC perform its POST? Does it beep when started up? If not, you may have unseated the graphics from the main board when you knocked the monitor off.
if the monitor has an HDMI port, try to connect it to another device in the house (Sky, FireTV, etc) first using another cable and then using its original cable. This may tell you if the monitor or cable is broken.
If neither of these are broken, open the PC case (with the power off) and apply a little force to the side of the graphics card (especially toward the rear) and see if it reseats. Then try it again.
Thanks for all of the above. Just to clarify, the broken monitor was plugged into an HDMI port on the mother board and worked fine. This port is just below the 15 pin port. And the message is on the replacement screen, that same message appears if the monitor is not plugged into the pc. The broken monitor has no clear display, just vertical lines for about a third of the screen. I think I will try the adapter as its's massively cheaper than a new monitor - but if the performance is hopeless than I will buy him a new monitor!
Thanks again for the suggestions and advice. Just to clarify, the broken monitor has always been plugged into an HDMI port just below the 15 pin port I'm trying to use for the replacement monitor - both are on the motherboard. The message being displayed is on the replacement monitor and that message is visible when it is plugged into the port on the motherboard and when it is unplugged. The broken screen has no clear display, about a third of the screen has vertical different coloured lines and the remainder is blank. I think I will try the adapter mentioned above as they cost about £5, if the performance of the new monitor is woeful then my son gets a new monitor!
Hold up - it has a separate graphics card and has always been plugged into the motherboard? Is anything else plugged into the graphics card? If no, then for the love of god get a new monitor, and plug it into the graphics card and not the motherboard.
Hell, if you're in Nottingham I can probably give one from the old monitor cupboard in our office.
Just to clarify, the broken monitor has always been plugged into an HDMI port just below the 15 pin port I'm trying to use for the replacement monitor - both are on the motherboard.
As sobriety says, this makes no sense. Are you certain?
I think I will try the adapter as its's massively cheaper than a new monitor
Throw a link up here before you spend money. A HDMI>VGA adapter and a VGA>HDMI adapter are not the same things.
Does the replacement monitor not even have a DVI connector? Going HDMI>DVI is considerably simpler and is digital throughout.
A photo of the back of the PC wouldn't go amiss either.
New monitors are cheap, I recently bought one of these. I can't believe how bad it makes the picture quality of my old (second) monitor look.
Monitor? How passé this is where it's at.. https://www.xreal.com/ 😀
PS: bloody hell an Iiyama monitor for £140? Nice
I think I'm creating more confusion due to my lack of knowledge but the guts of this gaming pc were bought in Dec 2020 with a lot of advice from here ( and, although it probably doesn't sound like it, we built it from scratch. This probably why the monitor was never plugged into the GPU! ) items listed below:
AMD Ryzen 5 2600 3.4GHz 6 Core (Socket AM4) CP
Gigabyte B450M H AMD Socket AM4 Motherboard
PNY XLR8 16GB (2x 8GB) 3200MHz DDR4 RAM
ASUS GeForce GTX 1660 Phoenix OC 6GB GDDR5 VR Ready Graphics Card, 1408 Core, 1530MHz GPU, 1800MHz Boost $6R7P9
PC has been faultless. The graphics card does have an HDMI port and I have just tried plugging the old monitor in and there is no change
Is image loading working on the new forum yet?
Thanks again
Image posting still appears to be iffy;-)
Currys have these:
https://www.currys.co.uk/products/msi-pro-mp223-e2-full-hd-21.45-va-lcd-monitor-black-10271002.html
If your son needs better colour reproduction then something second hand from the likes of the dell outlet will work.
OP, you must have jolted the graphic card connection out of place or loosen it inside the pc. Perhaps open up the case to unplug the graphic card and then plug it back into the slot again. Then connect the monitor and reboot. See if that helps.
Just a quick reply to say thanks for everyones help. Back up and running with a 15pin female to HDMI male convertor and now plugged into the GPU