Video Issues with Dell Dimension 8250

A friend has asked me to take a look at her Dimension 8250. Here are
the symptoms:

At boot up, the splash screen is a real mess. Garbled. Numerical
digits, difficult to read.

I can boot up in Safe Mode. The display is very grainy. Iin checking
the device drivers, it is noted that the video adaptor (64MB DDR
NVIDIA GEforce4 MX420 with TV out-Dell) is not working properly. I
download the driver from Dell.com and attempt to update it on the
machine and things seem to go well. When I attempt to reboot after
replacing the driver, the spash screen is still somewhat garbled, and
after going through the Windows XP screen (where the "timer bar" rolls
horizontally), the display goes black.

Any ideas as to what to try next?

Any help would be most appreciated!

Thanks!

Mark

if you know that the monitor is good (works when connected to another
computer) then it is likely that that video card is probably defective.
working in low resolution is typical for cards taht have become overheated
and blown a capacitor that might not be used when in low resolution. open
the machine and pull the card and do a visual inspection. if you see any of
the capcitors (small cylinder shaped objects attached to the card) with
buldging tops (in stead of flat) or leaking goo then it is definately the
video card. a comparable replacement video card can be had from ebay for
under $15 delivered. but you can also choose an better card for under $30
new from many vendors. just make sure the card has the port that you need
(probably vga analog, some card have dvi digital ports only) and at least
the same 64mb.

"Mark E. Bye" <fxdyna@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:dhqj04ha0lu2b6m69f1g8po9vu9rj7bsin@4ax.com...
>A friend has asked me to take a look at her Dimension 8250. Here are
> the symptoms:
>
> At boot up, the splash screen is a real mess. Garbled. Numerical
> digits, difficult to read.
>
> I can boot up in Safe Mode. The display is very grainy. Iin checking
> the device drivers, it is noted that the video adaptor (64MB DDR
> NVIDIA GEforce4 MX420 with TV out-Dell) is not working properly. I
> download the driver from Dell.com and attempt to update it on the
> machine and things seem to go well. When I attempt to reboot after
> replacing the driver, the spash screen is still somewhat garbled, and
> after going through the Windows XP screen (where the "timer bar" rolls
> horizontally), the display goes black.
>
> Any ideas as to what to try next?
>
> Any help would be most appreciated!
>
> Thanks!
>
> Mark

Graphics cards with nVidia chips from this era have a tendency to burn out.
Either they fail real hard or they have a slow steady degradation of what is on
the screen. If the card has a cooling fan that gets clogged with dust and dirt,
this makes the card fail even faster from an overheated graphics chip. Time to
replace the card. I prefer ATI cards, which usually last longer... Ben Myers

On Sat, 19 Apr 2008 07:55:52 -0500, Mark E. Bye <fxdyna@hotmail.com> wrote:

>A friend has asked me to take a look at her Dimension 8250. Here are
>the symptoms:
>
>At boot up, the splash screen is a real mess. Garbled. Numerical
>digits, difficult to read.
>
>I can boot up in Safe Mode. The display is very grainy. Iin checking
>the device drivers, it is noted that the video adaptor (64MB DDR
>NVIDIA GEforce4 MX420 with TV out-Dell) is not working properly. I
>download the driver from Dell.com and attempt to update it on the
>machine and things seem to go well. When I attempt to reboot after
>replacing the driver, the spash screen is still somewhat garbled, and
>after going through the Windows XP screen (where the "timer bar" rolls
>horizontally), the display goes black.
>
>Any ideas as to what to try next?
>
>Any help would be most appreciated!
>
>Thanks!
>
>Mark