Computer "Display Settings" Issue

[woodson_28]

Just going to throw this out there. I'm sure somebody knows more about computers than I do.

Issue: Yesterday, a huge lightening storm passed our house and knocked our power out. I do have everything on surge protectors though. Anyway, when my computer came back on, it had a default display setting of 1280x1024 (21" monitor). Before the storm, I had it at a comfortable 1680x1050. However, the display setting refuses to go above 1280x1024.

I downloaded the newest drivers from NVIDIA's website, and installed it, but that didn't help. I then did a system recovery, which didn't help. I'm not sure what to try now. My brother mentioned my video card could be fried. Suggestions? I tried 'google', but everybody just said to reinstall the official driver, which I've already done w/ no luck.

The video card is a "NVIDIA GeForce 6150SE nForce 430". Nothing great, just stock. I don't watch TV or Videos or play games on PC, so the video card isn't too important to me, I just want my resolution to be around 1680x1050. Thanks.

On a side note, if the video card is done, I have an old card I pulled from my old computer before I trashed it. It is a Asus GeForce 4 MX440 (V8170 DDR) - it's like 10 yrs old. Would this card provide me w/ my basic needs, or should I look to shell out some $ and find a suitable replacement?

[dAnzac]

Did you check the motherboard?

[BitterDodgerFan]

sounds like the video hardware is damaged...
if you're gonna try a video card, check to see if they are same interface (AGP, pci-e) as they won't fit in the slots if they're different interface. sounds like you had onboard video anyways so i don't think you have a video card in there. just a graphics chip on the motherboard instead. that geforce mx sounds like AGP card. if your computer is within the last few years, it probably is pci-e. open your PC up and check it out...

[Metroid]

fix it with a hammer.

[TheRock]

... a huge lightening storm ...

Is that when a bunch of brunettes decide they all want highlights all at once?

It seems unlikely that the only damage to your system would be that your video card, while still functional, doesn't have the same resolution as before. I would try completely removing it from your system, go back to your onboard video if you have one, then reinstall from scratch.

[woodson_28]

Having never heard of AGP before.... i pulled everything out and did find out the video card is a AGP while my motherboard is pci-e.

So, what now? I'm not sure what the "onboard video" is, so if you could describe exactly what that is, I could give that a try.

[BitterDodgerFan]

i'm not sure but i think maybe your GPU was soldered onto the motherboard, hence "onboard". if you did not have a separate video card, so just grab some cheap pci-e card and plug it in there. hopefully that should get it going. although a power failure could've damaged other parts of the computer. i once had it mess up my motherboard and had to get the whole thing replaced. and seeing that your video was onboard, your motherboard might have been damaged here too, not just the GPU.

[woodson_28]

Thanks for the advice.

I picked up a $10 pci-e video card and hooked it up. It worked very well the first day, giving me up to 1600x1200. However, when I went to start up my computer today, I once again got "no display". I can start it in Safe Mode @ 800 x 600 no problem though.

So... what's the thought here? Damaged motherboard too?