blank screen on xps one

If still under warranty, contact Dell Support. Have you tried booting to your vista disk?  Can you see anything before it goes to black screen? Can you run the diagnostics from the Boot Menu? If so, make sure to run the extended hard drive test.

It is no longer under warranty by a whole 3 months.  It does nothing. When i turn it on, it immediately turns the fans on, the disc drive makes some noise and nothing else. I cannot get it into any diagnostics or boot menu.  Thank you for your response. Jon

Thanks for the reply, but no I cannot hear anything.  It is like it just quit.  I dropped it off at Best Buy last night and they think it is the motherboard.  I am not sure that they did anything other then turn it on and listen to it.  Does anyone think it is worth giving Dell $49 to let them talk to me. Thanks again. Jon

An update.

I called Dell, paid them $49 to talk to tech support.  After  1.5 hours they told me the motherboard was bad.  They had me unplug a couple different parts and turn it on and off and nothing worked.  They then told me i should buy a new computer because of the cost to repair.  I called back to talk to parts and find out how much for the motherboard and got a major runaround. 7 different people with the last one hanging up on me.  I called back asked to speak to a supervisor told him what part i was looking for, he promised to email me and call me back the next day.  4 days later and not a word from them.  So with best buy and dell telling me it needed a new motherboard I bought a reconditioned one off ebay.  Installed it and the same thing.  I hate the idea of spending as much as I did for this computer 2 years ago and just throwing it away.  Anyone out there have any other ideas?  Thanks Jon

Are there any further diagnostic indicators?

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/Systems/xpsone20/en/sm/indicators.htm

You are right that the video card could certainly be the problem. You might as well try swapping it.

No nothing else. Solid blue light, fans on high, blue monitor light on. No beeps or anything on screen.  I just took off the video card/heat sink and turned it on and it seemed like it was booting up like normal, of course the screen is dead so i couldn't see what it was doing for sure.  Thanks.

PS  I called the tech line again to ask about the video card being the potential problem and after 2 transfers the 3rd man hung up on me.

Thanks Jon

I am into it this far, I think I will. Found a new one pretty reasonable, will update in a couple days when I get it .  Thanks Jon

So I installed the new video card and IT WORKS!  Very excited.  Thanks to everyone who helped on this.  Not one time did Dell suggest that the video card would be bad, or how to test it.  The dedicated xps-only tech support was very underwhelming.  And forget about trying to get a non-upgrade part.  But now I know more about computers than ever before.  Thanks again.  Jon

Congratulatons on fixing your pc.  I had the same thing happen on an xps 720 and i think the video card going down in my particular case (and many others too) is due to heat from  poor fan circulation from a build up of dust around a fan. When investigating the problem, I peeled off a 1/8 inch carpet of dust off the fan that blew directly onto the video card to cool it.

Also just for others to maybe learn from. In my case there are never startup beeps (post test beeps) even when the pc works properly, so to NOT hear the beeps when trouble shooting a blank or black screen that won't come on does not necessarily preclude the possibility that it could still be the video card at fault. 

Great exchange guys.  I have the same problem and I will order a new video card and hope that helps.

Thanks for the valuable information shared here.

Having the same problem with my XPS One...paid $59 for them to tell me it is the motherboard. Sounds like I should replace the video card first. How do you get the back cover off of this thing? 

 Smiley00

You can find the XPS One Service Manual, with the procedure for removing the back cover, HERE <ADMIN NOTE: Broken link has been removed from this post by Dell>

Bev.

Thanks Bev!~

Did you replace anything on your XPS One? I am being told so many stories from Dell. First they said the motherboard is $1,000 and now they are saying that they do not have the motherboard and it cannot be replaced because it is connected to the monitor. Everytime I call they tell me something new. They suggested I just spend another $1,500 on a new computer and throw this one out....LOL!!!

Have you had problems with your XPS? Have you replaced a Video Card or Motherboard?

Thanks for any help you can give me!