Dell Optiplez 620 video bios issue

Question

Hello all,   I keep all of my computers up to date with the latest patches and firmware.   I have 1-3 computers per month that when the power is turned on, all that we see is a video BIOS number on the screen.  We reseat the video card, replace the video card, totally run the power down and nothing changes.  We run diagnostics and get no errors.  A few days later, the computer is fine (sometimes).  I don't want to just start changing out parts as I really don't know what the issue is.  If I put the 'broken' video card in another computer, it works fine.  If I put a known good video card in the 'broken' computer, it may or may not work right away, but eventually does.  The video cards are 256 ATI Radeon X600 which came with our dell computer   Tom

x_lab rat · Answer

That you get video BIOS on the screen confirms the power supply is good and that the chipset is getting as far as releasing master reset.  At the time when this occurs, the diagnostic lights should be frozen with a distinct pattern.  What is that pattern?

Cafetom · Answer

Very good, now I am getting somewhere.  1,2,3 are green and 4 (D) is amber.  Which, acording to the troubleshooting means that there is some Other error.  We have gone though making sure that the cables are connected by disconnecting everything and reconnecting EVERYTHING.  We even disconnected the USB keyboard and mouse to be sure.  We have reseated the memory, processor, everything.   In trying to determine the problem, even swapping things from known working machines has not helped much   Another thing that MAY help, is that when we try to use the onboard video, we get nothing but a bunch of WHITE line segments

x_lab rat · Answer

At the GGGY stage, BIOS is looking at boot devices.  Disconnect optical drives, just to eliminate them.  If you still get GGGY, odds favor failing harddrive that is unable to read its sub-boot sector and identify itself.  Also, disconnect all USB devices other than keyboard and mouse; some BIOS versions will try to boot from a scanner and hang there.

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Dell Optiplez 620 video bios issue

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