Recently, I built a home-theater PC (HTPC) with the following components:
Motherboard: ASUS A8N-SLI Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Venice 1GHz FSB 512KB L2 Cache Socket 939
Memory: 1GB (2x512MB) SDRAM Unbuffered DDR 400 (PC3200) Dual Channel
Graphics Card: eVGA GeForce 6600 256MB TV-out/DVI/HDTV PCI-E Heatsink Edition
Operating Sys: Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005
HDTV Tuner: DVICO FusionHDTV5 Gold Plus
Monitor: Samsung HL-R5668W 1080p HDTV connected to PC via VGA cable
I’m running Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition (w/ all the most recent updates from Microsoft) and use a Samsung TV as a monitor via VGA cable between the GeForce 6600 graphics card and the Samsung TV.
Unless it’s doing something, this computer is always in standby mode. I run an application that automatically wakes-up the computer and records high-definition TV shows for me. The monitor (Samsung TV) is usually powered-down while the computer is recording.
This system runs great except for one issue. Here’s what happens:
– Computer running and recording as intended; monitor not powered-up.
– While the computer is running, I power-up the monitor.
– Monitor always displays “no signal” error message.
– Computer continues to run and record as intended.
No matter what I do — including powering the Samsung TV up and down and unplugging and replugging the VGA cable — the computer refuses to display anything on the screen. I’m sure the computer is running, because the TV shows being recorded are always OK, and I can “see” this computer from other computers on my wireless network.
It seems like the motherboard doesn’t “enable” the graphics card to create a display signal when the monitor is off.
Any suggestions on how I can get the motherboard to “wake-up” the graphics card when I turn on the monitor while the computer is running?
Thanks!
