crazy monitor

[katyw]

Hi guys. i just found this site so thought id ask you guys if you know whats up with my crazy pc. About a hour ago the picture on the screen kept jumping upto about halfway up the screen and scrolling back down and doing that over and over. Now the picture has stuxk about half way up my monitor so the image of my desktop ect is really squashed but still just as wide. i did a system resore but it all just started again after a while. Is this likely to be a broken monitor or something else? thanks for any help you can give me.

[jinjin]

It may be the monitor or the video card. In my experience, the monitor usually goes bad before the video card.

I do not like not knowing which is bad, because I do not want to waste money or time. I would try to find out whether the monitor is bad by either connecting a different monitor to the computer, or connecting the suspect monitor to another computer or a game console. If the monitor is bad, the problem will follow the monitor. If the video card is bad, the problem will remain regardless of which monitor you connect to your computer.

If you have no way of isolating the problem, then buy your replacement monitor from a store that allows returns or exchanges on electronic products without a hefty restocking fee.

[monosodium]

The behaviour is more indicative of a failure in the monitor. The other option instead of buying a new screen is to just borrow one from a friend just to test it with before you part with any cash. You could also look at freecycle if you have a group near you, there are always screens going on there, so you could get one, test it and use that until you get a replacement...

[cosmicB]

Could it be that the monitor was plugged into the tower while the computer was running, and a chip on the motherboard got fried..?