New graphics card shows no signal.

Hello, I recently purchased an nvidia GeForce gt 640 graphics card for my pc and it shows no signal to my monitor.I will try to provide as much information but sorry if I miss things out.


After seeing my brother buy this card and it worked fine on his pc I bought one myself along with a new 600 watt psu.


I first installed the psu with my old graphics card in and it all worked fine, then I installed the graphics card and that's when I started having problems.


Then yesterday removed all cables from my optical drive and the I got signal to my monitor. I then plugged my optical drive back in and began to install the drivers from the cd tom provided with the card, then after installing all drivers it turned off again and I can't get signal now at all.
I don't believe it is the psu, but I think it could have been something to do with the drivers, I can still get signal with my old card in. Thank you for reading and please help !


Pc specs: AMD a10 processor, 600watt psu, x2 3gb ddr3 ram, 500gb hard drive, nvidia GeForce gt 640 FFA card.

linnemeyerhere said:

Ben9518, Welcome SF. A series AMD CPU's to my knowledge have strong integrated gpu's but the can be cross fired with only a limited range of AMD cards. If you run the nvidia card I'm wondering if you'll need to disable the inter grated graphics to the CPU in you bios?

Thank you for your reply, how would I disable the integrated gpu? Also I can still return the card and exchange it with an amd card if that would solve the problem? Thanks again.

That sounds right, if you see the BIOS during boot up, then signal is getting through, does your mobo have a built-in VGA or DVI? Try that during boot up if you get no response from the new PCI card.
( hit enter, F2 or what ever your mobo manual reads at the start of boot up)

If you get to the graphics page of the BIOS, check the setting, then set it to the PCI[e] preference if you have to.
Now once years ago I had a mobo that I couldn't get inboard or outboard VGA to work, turned out after testing on another machine that the mail-order vendor [now out of business] sold me 2 sticks of bum RAM out of the four I ordered.
They were responsible for no video on that build.
After that, try the new graphics card in another machine, if you have access. If the obvious happens, contact the vendor for warranty, if bought at a brick & mortar, see if they'll exchange. Though check the settings first, some times a little quirk could send it into default [on board graphics].

BlueGuy said:

That sounds right, if you see the BIOS during boot up, then signal is getting through, does your mobo have a built-in VGA or DVI? Try that during boot up if you get no response from the new PCI card.
( hit enter, F2 or what ever your mobo manual reads at the start of boot up)

If you get to the graphics page of the BIOS, check the setting, then set it to the PCI[e] preference if you have to.
Now once years ago I had a mobo that I couldn't get inboard or outboard VGA to work, turned out after testing on another machine that the mail-order vendor [now out of business] sold me 2 sticks of bum RAM out of the four I ordered.
They were responsible for no video on that build.
After that, try the new graphics card in another machine, if you have access. If the obvious happens, contact the vendor for warranty, if bought at a brick & mortar, see if they'll exchange. Though check the settings first, some times a little quirk could send it into default [on board graphics].

Thank you for the reply. I can't get any signal from the motherboard VGA, but I can get signal from my old card when that is in, so would I be able to set the bios to pcie preference then switch cards over to my new one and give that a try? Thanks again

Ben9518 said:

Then yesterday removed all cables from my optical drive and the I got signal to my monitor. I then plugged my optical drive back in and began to install the drivers from the cd tom provided with the card, then after installing all drivers it turned off again and I can't get signal now at all. Was this AFTER a reboot?
I don't believe it is the psu, but I think it could have been something to do with the drivers, I can still get signal with my old card in. Thank you for reading and please help !

Pc specs: AMD a10 processor, 600watt psu, x2 3gb ddr3 ram, 500gb hard drive, nvidia GeForce gt 640 FFA card.

The first sentence doesn't sound logical to me, while I love AMD, I stayed away from the integrated gpu series for the very reason that I'm an nVidia fan-boy. I wonder if Windows is defaulting to the old drivers
for the previous card. PSU wouldn't be related to this. Ya got Radeon in one case, nVidia in another.
I confess I'm a hardware guy, not a software guy. Win7 has built-in drivers, a base, from which to upgrade to the most recent.
I'd have to go into your device manager to see what is going on.
Was the old card Radeon?
Try using the on-board choice in BIOS, in two steps, see if the device manager shows the old card
first, power down/off, swap, then see if windows acknowledges the presence of the new card.
Ya see, when I do a new build, I check to see if the BIOS lists all installed hardware first. Yet even on a fresh machine you should get the DOS/UEFI bios on screen, even on motherboards that do not have built-in VGA, you should see BIOS, on this build the mobo itself detected that the PCIe was in use and set it automatically. Only when everything is OK and set properly there do I go on to the OS.
You didn't mention what the old PCI card was but without further thought I think you might have a driver conflict. I'm going to need to think on this, for now I'm going back to watching my TV shows.
May I suggest a utility?
Get CPUID's HWMonitor @ majorgeeks.com it would at least let you see the voltage levels your PSU is putting out, though I don't think the problem is PSU or Optical drive related.
Is the card one of those gamer models that require an additional power plug?
Let me know.

Ack! linnemeyerhere beat me!
O.P. didn't tell us if he saw the BIOS screen while on the mobo VGA.
Though I still need some time to think on your problem, I still need to run my daily downloads, will try to get back this afternoon or tomorrow.

Solarstarshines said:

There should be no connection to the optical drive and Display signal that what you experienced is probably something you missed yourself.
As I said, his statements didn't seem logical.

AMD cards that will Crossfire with A10 Series APU are the HD7750 the best you'll get unless a HD7790 will work but i know for sure HD7750 is a solid yes

Yep, O.P. didn't mention if the old card was Radeon or not, I never built a system where I was mixing GPU
brands, either all Radeon or all nVidia not both in the same box.
Makes me wonder if elimination of the old Radeon drivers would get the GeForce to work once set in BIOS.
Na, don't think so.