Absolute Beginners Guide to Upgrading and Fixing Your PC

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Your monitor goes blank

• Your monitor displays a screen full of garbage

• Your monitor displays at the wrong resolution

• Your monitor whines or pops and crackles

• Your dual-monitor display doesn't work properly

Displaying a picture on your computer screen is a complicated procedure. First, your operating system (Windows) has to generate the instructions to display a character or image. Next, a video card has to interpret this command and generate the electronic impulses that create the image. Finally, these impulses have to be transmitted (via a cable) to your display monitor, which fires up a series of phosphor dots in such a way that a picture is displayed.

So why do you care? Simple any one of these things can go bad, causing you to have display problems.