[Inactive] Bizzare video problems
Hi
Recently I had about 5 computers have the video go wonky on them, meaning it went from 1024 x 768 with 32 bit color to 640 x 480 with 4 bit color. Yes, 4 bit. Also, after a while I couldn't even login, because I was getting login errors, which unfortunately I had written down, but can't find my notes now. Basically, the login error had something to do with remote user accounts, but the user accounts are all local to the machine.
There had been some construction going on in the building where they were all placed, so even though 1 of the computers acted up a couple weeks before the rest, I figured it was due to the construction (multiple power outages, moving machines from office to office, etc).
So anyway, I ran antivirus first, and it found nothing. Then I took a couple of the machines and wiped the drives, to see if that made a difference. I used the built in software restore function. The 5 computers are all HP xw4600 workstations. No dice. The video problem was still there.
Next, I took a generic xp disk and installed it on the machine, and grabbed the drivers for the video card from the nvidia website. No dice, the problem still happened. When I wiped the drive, I included the "restore" portion of the hard drive, so there was nothing on it.
So, I began to think maybe the machines were damaged by a brownout or something, and replaced them for now, until I could get this figured out.
However, now I have a couple of HP laptops doing the exact same thing!
I'm stumped. I've googled it, and I can't find any logical reason for this to be happening. BTW, the laptops are HP 6710b, and a 6730b. Again, virtually identical.
Oh, another tidbit of information that may help. When logging onto the machine in safe mode, the video is fine. Only when doing a normal boot up does the problem happen.
Anybody have a clue??
Thanks!
