Dual Monitors Have No Signal Until Login

[v0id]

I'll be as quick and straight forward as I can.

 

I recently purchased a pair of Dell S3220DGF monitors, manufactured January 2021. The primary is using a VESA certified cable bought from Amazon and the secondary is using the bundled cable, both DisplayPort. Upon startup neither monitor will show anything except 'No Signal' until I get to the login screen for Windows 10. After that they work like a dream. This may be problematic in the future because it is preventing me from accessing the BIOS, so I wanna nip it in the butt now. The settings are factory set and I haven't made any changes except to up the refresh rate to 165Hz for both monitors. I did some Googling and tried their suggestions.

 

- Reset CMOS

- Unchecking fast boot in power settings

- Tried every port one by one with only one monitor then the other

- Restarting within Windows to access UEFI (Shift + Restart)

- Tapping F2 and DEL (keys needed to normally access BIOS) on startup anyway

- Verified DP is the input source and auto-select is on

 

This is all occurring on a fairly recently built AMD system (circa end 2020). My previous monitors had no such issues but they were recently sold, so I have no other monitor to test with. Neither do I have any other cables, I figured DisplayPort was the best of everything so that's all I bought. Some threads have suggested a failing PSU, and while mine is around six years old, I can't imagine it's on the way out for simply changing monitors; it ran dual monitors before with no issue. So now I'm at my wits end. Thoughts? Thanks for any input (no pun intended).

 

PS - A similar thread is on LTT from 2019 but its solution did not work for me.

 

MOBO: TUF X570 PRO-WIFI

CPU: Ryzen 5600X

RAM: 32GB T-FORCE

PSU: Seasonic 860W

GPU: EVGA 980Ti Hybrid

[TheCoder2019]

Only the display thats set as main display will receive input until login. I cant explain it but its normal. Whatd you expect to happen?

 

EDIT: I didnt read fully, and thats very weird

 

Try win+ctrl+shift+b, that resets graphics drivers. Also check the inputs on your displays if more than one port is there

[Helpful Tech Witch]

Hm.... It's stopping you from accessing the bios? That's odd.

Usually the secondary, tirshiary, etc monitors are no signal unill you login.

Could you try to ddu and reinstall you drivers, see if it thinks another monitor is still conected?

[v0id]

2 hours ago, TheCoder2019 said:

Also check the inputs on your displays if more than one port is there

What do you mean by this? My monitor has HDMI and DisplayPort but I'm only using the DisplayPort.

 

2 hours ago, TheCoder2019 said:

ry win+ctrl+shift+b, that resets graphics drivers

I will attempt that tomorrow after work.

 

1 hour ago, HelpfulTechWizard said:

Could you try to ddu and reinstall you drivers, see if it thinks another monitor is still conected?

Now that is something I hadn't thought of, I'll also give that a shot tomorrow when I'm home.

[v0id]

Update

 

@HelpfulTechWizard

@TheCoder2019

 

I tried your suggestions but they did not work, though I appreciate the ideas. I borrowed an HDMI cable and used it instead of DisplayPort and the POST screen shows up just fine. If I plug the DisplayPort in along side the HDMI, the monitor auto switches to DP and I lose signal even if I'm currently on the BIOS screen! So temporarily, if I need BIOS I can just switch the monitor to HDMI, do what I need to do and switch back but that is terribly inconvenient. Also, now that I'm in Windows the display settings are showing a 3rd monitor which can do HDR but only 144Hz (I suspect this is the HDMI signal).

 

So now I'm at a loss as to why HDMI works on startup but DP does not. Is there a BIOS setting I should change now that I can access it? Any other ideas? Thanks!

[TheCoder2019]

I learned something from @LinusTech: DisplayPort may have issues. Learned from the build Sarah did

[v0id]

3 hours ago, TheCoder2019 said:

DisplayPort may have issues

That indeed may be true, I saw the video too. But I have no idea whether both DPs on the monitors, the cables or the GPU/computer itself are to blame. I suppose if nothing else comes from this thread I'll have to investigate with Dell though I'm saving that as a last resort.

[v0id]

Another update.

 

Spoke to Dell and they of course had no idea what was going on; they kept insisting it had to be my GPU despite the fact that it worked just fine with my previous monitors. But they're sending me another brand new one to try. If that one fails I guess I'm going to just return both of them because clearly something is wrong with this specific model.

[v0id]

Another update.

 

Dell sent a brand new monitor with the exact same issue (I guessed as much). I was set on returning all of them but honestly, after looking around the market for something else (amid a silicon shortage), I decided to just deal with it. Maybe some magic firmware update will solve it but for now, I guess I can manage; they're great monitors otherwise and a 32", 1440p curved monitor with high refresh rates are extremely hard to come by for what I paid. Maybe someone will stumble across this thread with an idea, but otherwise I'll let it die. Thanks to all who responded.

[v0id]

Last update.

 

I got determined AF to find a solution so I scoured the web again and stumbled across a different thread here on LTT. I must have missed it before. Well, long story short, I finally got it to work. Apparently my GPU needed some kind of firmware updater that's separate from GeForce Experience and regular Windows Update. With a simple update everything POSTs properly and I can get into BIOS no problem. I feel stupid that it was something as easy as an update, but honestly I had no idea this tool even existed. Thanks again to all who tried to assist. I listed the tool in case others might have issues as well.

 

Tool: https://www.nvidia.com/content/DriverDownload-March2009/confirmation.php?url=/Windows/uefi/firmware/1.0/NVIDIA_DisplayPort_Firmware_Updater_1.0-x64.exe&firmware=1&lang=us&type=Other