Long black screen before startup

[Alex Adamson]

so I have this problem with my computer where when I start it up it sometimes takes ages to actually start. The fan is going but nothing is on the screen. Sometimes it takes 20 seconds sometimes it can go hours without starting. It’s not the monitor because the mouse lights up when it starts working. And I just reinstalled windows on a new SSD and the problem was there before that so it’s not the hard drive. I don’t even know if it’s the hardware that’s the problem. Like I said the hard drives are new, about a month. The CPU is maybe 2-3 years old. And everything else is 3-4 years old. When it finally starts up everything works fine.

I5 4460
8gb Ram
GTX 960 4 GB

 

[lude1962]

before bios splash screen?
after bios post slash screen / before starting windows?
'hard drives', how many installed (try just the ssd if more than one)
remove gtx960 and try with just onboard video

 

[EsaT]

Also my crystal ball is showing black screen, so how about actually listing all component you have there?

BIOS/RTC battery could be one heap shot to try.
It can sometimes cause weird symptoms.

 

[Alex Adamson]

before bios splash screen?
after bios post slash screen / before starting windows?
'hard drives', how many installed (try just the ssd if more than one)
remove gtx960 and try with just onboard video

Nothing comes up. I start it up. Nothing. Fan goes black screen. Yeah an SSD and an HDD. I don’t think I have intergrated graphics.

 

[lude1962]

unplug hdds and graphics card, theres likely a blue vga connector on the motherboard connect to monitor
switch on, any display now?

what system are you using (no competitor references)