On startup, I am seeing the display go blank/inactive just after the xp splashscreen shows up. the system is still active, but no display. tried boot to disc. tried xp repair reinstall. What else could be...?

What do you mean blank page? And what is startup? Is startup the desktop with your icons? Tell exactly what happens and what you see when you power on the computer.

Maybe you are saying your system booted up all the way except your screen is blank. If so try the steps below.

Shine a flashlight on the dark screen to see if you barely see the icons on the desktop. If so, then the LCD Inverter is bad.

Plug in an external monitor and see if the display shows up on it. It can be any kind of monitor even the old big fat crt monitors as long as it has a vga cable to connect to your computer's vga port. If so that proves your video card is ok. The video will show on most systems when you reboot without you having to do anything. Some systems will require you to hit the FN (Function key) + F1 thru F12. Hold down the FN key then hit the correct key for displaying on the monitor (F1 thru F12). The correct key will normally have CRT/LCD on it or it will have the icon of a display.

If you see no icons by shinning a flash light and the external monitor works, then your screen is bad. If you see no icons by shinning the flash light and nothing shows on the external monitor, then most likely your video card is bad.

I suspect you have a screen saver set up that blanks the computer screen after 30 minutes.
If you are running Window XP, right-click your mouse on the desktop, choose Properties, from the Display Properties dialog, click the Screen Saver tab, then in the Wait box, increase the amount of time before the screen saver activates. Click the OK button when you are through.
Good luck,
-- SalParadise

The system tray (in short: systray, nowadays also called taskbar notification area) is the icon strip normally located near the right end of the task bar, next to the clock.
Some Windows XP installations show a peculiar defect in that some systray icons disappear or, rather, do not appear, when the system is booted and the user logs on. The problem is even more prevalent on systems with autologon. The most frequently affected icons seem to be the speaker icon (sound volume) and the power/energy icon.
This has nothing to do with the hide inactive icons settings. The defect shows up when you don't have any icons set for hiding.
In any case, please make sure for now that you haven't activated that setting. Right-click the task bar, click on Properties, uncheck the last check box. You can reactivate it later if all other problems are identified or solved.
Check your Startup folder and the starter registry entries through Start, Run..., type: msconfig, press Enter, to check whether the programs are really started at system start, or use Task Manager (Ctrl + Shift + Esc) to see whether the processes are running.

Hi,
Boot the system in safe mode. Go to device manager and under display adapters , right click on the onbaord graphics adapter and disable the same. It worked on one of the systems i troubleshot for the same problem.

Thanks for using Fixya
Proton

Try booting into SAFE MODE, usually by pressing F5 or F8 just after turning the power on. This should give you a display. Once you can see your desktop right chick on a blank area of the desktop, select PERSONALISE, then DISPLAY SETTINGS to reduce the screen resolution. Then reboot and try again in NORMAL Startup

Hi, a Pc wont boot up beacuse of certain reasons i the Ram are bad or seated badly so pls look on them .
2, your harddisk is corrupted operating system cant start .
Now get operating system cd then try booting with it .

When you start your computer, keep hitting the F8 key. you will get a menu that comes up.. Choose the VGA mode.. this will stop the computer from loading video drivers and will allow you to install the new monitor. 
Give that a try.. Hope it helps... let me know

Try disconnecting the data cable from the hard drive, then see if you can boot to the Resource CD. If you can, there is a good possibility the Hard Drive is bad.

If no difference, then try disconnecting everything but video, see if the system will boot past the Splash screen. SOmetimes periferal items cause issues

yes its a virus that's blocking explorer
a complete clean xp installation is needed to fix this problem.

rate plz

remove the battery and try to start the machine om AC power only

regards