Aspire 7720-6640, 4650 MXM Upgrade Issues, Help Appreciated!

Hello forum,
I am the owner of an Acer Aspire 7720-6640, that came stock with a Geforce 8600M GT, and that card, which had been giving me troubles since day one, finally stopped working. I purchased a replacement card from mxm-upgrade.com, an ATI 4650. I received the card a few days ago, and after installing it, I get a blank screen. Main output is black, VGA output is black, S-Video output is black, and I currently have no way of testing if the DVI-D output is black as well.

What's interesting about this is that the computer still boots up fine behind the black screen. Thanks to Remote Desktop, I am able to connect to the computer and check it out. Windows doesn't seem to see the card at all; in Device Manager, the "Display Adapters" section is completely missing, and things like GPU-Z and PCWizard report no video card at all.

Here's what I've tried so far:
Cleaning the computer and contacts of dust
Inserting the card a few times
Cleaning the contacts with Isopropyl Alcohol
Attempting to make sure nothing is being shorted out (the old card used a bracket; I've tried without)
Installed the modded bios "icl50_1.45_slic21_advmenu_mxmfix_v3.fd", including choosing "Clear CMOS" when flashing.

None of this seems to have changed the situation significantly. Same black screen, while the computer starts up fine.

What I'm somewhat worried about is, back after the 8600M GT stopped working (massive graphical corruption), I booted up the computer once, and once only, with nothing in the MXM-II slot. At that time, the screen actually turned on and was solid grey, very different from now. Did that action ruin my computer?

I also have no other card to test, as the 8600M GT is long gone.

Does anyone here have any suggestions? Kris from mxm-upgrade has been very helpful so far, and I don't want to have to send the card back for replacement without knowing for certain that it's broken.

I appreciate any and all responses.
Thank you.

 

Have you tried installing ATI drivers?

 

Ah, yes, forgot to mention that.

I have tried installing ATI drivers, specifically the "catalyst mobility 32 bit" drivers from the official site. The program reports "AMD Catalyst(TM) Mobility cannot be downloaded due to incompatible hardware/software on your computer."

 

I apologize for the double post, but I just tried DVI digital output as well, and there is still no screen output. Solid black, nothing.

I'm fairly certain that I could try resetting the CMOS from the BIOS, if I knew the keystrokes to do so from an InsydeH2O BIOS. I'm pretty sure all I need to do is hit left-arrow to get to the "system" page, but from there I'm stumped, as I don't have any reference, and the internet doesn't have many pictures.

Could somebody post a picture of the "save/exit" page of the InsydeH2O BIOS?

 

The best way to do a BIOS reset on InsydeH2O is to first flash a clean BIOS image downloaded from Acer's website using the Fn+Esc method, and then short out the onboard battery for a few seconds. This clears both the CMOS proper and the EFI variable store.

 

I see. I've just recently reflashed the BIOS, so it should be nearly clean. The only issue is shorting out the battery, as I'm actually not sure where it is or the best method to do so.

I downloaded the service manual, and there actually is almost no information about the CMOS battery. Here's the board layout from the manual, which appears to be the same as my board:
http://sadpanda.us/images/612829-ZUUS7PH.jpg
It might be the blue and white object to the left of "19" on the bottom, but that also could be a capacitor. Any recommendations? I appreciate the help.

 

Yea what exactly do you mean short out the battery?

the CMOS is circled in yellow:
its soldered on.

 

@Koiu Lpoi: Merely flashing the BIOS using the DOS or Windows flasher doesn't fully clear the EFI variable store (and AFAIK does nothing to the CMOS proper) - you must use the Fn+Esc method.

@niffcreature: Yes, that CMOS battery. I mean short the leads for a few seconds with a screwdriver to clear the CMOS. (Again, this does not clear the EFI variable store, where most "CMOS" Setup settings are actually stored.)