Topic seems self-explanatory. The monitor works fine once Windows is up and running, but obviously this prevents me from doing some things before then. It's also just disconcerting.

I'm running a Dell DM051with an ATI Radeon x300/x500/x1050 video card. My monitor is a GATEWAY HD2200. Any help is much appreciated.Have you tried hitting ESCAPE, Delete or F10 at startup to initiate the VGA driver ? ?
How new is this machine ?
It could also be a power saving scheme...check both in Power Management inside Control panel and also in your MBoard documentation...Haven't tried hitting buttons, will give it a go. The computer is about two years OLD. I can't see anything under power options that would be a cause of this. Where do I find documentation on the motherboard?Check the MBoard manuf. website...they usually offer the Manual as a free DLoad.Try Running Services.msc. then locate your display driver service and open its properties, then SET it to start up automatically. then restart your computer and see if that works.