client monitor woes

Any help appreciated with the following - a bit of a long-shot, i know and thanx in advance for anyone who even reads to the end. i won't be pissed off at no replies, on the other hand, it might have happened to someone, and i'm clutching at straws here

deep breath

I'm playing Avid DV Express through matrox parahelia to two computer monitors and a (stunningly crap) tv. Or I used to.

One time I unplugged the tv to use it elsewhere. Since around that time the client monitor has never worked. 6 months later (and getting into colour correction and wanting to show clients work in progress) and i'm really beginning to miss the tv monitor (i also don't like the false sense of quality the computer monitors give you, neither)

the other thing that could have coincided with removing the tv, was a few attempts to do a digital cut, ie output DV to a camera with DV-in (which i could never get to work)

The relevant lead is a bit of a stunner - two DVi connections out of the pc. one direct to the monitor, the other splits into two - one direct to the computer monitor, the other to both s-video and composite. i've tried it out of both slots - no change

i've checked every possible setting via the Matrox control panel, which is actually quite straightforward to use, so i don't think i'm doing anything wrong there (two stretched mode and feature window)

I think 'video display' is the relevant bit of Avid. There's a 'DV supports digital video input' and a 'send video to DV device (client monitor enabled)' and the reverse - i've tried every combination of those settings

I've (finally) taken the lead down to Maplins where someone tested the composite video through from the DVi connector. On the inside connector one pin was live, on the outside 7 pins were. The guy talked to their technical department, but all admitted it was beyond their knowledge. Fair enough.

I took a s-video to composite adaptor, but i already had a s-video scart block - so i've tried every combination of composite and s-video, both directly into the tv, and through a vhs player (vhs player plays ok to the tv, so both of those are working ok)

i'm stumped. completely. and it's pissing me off, mightily. i would so love help that i'll have your baby if you can help (well, promise i would if i physically could)

any suggestions for further things to try?