my brain teaser

[Guest]

ok about 3 weaks ago i put a modified superorb in my sys. i pulled out my agp card so i could see the connectors better to put the orb on. after i installed it and put my video back in i rebooted and all the sudden dx fails all the tests for video. at first i could run all games accept for tribes2. in tribes2 my character would be small and then grow massively and fall through the floor and things like that. in ts the problem i have used win2k/me/98 and none of them have fixed the problem. i've flashed my bios changed agp cards and it is still the same thing everytime. accept after i formatted now i can't get any graphics acceleration at all. the vid cards i have tried aRE THE creative anhilator pro/ and the 3d prophet 2 mx. both cards do the same thing. therefore i know its not a video issue. i have installed differant versions of dx several times updated my bios and called abit and they say there mobo is workin fine. this is way over my head and i would appreciate your help..
my sys. specs are as follows.
abit kt7 raid
t-bird 800 not oc'd
256 pc133 micron ram.
3d prophet geforce 2 mx
sb live sound
oh and i have restored my sys to its origional config too. and all bios settings are correct
ty very much for your help

 

[jlanka]

>oh and i have restored my sys to its origional config too. and all bios settings are correct

well, I would suspect software at this point (some driver still lurking around) so if it's not too much trouble, did you try reinstalling one of those OS's?

 

[Guest]

yeah i could try anything..i was evan gonna do a low level format but i don't think it would do anything.... just wonder howthe driver got corrupt to begin with?

 

[jlanka]

Not necessarily a corrupt driver. Not Necessarily software for that matter. My thought was that the registry is still loading a driver which is currently unnecessary, but conflicts with something else. Just a guess, though.

 

[Guest]

ok ty

 

[Ncogneto]

1)go to add/ remove programs and uninstall any video card drivers found there
2) boot into safe mode
4) remove all instances of multiple video cards
5) reboot and reinstall correct drivers..do not reboot
6) reinstall via 4.29 4n1 do not reboot
7) reinstall direct x 8.0a now reboot

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[jlanka]

> reinstall via 4.29 4n1 do not reboot

Actually I would try it without these first, and see if you're stable or not. If you are, then by all means add the 4 in 1's and recheck for stability

 

[Ncogneto]

I disagree

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[jlanka]

>I disagree

Can you explain why? My reasoning is based on sound troubleshooting techniques - adding one thing at a time and testing after each. Not throwing the whole kitchen sink in there and then trying to figure out which piece broke.

So what's your reasoning?

Just wondering.

 

[Ncogneto]

Not trying to pick a fight here but the 4n1's are a neccesaty. Of course the only parts of the 4 n one drivers that you need are the agp miniport driver and the inf file. I do not recomend installing the busmaster drivers. All motherboard manufactorers will tell you that you need the agp drivers from via. The install technique I described seems to be the best way to insure all drivers are installed in the correct order. This technique is one of the only ways to install an ATI card into a via chipset ( along with a few other steps). It also works perfectly well with other cards too.
Can you install each individually and reboot each time? Yes, usually you can. However, sometimes it is like have only half the puzzle and windows encounters problems do to the fact it is missing a piece. The video cards drivers, the agp miniport driver, and direct x all work together.

A little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing!

 

[jlanka]

No, no fight picking was intended.

Actually, I like your explanation. Especially the part about omitting the busmaster drivers - they gave me mucho problems with a recent W2K install.

Thanks for the explanation. Thats what forums are all about.