I need your driver wisdom please!

[riskyfrisky]

First post just a shame it's for ruddy problems!

Just built an AMD Athlon 64 system and i am getting similar problems to Sprog in that i get the grey bars at the bottom of the screen before the Windows XP loading screen appears. A grey line moves from left to right every time then the XP blue bar screen appears and the system loads fine.

There are three user accounts on there and the other problem is that is i try and switch users whilst remaining logged on, the system shuts down and reboots without warning. Once booted back up i get a dialog saying the system has recovered from a serious error. The error log is Sent to Microsoft and the reply they send states there could be a dodgy device driver on the system.

Fast user switching is set to automatic. Both of these problems occur since the system was first turned on. As far as i am aware all drivers have been installed (motherboard, graphics, cpu were all installed with the included cd's).

One thing i thought worth mentioning is the Cool n Quiet facility. I have that enabled through BIOS and all hardware is compatible, however, it says on the .pdf file from AMD website that if cool n quiet is full y operational then it will say 800mhz proc in the system tab-mine says 1.00ghz (processor is 3200+). Could this maybe have sommat to do with it or are my noobie colours shining through right now lol!

any help would be greatfully received guys, thanks in advance!

 

[riskyfrisky]

Anyone? Surely someone can help me, i'm desperate!

Since the first post i've installed the latest driver that i found on the MSI website. Now the PC doesn't reboot whilst switching users which is good but the monitor blinks off then on when the account loads up. Is this a graphics card problem or XP itself?

I'm still getting the grey lines at the bottom of the screen which are filled by the bar that moves left to right before the XP loading screen. I removed the driver for the graphics card then removed the card itself and used integarted graphics but the problem remained.

system spec:
AMD Athlon 64 3200+
MSI RS482M4 ILD (Radeon Xpress 200)
ASUS Extreme AX550 GE
512mb DDR400 RAM (Crucial)
80gb Seagate Barracuda S300
Samsung SH-R522 CD/RW

bios version 1.20

If anyone can help it would be appreciated, if you need more info please let me know.

 

[sturm]

Cool and quite is working fine. I have a 3200+ and mine only goes down to 1 Ghz.

Try reinstalling the graphics card. Use the origional drivers off the cd.
What is your power supply?
Turn off automatic restart. Right click my computer - properties - Advanced - Startup and recovery click settings. Untick Automatically restart. This will show any error screens that might be displayed.

 

[fattony]

yep good idea to see if there's a bugcheck
have you tested your memory to swap it out and all
also check your event logs for any errors

 

[riskyfrisky]

sturm, FatTony thanks for your replies!

I did remove the graphics card and the driver and tried using the integrated graphics but the problem of the grey lines at the bottom of the screen filled by the grey bar still remained. I reinstalled the Gcard and made sure i installed the driver straight from the cd.

I believe the power supply is a generic one but it's rated at 400w max, it comes with the ColorSit case i purchased from Gladiator computers:
http://www.gladiatorcomputers.com/ProductDetail.aspx?StockCode=CASCOLIT8010C4&Link=SearchResults

I'll try doing what you suggested and check the event log but the reboot problem when switching users disappeared when i installed the latest MSI drivers straight from their website (the monitor flicks off then back on though when i do switch users which is weird)

I have a spare stick of DDR400 ram which is also Crucial i will swap them around and see what happens. I got pissed off and tried reinstalling XP, it worked fine but the lines and grey bar still appear before the XP loading screen, should i be getting worried now?

One more thing, i realised last night that Safe mode doesn't work, could this be something to do with it?

thanks guys!

 

[fattony]

some kinda messy driver i think man...forget the re-install, just format the damn thing and see what happens