Tom's Hardware > Forum > Windows 2000/NT > Windows 2000/NT General Discussion > Max Ati graphics card - Driver for W2k
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Pointertovoid   12-31-2008 at 08:20:05 PM

Hello everybody!

I recently looked at Ati-Amd's website for graphics cards drivers for my beloved W2k and was badly disappointed: the latest driver for W2k is, according to Amd, Catalyst v6.2 which, again according to Amd, only allows a Radeon x850, which is a DirectX9.0b card.

However, information by Amd isn't reliable. I could install normally a Catalyst v6.8 on my W2k. Also, v6.2 as well as v6.8 contain a C2_30152.inf or C2_35722.inf which mention up to Radeon x1900, or a DirectX9.0c card - so I hope they should be accepted.

I already spent some time searching for drivers. Many sites link to "W2k-Xp drivers" which refuse to install on W2k, or link to Amd which seems to have discarded many drivers from Ati when buying them.

Having a Radeon 9600xt, I can't test the drivers by myself on more recent hardware.

So has someone reliable first-hand information?
Which Catalyst from what website was used successfully on W2k for a Radeon x1900, x1950 or even better?
Do graphics cards manufacturers supply W2k drivers for more recent Ati chips?
Do non-Catalyst drivers improve on that point?
dX10 won't fit on W2k, but can I find hardware and drivers for OpenGL 3?

Thanks a lot!

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Zoron   01-01-2009 at 01:34:23 PM
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See my answer in your nVidia post... it'll be the same situation with ATi. If you want to use modern hardware, you'll need a more modern OS.

------------------------------ Desktop: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Intel Q6600 CPU; E-VGA 780i SLI motherboard; E-VGA E-GeForce 8800GT; OCZ Vista 4GB dual-channel kit; Ultra X2 750W power supply; 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB in RAID 0. Laptop: Acer Aspire 8730-6314;
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Pointertovoid   01-01-2009 at 07:40:17 PM
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Reliable first-hand information, somebody?
Which driver, available where, allows which graphics card?

Just for info: Intel's Inf Installers for Core 2 and i7 are available for W2k, which isn't a phased out OS. No reason why graphics cards should do it another way.

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Zoron   01-01-2009 at 08:10:58 PM
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Just because Intel supports 2K, doesn't mean you can expect every company out there to do the same. 2K is very near the end of it's life cycle if it hasn't already reached it... so you can expect companies to focus on XP (which is also nearing the end of it's cycle) and later. Supporting 4 versions of Windows just isn't practical for most companies.

------------------------------ Desktop: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Intel Q6600 CPU; E-VGA 780i SLI motherboard; E-VGA E-GeForce 8800GT; OCZ Vista 4GB dual-channel kit; Ultra X2 750W power supply; 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB in RAID 0. Laptop: Acer Aspire 8730-6314;
 Reply to Zoron
Pointertovoid   01-03-2009 at 01:51:29 AM
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Zoron, your answers contain less information than my question.

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Pointertovoid   01-03-2009 at 02:30:02 AM
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Small improvement. The Catalyst 6.2 and 6.8 (=8.282) mention the Radeon x1900. But there
http://support.asus.de/download/do [...] uage=en-en
found the "eas 1950", asked for W2k driver, got
ati82821_w2kxp64.zip
which is a v8.282.1 which mentions the x1950 in its W2k inf files C2_35620.inf and C2_35483.inf.

It might work only on Asus graphic cards. The Inf file is heavily adapted for Asus, so it might at least need some rewriting to work on x1950 from other card vendors.

The x1950 is a dX9.0c card from 2006. Found no driver candidate for a dX10 Ati card, so nVidia has the advantage up to now.

Short digression: W2k was released on dec 1999 so Microsoft plans to maintain it until dec 2009. And just for workstations and servers, you have now W2k-Xp-2k3-V-2k8 plus four 64-bits versions, plus all the CE, hand-held and other editions, all in active life. Which doesn't prevent people from using Nt4 and 98se, as website statistics show.

Reply to Pointertovoid
Zoron   01-03-2009 at 02:45:03 AM
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Key word: Microsoft.

This in no way obligates other companies to produce drivers for an OS that is close to the end of it's life cycle. You can't even find drivers for the latest vid cards under 98... so why you would try to use that to support your argument, I don't know. Most new anti-virus programs won't install on anything less than 2K... and in some cases XP.

People are in no way prevented from using 98se or NT4.0. However, if you're going to build a system from brand new components... I wish you luck in finding drivers. Win98 had no SATA support... and it's unlikely you'd find Win98 compatible drivers. Win9x is a DEAD platform as far as hardware and software vendors are concerned. But yes, you can still "use" Win9x.

------------------------------ Desktop: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit; Intel Q6600 CPU; E-VGA 780i SLI motherboard; E-VGA E-GeForce 8800GT; OCZ Vista 4GB dual-channel kit; Ultra X2 750W power supply; 2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB in RAID 0. Laptop: Acer Aspire 8730-6314;
 Reply to Zoron
Pointertovoid   01-03-2009 at 03:23:57 AM
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I'd like to concentrate back on drivers for recent ATI graphic cards running on W2k. With useful information.

Reply to Pointertovoid
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