Radeon X1950 PRO

[chiefchris23]

So I'm brand new to this forum and would like to apologize in advance if this problem has already been asked about/solved. If it has, then I've been unable to find it thus far. So I have an older HP computer I got from a friend that didn't want it since he upgraded to a newer model. It was a huge upgrade for me so was happy to take it off his hands.

Only thing I needed to do to it was add a decent PSU that had a 6 pin pci e power connector and drop in my old x1950 pro in and I'd be set for some decent mid to high range gaming. Only problem is that I can't get the computer to recognize that the card is even in the slot.

So here's how the issue go's. Basically when the card is in the slot and fully hooked up, I'll power up the PC but monitor will just sit there. If I let it sit and run, it powers all the way to the desktop. I can tell this because I can hear everything in the speakers powering up normally as it would if I was still using my onboard. Now the funny thing is if I unplug the monitor from the GPU to the onboard without changing anything, the monitor kicks on and I can see everything again as if the GPU wasn't even installed in. Same thing if I power down and restart plugged into the onboard with the card still in.

Now I know that your supposed to change the bios setting from onboard to pci e. But I've already tried that and still dies the exact same thing I described above. The only thing i haven't tried is getting drivers for my MOBO/BIOS because A.) I wouldn't no where to look for legit drivers for this old MOBO and B.) No idea what I'd be doing if I had to flash the BIOS in order for the card or even the slot itself to be recognized.

Here's my Setup:
http://bizsupport1.austin.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c01357175 MOBO MCP61PM-HM (Nettle3)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103212 CPU AMD Athlon 64 x2 4800+
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817339012 PSU HP585D 585 Watt
ATI RADEON X1950 Pro Graphics card - 256 MB - GDDR3 SDRAM GPU (currently not installed (obviously) )
2 GIGABYTES of MEMORY RAM
325 GIGABYTES HDD
Windows XP Professional

Any help would be greatly appreciated

 

[rolli59]

Can you try the card in a different computer to either confirm or eliminate it is faulty?

 

[chiefchris23]

Can you try the card in a different computer to either confirm or eliminate it is faulty?

I have the original board to try it in but would have to switch it into another case since it's not getting any power to kick on in it's original case. But I remember not even that long ago I tried it in a mobo and got a PC to post with the GPU installed. So I'm not entirely convinced it's the GPU, I also can't see it being the PCIe slot because the person I got it from never opened up his case. He bought it, plugged it in and used it until he bought his new PC. This computer only has about 3 to 4 years of use before coming to me.

 

[Deemo13]

I would just re-seat it and maybe clean off the connectors. The X1950 is a pretty old card, and it might just have a little dirt.

 

[chiefchris23]

I would just re-seat it and maybe clean off the connectors. The X1950 is a pretty old card, and it might just have a little dirt.

It's a possibility, I've already tried re-seating it a couple times but I guess I could give it another shot. Can't imagine it being the connectors though since I just bought the posted PSU a few days ago.

 

[Deemo13]

Hmm that PSU seems to have a pretty low rating on the 12V with only 15A. Either way that should not be the issue.

Maybe you should try to uninstall the drivers currently installed for the onboard graphics chip, or disable it in the device manager in Windows. See if that does anything.

 

[rolli59]

It is actually 19amps if we look at the sticker but if a remember correctly the X1950 pro needed 24amps according to manufacturers.

 

[LERobinson1]

You mention 'onboard' so I am assuming you are talking about an on-board graphics chip. If so, you may have to disable the on-board video via your BIOS because what could be happening is the computer is booting sending a video signal via the on-board chip and therefore no video signal coming from the X1950.

 

[Murissokah]

Firstly, as you said yourself, BIOS must be set to PCIe video output. Even if it doesn't work that way, changing it to onboard will only guarantee that no output will come from the x1950. You said you "tried" that, did you leave it set that way?

While you can't get the card to run, log in whatever way you can (using the onboard) and check if the x1950 is listed on your device manager. We need to know if the system is actually recognizing that the slot is populated. If the card is recognized, try installing catalyst (AMD drivers).

I am not sure, but I think your card is PCI-E 2.0, which should be ok with whatever PCI-E version your motherboard is. If the card is 2.1 though, they might not be compatible. In this case, there might be a BIOS update, but let's not try that yet since you already pointed out what a headache it will be to find such update. Try to find out what PCI-E version the card is.

 

[Murissokah]

It is actually 19amps if we look at the sticker but if a remember correctly the X1950 pro needed 24amps according to manufacturers.

The card won't know how much current the PSU is able to handle, so if its not enough, the PSU will shut down from overcurrent protection. That or fireworks. Anyway, that only happens if our friend manages to get the card in 3D mode.

 

[chiefchris23]

It is actually 19amps if we look at the sticker but if a remember correctly the X1950 pro needed 24amps according to manufacturers.

I'm not to familiar with amp requirements for video cards but I came across a customer review on newegg that might clear this up.

Pros: Of the 4 of these power supplies i've bought for various people i have never had problems. I bought all of these supplies for mid-range budget gaming builds. The graphics cards used in them include a 5670, a 6850, a 4870, and a 6770. I have never had problems with them. The 12v rail barely fluctuates and there appears to be very little ripple.

Cons: There are none. This is a great cheap supply. I wouldn't buy anything cheaper or different.

 

[Murissokah]

Limited PSU capacity will not cause the issue will have, so you can forget about that until it the card is actually doing some heavy work. Just make sure the cables are right, though.

 

[chiefchris23]

Firstly, as you said yourself, BIOS must be set to PCIe video output. Even if it doesn't work that way, changing it to onboard will only guarantee that no output will come from the x1950. You said you "tried" that, did you leave it set that way?

While you can't get the card to run, log in whatever way you can (using the onboard) and check if the x1950 is listed on your device manager. We need to know if the system is actually recognizing that the slot is populated. If the card is recognized, try installing catalyst (AMD drivers).

I am not sure, but I think your card is PCI-E 2.0, which should be ok with whatever PCI-E version your motherboard is. If the card is 2.1 though, they might not be compatible. In this case, there might be a BIOS update, but let's not try that yet since you already pointed out what a headache it will be to find such update. Try to find out what PCI-E version the card is.

To answer your first question yes, it's set to PCIe ever since the first time I switched it to that prior to starting this thread. As for device manager it's only listing the onboard graphics. As for the card being 2.0 x16 you might be right. But as far as I know it's a PCIe x16 card. Even if it was a 2.0 x16 the MOBO it previously worked in was a x16 slot.

Also disabling the onboard didn't work. I have the GPU installed now and it did the same thing I described in my first post.

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c00361528&locale=en_US MOBO the GPU was in when I got it.

 

[Murissokah]

Well, the only reason the onboard card would have any output is the lack of a PCI-E card. Since the card is also not detected on your device manager, we can assume the issue is either hardware or BIOS. This is an obvious question, but does the card's fan spin? Next step would be looking for that BIOS update, which I've had no luck with yet.

 

[chiefchris23]

Well, the only reason the onboard card would have any output is the lack of a PCI-E card. Since the card is also not detected on your device manager, we can assume the issue is either hardware or BIOS. This is an obvious question, but does the card's fan spin? Next step would be looking for that BIOS update, which I've had no luck with yet.

Yep, the card is getting power and yes the fan is spinning. So far still running with on-board GPU disabled. Pretty much operates the way any GPU would without drivers installed. Speaking of drivers, would it make any difference if I tried uninstalling the nvidia drivers and installing the radeon drivers for the card?

 

[Murissokah]

Yep, the card is getting power and yes the fan is spinning. So far still running with on-board GPU disabled. Pretty much operates the way any GPU would without drivers installed. Speaking of drivers, would it make any difference if I tried uninstalling the nvidia drivers and installing the radeon drivers for the card?

It's operating more like as if there was no card installed. The lack of drivers would not keep the card from showing up on your device manager, even if as an unrecognized device. Also, the only reason I can think of for you to have image on your onboard card is that the system is trying the PCI-E interface first, than since it finds nothing, it overrides the setting for the onboard card. Of course, there is no harm in trying to uninstall your NVIDIA drivers than installing the AMD ones. I've got no better ideas right now.

 

[chiefchris23]

So I attempted to uninstall the nvidia drivers and install the radeon drivers right before restarting the PC. So it gets to starting the install portion and says you have no radeon devices connected (or something like that) assuming it's because I am plugged into the onboard while attempting to install radeon drivers. Then I power the PC off and plug into the GPU, alas the same thing as before. So I quick switch the PC off with the PSU switch and re-plug back onto the on-board. So here's where it gets weird (no idea if it's because I uninstalled the nvidia drivers or switching off the PC with the PSU switch).

I now come to a message box while at the blue screen with the windows logo on it (right before loading to desktop) The box says something like; Windows cannot access the local profile and will log into a temporary windows. I actually checked the device manager and it says VGA controller. But there's only one and I'm pretty sure it's just reading the onboard that has no drivers.

So far I've restarted the PC a good few times and I continue to load into the temporary windows. Please tell me it's just because of the drivers being uninstalled.

 

[chiefchris23]

Ok, I think I fixed it, I was able to do a restore point and now it's back to normal. No more using the PSU switch like that. Scared the crap out of me lol.

 

[chiefchris23]

Alright so I think I may have found the problem, it's theoretical but makes sense to me. I hope it does to the people trying help me as well. Right now I have the newest graphics drivers from nvidia installed for my onboard graphics. If I click the nvidia control panel I get Geforce 6150SE nForce 430. I did some google searching and found that my board (nForce 430 (I think) ) has chipset drivers on nvidia somewhere. But currently the oldest the search lets you go is the nForce5 series. But if you use the search bar you get all kinds of stuff ranging from 2005 to 2007-2008 for nforce 430/410. No idea how recent it go's but if someone can help locate the newest drivers for my MOBO I'd greatly appreciate it.

Something else I think I found that may be relevant is that when I go into device manager and look at the drop down for system, you see all kinds of stuff for the MOBO, pci to bridge and pci to memory and all that. But there is absolutely nothing there about the PCIe.

My question on that is, is that an issue with the lack of updated chipset drivers or could the nvidia geforce GPU drivers I have for the onboard be completely negating the existence of the PCIe slot. Or is that entirely normal and doesn't really have any baring on the GPU.

That's it for now, so far I feel it's just a chipset driver issue (a lack of proper update drivers with PCIe support) and that it may just need the most up to date that has PCIe support, or at least something like that.

Thanks for all the help so far.

 

[Murissokah]

Hello Chris,

Its normal not to have any PCI-E listing on your device manager, because it lists as PCI. The card should be listed anyway, though. What is not explained by bad drivers is the pre-boot behaviour, but new drivers are still worth a shot.

I'd try these chipset drivers:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nforce_winxp_15.24.html

 

[chiefchris23]

Hello Chris,

Its normal not to have any PCI-E listing on your device manager, because it lists as PCI. The card should be listed anyway, though. What is not explained by bad drivers is the pre-boot behaviour, but new drivers are still worth a shot.

I'd try these chipset drivers:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/nforce_winxp_15.24.html

Alright then, Do I need to remove any previous chipset drivers before installing new ones and if so how do I go about doing it? (have never messed around with chipset drivers so I'd assume it's the same as doing GPU drivers, but just clarifying it first).

 

[Murissokah]

Usually these are installed fresh. If you already have old drivers installed, you should override them. In case anything goes wrong, you can use the "revert to old driver" function on the device manager.

 

[chiefchris23]

Usually these are installed fresh. If you already have old drivers installed, you should override them. In case anything goes wrong, you can use the "revert to old driver" function on the device manager.

A little unsure if I should go right through with the install. When it unpacks it wants to give all kinds of stuff like audio driver and display drivers. But gives me options to check what I want. But I don't see anything in there specifically about the MOBO. How should I go about doing this?

The checkbox options are as follows: (Select the features you want to install and deselect the features you don't want to install.)

NVIDIA DISPLAY DRIVER 82105k - Do I need this? or need to uninstall my current on-board drivers for this to work right?
NVIDIA SMBUS DRIVER 592k
NVIDIA SMU DRIVER 592k
NVIDIA AWAY MODE INF 565k
NVIDIA ETHERNET DRIVER 38702k - Don't think I need as I have a dedicated PCI ethernet card I'm using
NVIDIA MEDIASHIELD 14932k
NVIDIA HD AUDIO DRIVER 1531k

Besides the audio, display and ethernet drivers I don't really know what the rest of that stuff is. Thought I'd post it and make sure before continuing.

 

[Murissokah]

Mmmm... I'd keep the three first ones. Mediashield seems to be related to RAID storage, so you don't need it. Ethernet and audio you can pass too, ant that away mode looks highly superfluous. SMU and SMBUS are system management interfaces, so keep those. Display driver is the closest to what you are trying to fix, so that one you must install.

 

[chiefchris23]

Mmmm... I'd keep the three first ones. Mediashield seems to be related to RAID storage, so you don't need it. Ethernet and audio you can pass too, ant that away mode looks highly superfluous. SMU and SMBUS are system management interfaces, so keep those. Display driver is the closest to what you are trying to fix, so that one you must install.

Well I installed the drivers, dropped the GPU back in, hooked it up and still I get the same thing as above. At this point, now I don't know what the hell to do. I'm thinking the the only things left are to either A.) flash the bios or B.) just declare the card or the slot or both dead.

I'm open to any suggestions though if there's something someone else thinks I haven't tried that I should go for. I'm feel pretty certain the slot itself is fine since it's never been used. So I'm guessing it could just be the card.