Trouble with 2nd video card

pstj

Distinguished
Sep 22, 2005
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18,510
Hi!

I recently purchased an ATI Rage Pro 8mb PCI card from Ebay, hoping to setup a dual-display on my computer. My main video card is an ATI Radeon 7200 AGP, the motherboard is an Abit - BH6. OS is Windows 98se. (yeah, older machine)

I first tried to install the Rage card in the only free pci slot, which, on bootup, gave me an error (I've got an Award BIOS). Thinking it had something to do with the presence of two videocards, I removed the PCI card, booted up again, and changed the display bootup option from PCI to AGP. Installed the PCI card again, booted up, and found my way to Windows. Upon installing the drivers, the system hangs. I boot up again. Upon entering Windows, the system hangs again.

I then think that it is something to do with the drivers and a conflict inside Windows between the two cards. I decide to shut everything off, remove the AGP card, and only boot up with the PCI one. Again, I get an error beep on bootup, but this time I have something displayed - a very mangled, constantly changing mix of colours, yet I'm able to make out that the computer is starting up.

I then assume it might be a bad PCI slot. I remove the PCI card, clear another PCI slot, and reinstall the PCI videocard in a new slot. Same problem. I do this another time, then give up. I remove the PCI vid card, put the AGP back in, boot up, and head to pcmech.com.

I am slowly starting to suspect a problem with the PCI videocard itself, but is there something else I can try before returning the card? I don't really want to have to deal with the Ebay return process, and would much rather have a working card now.

Thanks in advance for the help

pstj
 

Crashman

Polypheme
Former Staff
OH, 98SE! That's too bad, because XP has built in drivers for the card.

Anyway, you could have a conflict between bus mastering devices, common in hardware that old, especially with older OS's. Or you could have a driver issue. Or it might be a bad card.

I'd take out all the cards and try the card by itself, and install the latest driver from ATI for Windows ME (works in 98, really!).

Rage Pro drivers are different from Radeon drivers. But if that proceedure gets you up and running, you'll have to start adding cards until you find any conflict, then find a workaround.

But, like I said, it could be a bad card.

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