Help-Radeon 8500 DVI port dual monitor flickers

CookieMonster

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Jun 8, 2002
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I started with an ATI Radeon 8500 64DDR that when set up with 2 CRT monitors the monitor on the DVI port has a really bad flicker. The flicker is generally horizontal and will not go away with resolution/refresh rate/color depth changes. Moving a window around the desktop makes the flicker worse, along with connecting to the internet through the PCI winmodem. As an additional testing procedure, I have tried swapping monitors and the flicker stays on the DVI port monitor ruling out the monitor. Calling the PCMall and my MOBO vender tech support, both had diagnosed the problem as a bad video card. Sending the card back as defective, I purchase a 8500 128DDR card. This card has the exact same flicker on the DVI port monitor. I also tried the card in 2 other PC’s, a PII-350 w/ 2 CRT screens had the flicker but it wasn’t as bad, and the Celeron-400 with one CRT and one Microtech C580 flat panel with a VGA connector that I tried it on worked fine. In the PII-350 machine before the 2nd monitor was enabled and the desktop extended, the DVI port did not have a flicker with the image cloned when I first installed the driver but as soon as the monitor was enabled the flicker started. Since the PII-350 machine did not flicker until the second display was enabled, this leads me to believe that it is a ATI video driver issue (the AMD-2100 winXP OS recognized the second display immediately and it flickered as soon as the driver was installed.) Since it did work on one computer but not work on the others, the video card is probably fine but how do I get it to work on my computer? Is this a driver issue, a system configuration issue, a system incompatibility issue, or something else entirely such as RF noise from the AMD 2100+/A7V333/Cheap Winmodem? (I did test the system without the modem and LAN card and the problem however continued)

System configuration is as follows:
Case: Antec SOHO 1040B, 400W power supply, added 2 thermal “Smartfans”
Motherboard: ASUS A7V333/PA/RAID/U2/1394-UAY, Part No. 90-M7A501-WOUAY
AMD Athlon XP 2100+ boxed processor
Corsair 512 MB modules (2): CMX512-2700C2, XMS2700v1.1, 021316
ATI RADEON 8500 128Mb video card: Serial No.180123 004685 RADEON 8500 128MDDR;P/N 1028280400 056779; Card Marking N625, PN 109-82800-00
Hard Drives: (3) IBM P/N 07N6655, MLC H32368, 61.5GB, Model IC35L060AVER07-0
Drive #1: IDE 0 for OS
Drive #2-Drive #3:RAID 0 array on MOBO RAID controller
DVD Rom: Sony DDU1621
FDD: Sony Model MPF920-Z
TKD AI-321040X CDRW Drive

Bios: ASUS 1.005
Graphics arpeture:64MB
AGP:4x (tried 2x, 1x w/ 64DDR card and did not help)
AGP Drive strength: Auto
AGP Performance Control: Enabled
AGP Fast Write control: enabled
Video Memory cache mode: UC
Memory Hole @ 15-16Mb: Disabled
PCI 2.1 Compliant: disabled
PCI Pallette Snoop: Disabled
Primary VGA BIOS: AGP VGA Card
PNP OS: Yes
Boot Virus Detection: Enabled
Reset configuration (ESCD): No

Bios: ASUS 1.007 (tried 1.006b004/1.006 and system would not POST/boot)
Graphics arpeture:128MB(grayed out, not allowed to set size)
AGP:4x
AGP Drive strength: Auto
AGP Performance Control: Enabled
AGP Fast Write control: enabled
Video Memory cache mode: UCSW (grayed out, not allowed to set)
Memory Hole @ 15-16Mb: Disabled
PCI 2.1 Compliant: disabled
PCI Pallette Snoop: Disabled
Primary VGA BIOS: AGP VGA Card (PCI VGA card flickered too)
PNP OS: Yes
Boot Virus Detection: Enabled
Reset configuration (ESCD): No

Win XP OS, all system update downloads applied
Radeon driver: 6.13.10.6071 (older drivers shipped w/ the cards, 6.13.10.6043 did not help either)
VIA 4 in 1 drivers: 4in1438(2)v(a) downloaded from the VIA Arena website, plus original drivers
Radeon is on IRQ 16, with no other devices listed/conflicting on that IRQ, no known system conflicts or problem devices in device manager/system information.

If anyone has had this problem before or has any suggestions how to fix it I would love to know.
 

adria

Distinguished
May 26, 2009
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18,510
I have the same flicker, on the secondary monitor of the
MSI PCIe 256mB ATI 2600XT DDR3 installed on an ASUS P5K3 with DDR3 and a Q6700 CPU with Vista.

I can change/stop the flickering by disable/enable the secondary monitor.
Mostly the flickering stops.

I think the secondary monitors'vidoe is refreshed outside the raster blanking of the monitor.
When they are in sync then the flickering disappears.

The fkickering depends on the screen content and varies between one video stripe, white or black up to 1/3 to 1/2 screen flicker.

This is already for 1.5 years, and after all emails to ati, no reply and a lot of new releases with no change on screen flicker.

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