----HELP---- with Video Card

[MR.CD:\]

Hi guys:

I don't know if I'm offending anyone by saying this, so sorry in advanced, but....

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD I NEED THE HELP OF ALL OF U!!!!!!!


I have spent the past 2 years owning a video card, installed into a computer that really doesn't deserve it. It was meant for a Compaq POS. Now, I have gotten... "authorization" to install the video card into the PC (family matters... I'm 16 and not A+ certified, so they don't trust me). Now, I have spent the most agonizing moments in my short life trying to install that thing on this pc. The main problem is that, even when I start the pc in safe mode, uninstall the onboard crappy Video, turn off, put in new video card, turn on... THE monitor won't get the signal. It will blink it's light orange, like the tower wasn't turned on. Now, I e-mailed and chatted HP support about this (apparently HP aquisitioned Compaq? I guess) , and after like, oh... a million tries they finally understood that:
A) The card is FINE. As in not damadged and;
B) The card IS compatible witht the pc, I have double and triple checked.


After this, they said that the problem must be with my BIOS. They gave me an update, I installed it (the whoal floppy boot disk and all), tried to install it again... and NOTHING!!!! NOT AT ALL! Now, I think this might have something to do with the IRQs, but I saw an e-mail support message on the video-card's web site that had an IRQ problem, and the monitor booted just fine (the problem was later on, crashing and whatnot) so I doubt it.

The card is a Visiontek Xtasy Nvidia GeForce 2 MX (outdated, I know, but hey, try getting something better on a scrap budget), just in case your wondering. I would very much like to one day finally have enough memory in this machine to play a decent game with my friends on this thing. So...
PuH-LEASE HELP!!!!!!!!!!!



Thanks a million!

[MemorY]

Wait, did you have a video card installed before you bought that one, or did u have the "chip" on the motherboard..?? I know wheni nought my GeForce2 MX400 FXF, i just popped it in, turned on the moniotr, and installed the card via the CD that came with the card. Then i went to Right click my computer-> Manage-> Display-> Disable the old card and restarted....

[MR.CD:\]

Well, I think I should be more specific.
The Video IS onboard. I read in a related post by nihil something about disconnecting the VDU cable from the onboard to the new video card. Now, I might just be all newbie saying this but, I'm assuming this is a cable "inside" the pc case? Seeing as he disconnected it FROM the onboard. If not, I guess it's just the monitor cable? Please advise, cuz this might be the solution to my problem. Yeah, I'm using windows ME (sadly).

[MemorY]

Wait Wait man.....

It's a PCI card right? Ok do the following...go back to your old Graphic card..turn on your machine to make sure it works....turn it off, pop in the new card, dont do anything just pop it in.. turn on your machine and install the video card with the CD you got....or download the setup from www.nvidia.com. Then just plug in the monitor cable in the new card, and then go to my computer -> manage...and disable the old card.....

[MR.CD:\]

Yeah, to answer your question: It's PCI.
Seriously, I'm this close to just giving up and trying to get a new video card. But, thinking about it, how can I get a new one knowing it might not work.

Thanks Mem... but it didn't work. See, I tried that once before, I tried it again on your suggestion. But the problem is, no matter what, the monitor never gets the signal. It's not the pc crashing, it's not drivers.... it's just that if that card is inside the machine, the monitor will never ever get the signal (the light goes orange and the display is black). It's amazing. I guess I need one of two things: A new video card or a knife, cuz this is getting frustrating. Thanks anyways, mem.


P.S.:
Anyone know if the saints work on PCs? I'd gladly submit them to the vatican if they make this work. I'm still open to suggestions, BTW.

[MemorY]

What if the new card is inside but you connect the monitor to the old port ? If the monitor still stays black im guessing the video card is not compatible with your motherboard maybe...

[jinxy]

Try this,
Make sure you have uninstalled the drivers for the new card. Turn off, put new card in its slot, reboot using on board video. Go to control pannel run the new hardware wizard. If windows can see your new card it will prompt for the driver follow instructions on screen. If not choose new hardware manualy it may be on the list you will see if not click have disk and follow instructions on screen if windows does not find the driver automaticaly you will have to tell it ware to look by browsing to the folder on the cd.

Once you have the crd and driver installed go into the device manager and look at the properties of your on board video and the new card to see if there is an irq clash, if there is you will have to change the irq for the new device either through the controll pannel or the bios.

[VictorKaum]

This card should be working even without the proper windows drivers, only a blank screen and a monitor in standby simlpy means problems on a lower level than drivers.

You are sure your vga card works? You are sure that the monitor and card have at least one compatible frequency and resolution area? Normaly they have.

I suggest the following, if everyone's else advice above already failed:
start with as less components and requirements as possible, and see if you can get the signal to work. Then slowly put things back.

So basicly start your box with only your motherboard offcourse cpu and ram, and your graphic card, disable the onboard video (read the manual how to do that, probably requires you to change a jumper).

If that works, figure out the conflicting components, probably an IRQ issue like said before.

Finaly to have not to much trouble with your windows, connect all old stuff and the old onboard video, go to windows set the video settings to standard VGA, nothing fancy just plain old VGA, shutdown your box, disable onboard video, plug in the PCI card, and boot your box, Windows will recognize the new hardware, put in your CD and there you go.

A sometimes forgotten thing is that many motherboard manufacturers forsee certain slots for certain cards, and assign IRQ's accordingly. This may sound very strange, but it's a very good possibility that your card is unable to work in a certain slot and certainly not in combination with certain cards in other slots, cause of IRQ sharing. So therefor it's important to see if your card can run solo on the mobo without other devices connected like soundcard, PCI modem, ... try several pci slots for your card.
Probably there are pci slots with shared IRQ's and one or more without a shared IRQ, this can be checked in the manual or by fail and error. Read out the auto IRQ assignments in Bios when you replace the card, this way you can later assign the IRQ's yourself accordingly.

[MR.CD:\]

You know, guys. I was thinking about it, and it's probably an IRQ problem. See, I was checking out the IRQ assignments in my pc, and 1) They are all full (I think, I mean, they go up to 15) 2) The same IRQ that's for PCI bus steer (for the free PCI port, I think) is also the one used by the onboard. Correct me if I'm wrong, but this should be the source of my troubles? Right? It should cause the monitor to not get the signal? (Yes, I have tried uninstalling the onboard and did plug in the monitor to the new card). If I'm correct, I think when I turn the pc on (which has the video card and the onboard if I put it in), both the onboard and the new card are IRQing(or whatever verb IRQ converts to) the cpu, with the same one (3). That should cause that, right? Tell me if u know.

[VictorKaum]

Yep, you are on the right track. It is indeed very common for PCI busses to share same IRQ, like I said above. Some cards / peripherals don't care to share, others do. So your best bet is either config your IRQ's manualy, or look at the manual of your mobo for the shared IRQ slots. It seems logical to me that you cannot share an IRQ for the video card together with one reserved for the PCI steer.

On a PCI only pc there can not be such thing as insufficient IRQ's, cause all could be shared.
There are 4 PCI interrupts reserved by onboard or PCI plug-in cards these are linked to IRQ's by the BIOS. So changing the card to another PCI slot can eventualy be a working solution.
power off, clear bios, change card, power on

In the document (link bellow) they describe the same method as I did before, start up with minimum installed (VGA + mobo + cpu + ram + hdd) and see of this solves the conflict.
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/...0_118_756_3734^1039^3055,00.html