6800 driver nightmare please help

[noobalicious]

Hey everyone

i am a complete noob to the world of tech forums so please bear with me.

i have a totally whack problem with a brand new system that my friend and i put together. we had everything up and running, looked awesome, so happy, hours of WoW. then my pointer cursor locked up in the game but the mouse continued to work as far as moving the camera or highlighting buttons. rebooted worked fine. same thing occurred later, rebooted and after windows splash screen, monitor LED goes to orange and nothing happens for a couple minutes, then the computer reboots itself and the same thing happens. after it failed the first time it gave a blue screen saying that the computer had shut down to protect files and folders because it was stuck in an infinite loop due to a corrupt file: nv4_disp. at my friends suggestion i uninstalled the nvidia driver from add/remove programs then used driver cleaner to clean out the previous nvidia driver (66.93) tried to install older driver off of bfg tech support cd, but the same error occurred, stuck right after splash screen. i have tried several drivers (56.72, 66.81, 70.90, 61.77, 66.93) but they all have the same problem. when i use driver cleaner and clean the driver i can boot into normal windows, no problems, but i cant set my resolution above 1280 x 1024, and all the windows look so choppy and bad when i move them (maximize, resize whatever). under this driverless configuration i get the message:
Windows cannot start this hardware device because its configuration information (in the registry) is incomplete or damaged. (Code 19)
in the device manager properties of the card.
i previously had sp2, but i reverted back to sp1 after reading some other peoples problems. i know there are several similar threads, but i havent found any that offer a solution to my problem. please help!

thanks


asus a8v deluxe rev2 (bios 1007)
athlon64 3000+
1 gig kingston hyper ram
bfg 6800 oc nu
450W super flower psu
74 gig WD raptor
win xp sp1 (previously sp2):brokenheart:

 

[Matthias99]

As far as the driver issue, it sounds like something got out of whack in the registry info for the card.

Did you try completely uninstalling the drivers, *then* using Driver Cleaner, then reinstalling them? That ought to fix that issue.

You also might want to try some stability testing with memtest86 and prime95. If the system is not stable, you'll just keep having problems and corrupting things.

 

[Edward Lee]

Also make sure the drives for your MOBO are up to date.
I had problems after I put together my system too. It might sound simple but after trying everything that's the thing that worked for me.

 

[noobalicious]

Thanks for suggestions guys-

i removed nvidia drivers from add/remove programs as well as manually deleting pretty much every nvidia thing i could find when i searched my hard drive. i rebooted my comp into normal windows, it detected the vid card, claimed it needed a driver, so i installed off of the bfg support cd, appeared to work but on reboot went to a foul-looking 4-color windows. rebooted again and same problem as earlier, that is after windows splash screen monitor goes to sleep and nothing happens.

the currently installed mobo drivers (via 4 in 1, agp 2.0/3.0) are the ones the came with the mobo support cd.

 

[Edward Lee]

I would try to download the updated drivers for your MOBO.
My problem was I relied solely on the the support disk. Then after I got the updated drivers all my problems went away.

 

[Matthias99]

Originally posted by: noobalicious
Thanks for suggestions guys-

i removed nvidia drivers from add/remove programs as well as manually deleting pretty much every nvidia thing i could find when i searched my hard drive. i rebooted my comp into normal windows, it detected the vid card, claimed it needed a driver, so i installed off of the bfg support cd, appeared to work but on reboot went to a foul-looking 4-color windows. rebooted again and same problem as earlier, that is after windows splash screen monitor goes to sleep and nothing happens.

the currently installed mobo drivers (via 4 in 1, agp 2.0/3.0) are the ones the came with the mobo support cd.

DEFINITELY get newer MB/chipset drivers online. Those are likely hideously out of date (as are your video drivers if they weren't new).

Did you remove the entry for the card in Device Manager? That's how you "uninstall" hardware manually (or you can edit the registry, but using Device Manager is easier and safer). Just deleting files won't help, and is likely to get you into the sort of situation you describe above (where it has a piece of hardware "installed", but can't find any drivers to use with it).

 

[Killrose]

You say it worked fine initially and then went to crap? Did you happen to add, download or install new hardware after you had it working fine? Do you have another video card you can try to make sure the rest of the system is ok?

 

[Killrose]

You might want to try re-installing just the AGP gart driver too, especially if you have been swapping video cards around.

 

[noobalicious]

by new mobo drivers do you mean new bios? if so is the only way to update the bios by flashing it? because if that is the case i need to reattach floppy drive, and if i am going to reattach i almost just want to reformat and reinstall windows.

kilrose, the only thing i added was a new keyboard and i think that it is unrelated to the problem. sadly i do not have another vid card to test.

 

[Killrose]

I would try re-installing just the AGP gart driver, might help too if you have the latest vers.

 

[noobalicious]

at guru3d there are so many via mainboard drivers, do you have any suggestions on which ones to use? also is this the same thing as agp gart driver? sorry i am confused about the terminology

thanks

 

[Killrose]

Give the ones off your origional set-up CD a shot or go to the motherboard manufacture for your mainbaord and get the ones they list for it

 

[Edward Lee]

Noobalicious,
looks like you chipset is the K8T800Pro + VT8237 for your MOBO here's the link to the newest driver http://www.viaarena.com/downlo...ion%204in1_v455vp1.zip

Try this. This is NOT the bios. These run the components on your MOBO ie. your AGP/PCI/Sound/ etc....

 

[noobalicious]

i uninstalled the nvidia drivers through device manager then ran driver cleaner, installed the via 455vp drivers, rebooted and found new hardware wizard opens on start up. i install the drivers from the bfg support cd that came with the card. the computer recognizes it as nvidia geforce 6800 which is correct. then found new monitor pops up. i install the software that came with that. when i go to desktop->properties->settings, new resolutions are available. i try to resize to 1600x1200 (which previously worked before all this mess started) and the screen goes black and then the LED light goes orange like its sleeping and nothing happens for a couple minutes, then the screen comes up in disgusting 4 colors and everything gigantic-sized. i am reaching the limit of the pain i can handle from not being able to play WoW. i really dont know what to do.

 

[noobalicious]

i can only boot to normal windows when no nvidia drivers are installed. when i do install them i have to boot to safe mode. as i previously mentioned i have tried several different nvidia drivers, some older ones, the current one from nvidia website, the one with my support cd, and the new 3rd party 70.90, all to no avail. i can reformat and reinstall windows if i NEED to, but i would really like to avoid that if possible, and i am not sure it will help because i just installed it the other day on a brand new hard drive.

 

[Edward Lee]

Reinstall windows and start fresh. If it's not a software problem it must be a hardware problem.
Only way to make sure.

 

[Killrose]

I actually had a similar problem with my 6800U when I first got it. Problem #1 was I was running Win98se which the 6800 series does not like at all. Second was there was a conflict between the 6800 and the drivers for my Aureal snd card.

I actually had to format twice before I figured out the problem. The first time I formated I left the Aureal card in there and had the same problems crop up. I then decided to reformat once more with all unnessasary cards removed from the system so I could add them one by one to catch the problem.

Sure enough, once I installed the Aureal drivers I received a warning from windows that said it would never install the drivers because of a conflict, the moment I forced the driver install, bang problems occured. The most notable one was that my system would not hold my display settings and if I tried to set them on a boot up I would get the blue screen or worse.


My advice might be to re-format at this point, and keep all unnessary cards and associated drivers out of the system and add them one by one, rebooting each time and running some apps to see how things run before adding another component..

 

[noobalicious]

just reformatted and reinstalled windows, before i mess anything up is there a suggestion as to which order i install the drivers or download sp2 in?

 

[Navid]

First thing should be your chipset driver. That is not the BIOS. And you should get the latest from the Motherboard web site.

You may want to download the things you need to install with another (secure) computer. You should not connect this computer to the internet before it is patched and secure (firewall/anti-virus.

 

[noobalicious]

ok i reformatted, dled and installed sp2, then nvidia driver, same thing happened as before. reformatted and reinstalled, installed the 4in1 drivers off of the cd that i got with mobo (they looked to be as new as what i could find on the asus site), then installed the nvidia driver (66.93) restart comp, windows splash screen and then orange led sleep mode on monitor. then a blue screen about windows shut down to protect files and folders and something about "nv4" something.dll but the blue screen went too fast for me to read. i dont think the video card is broken, because it worked the other day, and if it was broken it wouldnt be able to display the desktop at 1280 x1024 with the default windows driver right? about to drink til i pass out or kick the computer VERY hard or kill myself

 

[noobalicious]

when i enter safe mode it says windows recovered from a critical error, it seems the driver for nvidia geforce 6800 caused the instability

 

[Killrose]

what snd card are you using? Try a different NV driver maybe?

 

[noobalicious]

not using sound card, just using the mobo onboard sound and those drivers are not installed right now. they were earlier when this problem began. i tried NV 66.72 driver as well, but to no avail

 

[Killrose]

you did install DX9 right? and you have selected AGP as the display type in bios too?

 

[HardcoreRobot]

did you try using the 4in1 sans agp and use MS agp driver from sp2? i saw that suggested on the via site.