crash after video driver

[ducttape]

I know this is really long, but I think I was very thorough and want to try and forestall any questions by being descriptive. Please bear with me.

I've been trying to rebuild my computer, basically from scratch, for the past week or so. I installed the Windows XP Pro SP1 onto the hard drive and then tried to install the nforce chipset drivers that came with the board. The video card driver was installed by the OS installation.

My configuration when I started having problems was this:

• Lian-Li pc65b case
  Enermax 450W power supply
  Athlon XP 2400+
  Gigabyte motherboard (the GA-7N400Pro2)
  ATI 8500DV AGP card
  two 256MB sticks of Kingston pc2700 RAM
  Maxtor 40GB hard drive
  TDK CDRW drive

About three minutes after booting into the OS I would get an error message that the video driver went into an infinite loop and that (paraphrasing here I needed to install an updated driver or get a new video card.

After installing an updated driver, an old driver, and the driver that originally came with the card with no change in the problem, I got a new video card: a Chaintech GeForce 5200 FX.

The OS didn't recognize the new card but I had video. I installed the drivers that came with the card, and this time the OS rebooted and got as far as the XP Pro splash screen. After the splash screen, where you should be presented with logon options, the screen went blank and sat for a little while with the HDD LED flickering occasionally, after which the computer would reboot. So I tried an updated WHQL certified driver. Again, the computer would reboot in the same place. So I tried an older WHQL driver, with the same results. I then formatted the hard drive and reinstalled Windows, and tried to add the chipset drivers. After messing around with the issue for a while longer, I bought two new 256MB sticks of Kingston pc3200 RAM and swapped out the hard drive with another 40GB Maxtor drive, and reinstalled Windows after each change. (I'm a firm believer in only making one change at a time when troubleshooting.) Those changes had no effect, so I exchanged the motherboard at the shop for a different copy of the same model. I tested that for a day or so with no luck and exchanged the Gigabyte motherboard for an Asus A7N8X-E Deluxe.

Now my system looks like this:

• Lian-Li pc65b case
  Enermax 450 watt power supply
  Athlon XP 2400+
  Asus motherboard(A7N8X-E Deluxe)
  Chaintech GeForce 5200FX (A-FX20-N)
  two 256MB sticks of Kingston pc3200 RAM
  Maxtor 40GB hard drive
  TDK CDRW drive

I've tried three different video cards in the computer, and the only one I can get to work with a driver beyond the Windows Standard VGA driver is an old SIS PCI card I had lying around. I've tried locking the AGP bus at 66 MHz, locking the AGP power at 1.5v and than at 1.6v, disabling AGP 8x support, and basically disabling or enabling or changing anything else that is directly related to AGP in the BIOS, all without any change in the problem. I also tried loading the default BIOS settings, again without any change in the problem.

Interestingly, I was able to get the video card recognized and working by disabling all onboard USB ports and the onboard sound, but leaving it that way isn't really an option for me. I am also able to boot into safe mode. after the video driver is installed.

So, any help getting my AGP video card working would be very appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Fern]

Welcome to the Forums ducttape. You wrote " then tried to install the nforce chipset drivers that came with the board".

Well, it doesn't sound as though your'e sure you got them installed. Go to nVidia's site and download the newer chipset drivers. Perhaps that'll do the trick for you.

Good Luck

 

[ducttape]

Thanks for the welcome and the response.

Originally posted by: Fern
Welcome to the Forums ducttape. You wrote " then tried to install the nforce chipset drivers that came with the board".

Well, it doesn't sound as though your'e sure you got them installed. Go to nVidia's site and download the newer chipset drivers. Perhaps that'll do the trick for you.

After getting the computer working with the PCI card I did successfully install the newest chipset drivers. Despite that, when I put the AGP card back in (after removing the PCI card drivers in safe mode) the black screen/reboot problem was still there.

 

[jlr69t]

Well it seems like you have tried just about everything. When I reformat my hard drive I do not install Windows updates. I have found that they are the root of most of my problems. Try installing windows without any of the updates.

There could be a problem with how you set up your bios, reset your bios to default and see if that works, I would do that before you reinstall windows.

Another thing, when installing the drivers for your new video card make sure the old drives are unistalled first.

I hope this helps...

 

[ducttape]

I haven't tried installing XP Pro without SP1, but I do have a CD with the original XP without SP1, so I'll give that a try and post results after I've completed the install.

As for the video drivers, Windows originally starts without drivers for the card. It just starts with the VGA Compatible driver. I've gone in using safe mode and removed the driver and then installed the new, card specific, driver (while still in safe mode). I think that's what you mean...

 

[Fern]

A couple more thoughts..

- From what I can see you've had several vid cards in there: nVidia, ATI etc. Maybe time to get driver cleaner (free d/l) and clean some old drivers out.

- PCI card works, but not AGP? Check BIOS and ensure Primary Graphics Adapter is set to "AGP" not PCI.

- AGP Aperture size? set at 64 or 128

- I see you have changed mobo's. Did you reformat/reinstall after change to get rid of old chipset drivers? or try to change w/o reformat ?

 

[ducttape]

I had way too much time on my hands when I started troubleshooting this!

I formatted the hard drive and reinstalled windows after each hardware change (motherboard, video card, hard drive

, memory).

Each time I've changed the video card I've made sure the Primary Graphics Adapter setting in the BIOS was set appropriately.

I tried changing the AGP Aperture size from the default 64 MB to 128 MB. When there wasn't a change in functionality I thought the better part of valor would be to go back to the default of 64 MB, and that's where it is now.

This is just getting frustratingly humorous! Thanks for the continuing efforts, I think you guys are helping keep me sane. At least I think so...

 

[ducttape]

Ok, so the latest results are in. I installed a plain old vanilla version of Windows XP Pro (without SP1), and again had no luck with the video problem. Over the weekend Nvidia also released new drivers and I tried them in another effort to fix the problem, also without solving the problem.

 

[jlr69t]

Besides Windows, what other programs are you installing?

When you reinstall windows are you doing a completely new install of windows? If not try to repartitioning your hard drive, this will wipe it clean.

 

[ducttape]

Basically, I reinstall Windows (repartition, format, reinstall) every time I make a hardware change. Other than the chipset drivers and the video drivers, I install no software other than the operating system. I've tried installing the chipset drivers then the video drivers. I've tried installing the video drivers and then the chipset drivers, but I don't get very far trying to do that because once I install the video drivers, I can't get back into the machine.