• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

Need help with Radeon 9800Pro lockups

J

JebC

Junior Member
Hello all,

Man, I'm about to go crazy trying to fix this problem, so I'd really appreciate any advice you folks could give me.

First, system specs:

WinXP
Asus A7NX Deluxe (Nforce 2)
Athlon 2500XP
1 GIG Generic DDR400 memory
Raptor RAID 0
Sapphire 9800Pro OEM (running Catalyst 9.0)

Here's the story: About two months ago the 9800 died on me (using this exact same system). Garbled screen, from Post to Windows. After much searching for how to RMA the thing, I found out I had to send it to the place I bought it from, which I did. In the meantime, I've been using a Radeon 9200 to tide me over.

So, after two months, I FINALLY get the card back, and there was much rejoicing. I figured since it was the same set of drivers, I could just take out the 9200, and put in the 9800. I do this, and at first everything appears fine. But here's the killer - the card locks up in every single game I try, which so far consists of three - Freedom Force, Call of Duty, and America's Army. It will lock up about 20 or less seconds after COD loads, almost immediately in Freedom Force (When the Electronic Arts logo first appears), and almost immediately in AA.

Oddly, a fairly graphic intensive visualization like Milkdrop in the latest Winamp will run all day without a hitch at fullscreen 1600x1200.

Any ideas as to why this is happening? I've already gone into the BIOS and turned off FastWrites and set AGP to 4x, which I thought from reading various posts would solve it, but no joy, same damn problem. I don't have another computer to test it in, and I'd really prefer not to reinstall XP if possible, but I don't know how to pinpoint if the card itself is bad or not. It took so long to get it back that I hate to RMA it.

Any and all help is GREATLY appreciated.

Regards,

Jeb
 
At some point you really need to test the card in another PC since no amount of reformatting,tweaking etc will cure a faulty card,anyway you could try running Driver Cleaner from here .Also make sure fastwrites are turned off in ATI SMARTGART tab as well.

Btw you tried the DirectX diagnostic in system info (tools menu) this will tell you if you have a general problem rather then specific problems with just some games.
 
Originally posted by: McArra
Try uninstalling and reinstalling Cat 3.9s again.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the quick reply McArra. I'll give reinstalling the drivers a shot, but that brings up another problem. Can you tell me how to install the 3.9s after removing them, without XP automaticlly loading whatever built-in 9800 drivers it has upon reboot?

Thanks again,

Jeb

 
Originally posted by: Mem
At some point you really need to test the card in another PC since no amount of reformatting,tweaking etc will cure a faulty card,anyway you could try running Driver Cleaner from here .Also make sure fastwrites are turned off in ATI SMARTGART tab as well.

Btw you tried the DirectX diagnostic in system info (tools menu) this will tell you if you have a general problem rather then specific problems with just some games.
Click to expand...

Thanks a bunch Mem, you've given me some good ideas. I'll try the direct X diagnostic and see what that tells me. I was already wondering if it had something to do with that. I figured MilkDrop used OpenGL, while the other games I referenced were using DirectX.

Thanks again,

Jeb
 
XP should revert to the "Standard VGA" drivers, or you can manually switch to them before running Driver Cleaner. Choose "select from list" when it asks where to get a driver from, and check the box that shows all drivers rather than just compatible ones; it should be one of the first ones available in the list.
 
There are instructions included with Driver Cleaner(see readme file),you basically remove your ATI drivers via Control Panel(add/remove programs icon) and then you reboot into safe mode and run Driver Cleaner at desktop .


Couple of points disable your NIC or cable connection and it`s recommended(in safe mode) you run Driver cab cleaner and SP cab cleaner(for WINXP SP1) both in tools menu of Driver Cleaner,just before you run the main Driver Cleaner program,remember if hardware wizard comes up with new hardware detected hit cancel.

After you have run Driver Cleaner and rebooted back to desktop you can reinstall latest ATI drivers and finally renable your network connection.

 
You definately have to uninstall and reinstall the drivers (use Driver Cleaner 2.0 or 2.5 to help get rid of everything). I tried this exact same thing - switching from an ATI Radeon 8500 to a 9800 by just swapping cards and it gave me huge problems, lockups, etc. It just doesn't work. You have to uninstall and reinstall ATI drivers fully when you change cards. It's unfortunate, but what can you do? Once you totally get rid of the old drivers and reinstall it should work fine though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top