WIN XP PRO Reinstallation Probems

[Hutch]

Hi,

 

My old WinXP Pro pc recently suffered a hard drive failure. I replaced the hard drive and reinstalled Windows XP Pro but then discovered I no longer had the various drivers for the Gigabyte GA-8SIMLH motherboard. I managed to download these from the Gigabyte site and reinstalled them. However, when I try to reinstall the software for the Radeon 9250 videocard from its CD I keep getting an error message saying "Setup can't find a driver compatible with the current hardware or operating system." I have downloaded another copy of the ATI software from AMD but this produces the same result. Without the ATI software installed the graphics are very unstable, text is distorted and white backgrounds are discoloured. Frequently the motherboard gives a warning beep and the pc freezes up. I'm wondering if this has anything to do the VGA driver as the Device Manager has a yellow question-mark against Video Controller (VGA Compatible). Anyone have any idea how I can get around this problem, please?

[KenB]

Hi and welcome to ExTS

 

When you downloaded the drivers for your Video Card - was there an option to d/l 32 bit / 64 bit software ?

 

In Device Manager - click the + next to Display Adapters.

Is there an on-board option listed ?

 

What is listed there ?

 

yellow question-mark against Video Controller (VGA Compatible)

If you right click on this - is there an option to "Update Driver Software" ?

If so - click on this and follow the prompts and select the auto option and use the net.

[Synapse]

Also, just a thought, have you brought your XP install up to the latest service pack and updates?

[Hutch]

Thanks for the welcome, KenB.

 

Yes, there were both 32bit and 64bit versions of the VGA driver available - I downloaded and installed the 32bit version.

 

I've just reinstalled the Radeon 9250 driver again in order to get the Display Adapter to reappear in Device Manager. Right-clicking on Display Adapter reveals the monitor icon and "Radeon 9250". Device Status says the device is working properly, but the graphics have become extremely wobbly and unstable again which was my reason for uninstalling the program before. Also, the yellow question mark for VGA Adaptor under Other Devices has now disappeared.

 

Yes, the Update Driver button is available under "Radeon 9250 Properties", but as this computer is not connected to the 'Net (I'm also having networking issues with it and can't yet get it to talk again to my laptop), I'm unable to auto-update the driver.

[Hutch]

Also, just a thought, have you brought your XP install up to the latest service pack and updates?

 

Not as such - I have just loaded SP2 from disk. This pc isn't usually used online, just for running legacy software that doesn't perform well, or at all, with Windows7.

[KenB]

I downloaded and installed the 32bit version.

Assuming that you have the correct drivers for your system ( 32 bit ?) can you confirm that there are no problems with the Video Card itself ?

Can you try it in another system ?

 

If you boot up in Safe Mode - do you get the same problems ?

[ tap F8 about once per second after switching on - Safe Mode will be one of the options ]

[Hutch]

Assuming that you have the correct drivers for your system ( 32 bit ?) can you confirm that there are no problems with the Video Card itself ?

Can you try it in another system ?

 

If you boot up in Safe Mode - do you get the same problems ?

[ tap F8 about once per second after switching on - Safe Mode will be one of the options ]

 

All I can say about the video card is that it was working perfectly up until when the HD died. Unfortunately I don't have another desktop pc that I can try it in. My monitor is connected to the videocard rather than the onboard graphics and the screen display looks perfectly normal until I try to manipulate onscreen windows, etc, then everything starts getting wobbly and unstable.

 

I had already tried booting in Safe Mode - in fact when the system froze following installation of the Radeon/ATI software and I had to perform a 'hard' shutdown, the pc would only initially reboot in safe mode which as expected resulted in very low-res graphics. The usual Windows error message about recovering from a serious system problem appears after rebooting and says that the problem appears to have been caused by the Radeon 9250 driver. But I have downloaded another copy from the AMD site and I encounter exactly the same issues with that.

[KenB]

I know Safe Mode gives you low resolution - this is because the system is running on minimal drivers.

If the graphics is stable in Safe Mode then it could be software ( drivers ) causing the problem.

 

Is the on-board video listed in device manager?

If so - right click > disable it.

It could be conflicting with the Radeon software.

[Synapse]

It is worth using the 'Automatically Detect and Install' option on the AMD download page. I wonder if it a slightly modded or different to standard card with a different device ID - it is worth a look.

[Hutch]

I know Safe Mode gives you low resolution - this is because the system is running on minimal drivers.

If the graphics is stable in Safe Mode then it could be software ( drivers ) causing the problem.

 

Is the on-board video listed in device manager?

If so - right click > disable it.

It could be conflicting with the Radeon software.

 

No, graphics are still very slow and unstable in Safe Mode. Onboard Video is not listed in Device Manager.

[Hutch]

It is worth using the 'Automatically Detect and Install' option on the AMD download page. I wonder if it a slightly modded or different to standard card with a different device ID - it is worth a look.

 

I would love to be able to use Auto Detect but I'm not currently able to get online with the pc - I'm communicating via my laptop. I've also got a copy of DriverMax which would probably solve a lot of my problems, but lack of Internet connection on the pc is making life even more difficult.

[KenB]

Does this machine have on-board video ?

If so - it will be disabled in the BIOS.

 

Take a look and see if you can enable it - if you can ....remove the Video Card and run off the on-board video.

If the graphics are stable then it looks like it may be a problem with the card ( if the drivers that you installed are OK ).

[Hutch]

Does this machine have on-board video ?

If so - it will be disabled in the BIOS.

 

Take a look and see if you can enable it - if you can ....remove the Video Card and run off the on-board video.

If the graphics are stable then it looks like it may be a problem with the card ( if the drivers that you installed are OK ).

 

We were away over the Xmas holiday so didn't get the chance to follow this up until today. The pc definitely has onboard video because it was working OK before I installed the Radeon video card myself after acquiring the machine. Video performance was fine for the year or so up until when the hard drive recently died. I've just gone into BIOS at startup but couldn't find any option for enabling/disabling VGA. So I physically removed the video card and restarted the pc. All was well until the first Windows screen (black background with WinXP Pro logo) appeared and then everything suddenly went blank and my monitor said 'no signal'. So I'm guessing that the VGA driver is not installed, despite having run its setup several times. I refitted the video card which then restored the graphics, albeit with the same problem as before. I'm at a loss to know what to do next.

 

Happy New Year to all!

[Plastic Nev]

Hi, unless there is definitely something wrong with the graphics card, which I actually doubt, it is pointing at a missinstall of either the Windows XP itself, or perhaps the motherboard drivers, which may be either not properly installed or perhaps not the correct ones.

 

I assume that as yet no data has been put back or at least is backed up elsewhere.

 

Don't as yet do this as it is a last resort, as there may be other things to try first.

However, it may be a case of going back to a reinstall of Windows, then being sure you have all the right drivers, including the drivers for the network adaptor, as a lack of drivers for that could be the issue with no internet connection.

Once you are sure about all the drivers, and they are the correct ones, then install them again.

 

Nev.

[Hutch]

Hi, unless there is definitely something wrong with the graphics card, which I actually doubt, it is pointing at a missinstall of either the Windows XP itself, or perhaps the motherboard drivers, which may be either not properly installed or perhaps not the correct ones.

 

I assume that as yet no data has been put back or at least is backed up elsewhere.

 

Don't as yet do this as it is a last resort, as there may be other things to try first.

However, it may be a case of going back to a reinstall of Windows, then being sure you have all the right drivers, including the drivers for the network adaptor, as a lack of drivers for that could be the issue with no internet connection.

Once you are sure about all the drivers, and they are the correct ones, then install them again.

 

Nev.

 

Hi Nev,

 

Thanks for your assistance. No, I haven't yet copied any of my data back from external storage as I'm still stuck with the graphics issue. I really do not think there's anything amiss with the video card itself.

 

Regarding doing a reinstall of Windows XP, I have already tried that - when I first realised there was a problem with the graphics I thought it may have been caused by a bad Windows installation so I reinstalled it. I've also reinstalled Service Pack 2. The drivers I have installed were all downloaded from Gigabyte's site, having positively identified the motherboard by reading the model number from the board itself. I have just had another try at running the SiS VGA Utilities Setup and I now get an error message that says "The system cannot detect the device, please confirm that the device is configured properly and then restart the setup program."

 

I have overcome the network connectivity issue by plugging-in an external USB wireless LAN which, although it won't connect with my BT Hub3 for some reason, does connect with a local BT WiFi hotspot so I can at least access the Internet.

 

BTW, the graphics issues I am experiencing consist of discoloured screen displays (vertical yellow streaks) and very jerky movement if I try to drag a window across the screen. Although I have refitted the video card, I haven't installed it as new hardware. When I do install it, the discolouration disappears but window dragging is still jerky. When I then reinstall the SiS AGP driver (the video card uses the AGP slot), window dragging becomes smooth again but window borders distort with movement. After a very short period of trying the graphics the mouse freezes, necessitating a 'hard' reboot, and sometimes there's a warning beep from the motherboard and the pc shuts itself down and restarts. I then get the usual MS Windows error message: "Computer restarted after an unexpected shutdown. Windows detected a possible device failure. The driver for the display device was unable to complete a drawing operation. The display driver for RADEON 9250 seems to be responsible for the system instability." The driver installed was from the video card's own disk, although I have also downloaded and installed another copy from AMD's website with the same result.

 

Cheers.

[Plastic Nev]

Hi again, this is very puzzling, so considering it all starts from the hard drive failure, lets go back to that and what exactly happened at that point.

I am a little concerned now that there is a hardware problem, but without knowing what happened when the hard drive failed, it is hard to say what.

 

Nev.

[Hutch]

Hi again, this is very puzzling, so considering it all starts from the hard drive failure, lets go back to that and what exactly happened at that point.

I am a little concerned now that there is a hardware problem, but without knowing what happened when the hard drive failed, it is hard to say what.

 

Nev.

 

OK, the problem with the previous hard drive began when I booted-up one day and got a completely blank (other than my usual background colour) desktop. I opened the Task Manager to see what was going on and found no activity. I clicked 'New Task' and opened a recent document which then resulted in the desktop being restored. A window opened which appeared to contain a string of DOS commands but I closed this and was then able to continue as normal. At this point all video performed perfectly normally. After a few days of this routine I decided that Windows XP had become corrupted and attempted a system repair. But during the repair routine the console declared that it was unable to detect a hard drive. I exited the repair routine and went for a normal reboot but BIOS also declared it was unable to detect a hard drive. I had experienced a similar problem with another pc several years ago where it turned out to be a bad boot sector on the HD, so I assumed it was the same thing here. I duly replaced the HD with a brand new unformatted drive and performed a format and fresh install of Windows XP Pro. After that was when my video problems started. I did try swapping the drives back again but once again BIOS declared it couldn't detect the old hard drive. So I assumed that the old original HD was well and truly dead and reinstalled the new drive again.

[KenB]

The pc definitely has onboard video

Take the Video Card out.

 

Try tapping F8 to get to the Advanced Startup Options - Enable VGA Mode is an option - select this.

 

Does it boot with no problems ?

[Hutch]

Take the Video Card out.

 

Try tapping F8 to get to the Advanced Startup Options - Enable VGA Mode is an option - select this.

 

Does it boot with no problems ?

 

I have removed the video card from the pc, enabled VGA Mode on startup and, yes, it does boot without any problems. The graphics are still very slow and jerky when dragging an onscreen object but otherwise appear to be reasonably stable. Prior to originally installing the video card about a year or so ago, video performance was a lot smoother than it is now. I only added the video card when I decided I wanted to run Photoshop on the machine. So I'm guessing something's not quite right with the VGA driver now.

[KenB]

Hi

 

Take the RAM modules out - give the contacts a clean with a pencil eraser - and replace just one module ( leave the other out )

 

Using the VGA option - boot up.

 

Try the other module by itself if there is no improvement.

 

Let me know the results of doing this.

 

How much RAM do you have ?

[Hutch]

Hi

 

Take the RAM modules out - give the contacts a clean with a pencil eraser - and replace just one module ( leave the other out )

 

Using the VGA option - boot up.

 

Try the other module by itself if there is no improvement.

 

Let me know the results of doing this.

 

How much RAM do you have ?

 

The computer has 2Gb of DDR333 RAM.

 

I have removed both memory modules and cleaned their contacts.

 

I have replaced one module and rebooted in VGA mode. There was no difference either way (neither better nor worse) to the video performance - still jerky.

 

I removed the first module and reinserted the second module and rebooted in VGA mode. Same result as before.

 

The only thing I haven't tried is to swap the memory modules between their respective sockets.

[KenB]

Have you tried using the XP installation disk and running a repair install ?

 

Take a look here

click here

[Hutch]

Have you tried using the XP installation disk and running a repair install ?

 

Take a look here

click here

 

Yes I have, but I'm going to try again (without video card installed)

[Hutch]

Yes I have, but I'm going to try again (without video card installed)

 

OK, I've successfully performed a Windows XP Repair, and reinstalled the SiS VGA drivers again. But this time the video performs exactly as it should do! Dragging objects across the screen is performed smoothly and with complete stability. I suspect that the VGA drivers hadn't correctly installed during previous attempts.

 

Next I will try refitting/reinstalling the video card and will report back with the outcome.

 

Thanks for your patience and perseverence!

[KenB]

Looks like we are getting somewhere :)