Nvidia Geforce 9800 GT Mystery

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Grantthejester

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I recently upgraded my motherboard to the XFX geforce 8200 motherboard, switched over my old hard drives to the new case, and reinstalled windows XP. Everything was running fine until I decided to add a vid card.

MOTHER BOARD: Geforce 8200
Vid Interface: PCIe2
Vid Card: GEforce 9800 Gt
OS: WIndows XP Pro

Here's what happened. I installed the vid card, plugged it in and booted up the computer. I get the bios screen and the windows loading bar and on the first occasion I got windows to load in it's absolute lowest resolution. So I installed the necessary drivers, it asked me to restart my computer, so I did. This time just after the windows loading bar, all I get is a blank screen. I know windows is loading because I can type in my password and hear it come on, I just can't see anything.

I then resolved to take out the vid card, and reboot, and the system starts up and functions normally, but I can't do any gaming. I wiped clean all the old video drivers with Driver Sweeper. Got online, found the most recent driver set, installed that, installed directx 10, reinstalled my monitor drivers just for kicks. I also went into the bios and made sure that the PCIe 2 slot was set up as a video priority and made to recognize second generation cards.

I then put the card back in, booted it up, and got that same black screen. I can get to windows in safe mode, which leads me to believe this is a definite driver problem.

When I do get windows to load, not is safe mode, it is always at it's lowest resolution and when I go into control panel it doesn't recognize that the card is there, it also won't recognize my monitor or allow me to adjust the graphics settings to a higher resolution.

Recently I redownloaded the latest driver for the card from the Nvidia Website and installed it, now I consistently get a black screen instead of the Windows logon.

Can anyone help me out here?
 
Chipset drivers installed? Hard to tell what you did since you don't describe it!

:)
 
first you need to uninstall the card use the onboard video to go in and uninstall the nvidia drivers, then restart the computer go into the bios and disable the onboard video there might also be a setting for making the pci-e slot the primary display then save and shutdown. Install the 9800 and the turn the computer back on install the new drivers and restart the computer for good measure when it restarts you should be good. another thing to look at is that you might need to change which port your plugging the monitor in on the video card.
 
Make sure you're using the stock drives from nVidia.

I encountered an issue with an Asus 7300GT and LogMeIn.
The drivers from Asus would install an extra driver - when LogMeIn was installed, the PC would boot but the screen would go blank once it booted into Windows.

Removed the Asus drivers, installed the stock nVidia drivers, been working fine ever since.
 
On my recent attempts to get this working I managed to consistently get windows to load and show up with no drivers installed, but as I install the new drivers I've downloaded from the NVidia website, the screen goes black, right in the middle of installation. It does this same thing with the drivers on the disk which came with the video card.

That last theory posted makes a lot of sense. Is there anyway to determine which other drivers are giving my system problems? I'm just about at my wits end with this driver situation.
 
Check if Windows reports any problem devices
  • Click Start->Run, enter: msinfo32
  • Click the + sign next to Components to expand it
  • Click Problem Devices. Anything appear?
  • If yes, click on it, then Edit->Select All, Edit->Copy Paste into next post
Generate a DirectX report
  • click Start->Run, enter dxdiag
  • Notice progress in lower left window corner
  • When done, click Save Information button and save to your Desktop
  • In TechSpot, use the paper clip icon to attach the reports. (If you don't see icon you may need to first cick Go Advanced)
 
had this exact problem

i had this problem too. it turned out that my power supply wasn't giving it power. if this is the card i think it is (with the extra power cable). try making sure that is well connected before doing anything more complex.
 
Here's the directX Diagnosis file.

I double checked my power supply and it is functioning properly.
 

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  • DxDiag.txt
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Do you have the 6-pin PCI-E power connector plugged into the card? If it is, can you try another connector, if your PSU has one?

And how did you check the PSU?

Grantthejester said:
I then resolved to take out the vid card, and reboot, and the system starts up and functions normally, but I can't do any gaming.
What did you mean by this? You mean you cannot start any games or does something else happen while running the game or attempting to start it?
 
The DirectX report shows your video drivers are are loaded BUT driver to allow control of video RAM is not installed!
Code:
     Name: PCI standard RAM Controller
Device ID: PCI\VEN_10DE&DEV_0751&SUBSYS_CB8410DE&REV_A1\3&267A616A&0&0A
Check for any chipset drivers for your motherboard or if nvidia offers these separate from the video driver
 
Do you have the 6-pin PCI-E power connector plugged into the card? If it is, can you try another connector, if your PSU has one?

And how did you check the PSU?


What did you mean by this? You mean you cannot start any games or does something else happen while running the game or attempting to start it?

My PSU has two PCIe Power connectors and I've tested both of them with a volt meter and made sure that they were putting out adequate voltage.

Also because of the onboard graphics games will start, but they run so slowly there is really no point.
 
Grantthejester said:
My PSU has two PCIe Power connectors and I've tested both of them with a volt meter and made sure that they were putting out adequate voltage.
The voltage is not what you need to check. The current is what matters, since the +12V voltage will not deviate more than 10% from 12V (with little or no load applied). The current determines the total power on each individual rail, so check that enough power is being supplied on each rail.

Also, DX10 is for Vista only. You might be better off trying a clean install of XP and then installing the latest version of DirectX for it from Microsoft's website, along with the drivers for your card.
 
The voltage is not what you need to check. The current is what matters, since the +12V voltage will not deviate more than 10% from 12V (with little or no load applied). The current determines the total power on each individual rail, so check that enough power is being supplied on each rail.

Also, DX10 is for Vista only. You might be better off trying a clean install of XP and then installing the latest version of DirectX for it from Microsoft's website, along with the drivers for your card.

Should one still to focused on exploring power problems/solutions upon there's no driver installed to provide video RAM access?
=> Don't you need to fix that first? Aside from video RAM access being critical, sounds like it might cause other errors which are really just side-effects on the one error.
 
Agreed, but I try to cover all avenues. Power delivery is something not many people think of as a cause, since most assume the PSU is delivering enough power.

As for the VRAM access, that is non-significant, since the diagnostic log has been generated with the onboard graphics activated, which do not need this driver AFAIK.

Grantthejester said:
I then resolved to take out the vid card, and reboot, and the system starts up and functions normally, but I can't do any gaming. I wiped clean all the old video drivers with Driver Sweeper. Got online, found the most recent driver set, installed that, installed directx 10, reinstalled my monitor drivers just for kicks. I also went into the bios and made sure that the PCIe 2 slot was set up as a video priority and made to recognize second generation cards.

I then put the card back in, booted it up, and got that same black screen. I can get to windows in safe mode, which leads me to believe this is a definite driver problem.
From what I understand, the drivers for the onboard video have been installed via Windows, but after doing this you are trying to boot with the card. This will cause problems since the drivers installed do not correspond to the card. You need to remove the drivers for the onboard graphics, reboot and insert the card, then boot using the card and install the drivers.

Grantthejester said:
I know windows is loading because I can type in my password and hear it come on, I just can't see anything.
The reason you can hear everything is because Windows has just booted recognizing the onboard graphics as the primary display adapter. If you switch your monitor over to the onboard card during this black screen, you should probably be able to get a display.
 
Oddly enough when i switch back to the on board graphics slot, when the card is installed, it is still black, not that that solves much of the puzzle at this point.

I think I may just reinstall windows and start over. It seems that if guerrilla warfare isnt working I should switch to napalm.
 
I've dried disabling the onboard graphics, both in the bios and in the device manager. I've uninstalled and reinstalled the drivers in every sort of scenario with every sort of configuration. I've installed things in safe mode, I've disabled all other non essential programs and processes and I've exhausted all of my will to do any more trouble shooting. The next time I put that damned card back in, it is either going to work, or I will probably jump out my window.
 
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