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rtm214

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Cant install NVIDIA AGP driver

My ABIT NF7S2 mobo uses the NForce2 chipset and has an AGP slot.
I have been running it with an ATI Radeon 7000 AGP just fine.(I thought)
Now I bought an ATI AIW 9600XT which however will not install.
Evidentally my ATI Radeon 7000 was running in PCI mode not AGP -BUT- the AIW will not run at all - wont even show the BIOS screen on boot and no beep.
The AIW manual states that you MUST have the VGART driver from the Chipset maker installed prior to installing the card or you will have just a black screeen on boot (and they are right).
I tested the AIW in another box and it ran fine.(AGP controller was under System Devices in D/Manager as it should.)
I removed all other cards to avoid conflicts.
My BIOS is set for AGP enabled.
My problem is that I have D/Loaded and run the latest Nvidia driver set ver 5.10 which includes the AGP driver BUT when I look in Device Manager there is no listing for AGP Controller under System Devices (or anywhere else)
I removed all the old NVDIA drivers through "add/remove hardware" and then ran DriverCleaner to get rid of any traces.
Still the new NVIDIA AGP driver refuses to install - when I run the installer it appears to install but nothing shows up in
Device Manager indicating that the AGP controller is installed.

What do I have to do to get the NVIDIA AGP controller (driver?) installed ?

Hope you can help.

Bob

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Abit NF7S2
AMD Athalon 1800 XP
XP S/P1
ATI AIW 9600 XT
2 x 256 Kingston Hyperx PC3200
2 x 80 mb WD 8MB H/D
1 x 160 mb Maxtor 8MB H/D
SBLive 5.1
Samsung D/L DVD RW
Antec 300w p/s
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mysticaldan
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Is the graphics card fine? Hope its not a bad card as can happen. Try it on another system just in case.

Your AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) connector supports AGP 8X/4X (0.8V/1.5V) so it shudnt be a problem.

Your graphcics card is compatible with AGP 8X (0.8V)/4X (1.5V) slot so thats also fine with the specefications. The only thing remaining is the AGP port and the BIOS if the ATI card is not dead.

Try and update your BIOS from http://www.abit-usa.com/products/mb/bios.php?categories=1&model=204

Make sure that the version isthe same as ur board. This BIOS version is for NF7-S2 only. Note: NF7-S2 is not equivalent to NF7-S v2.0.

After ur done with that. Set the motherboard settings to OPTIMAL and then see. Optionally you can try to reset the BIOS also and see if that helps. SOmetimes the board is set for a particular voltage and graphics card so it can be a problem. Also if you have an onboard graphics card make sure its disabled from the BIOS. Its possible earlier u were using the PCI card while now the AGP onboard interferes with the ATI.

Dan
and also make sure in you bios that pci/agp is set as the init
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Watzman

ATI has two removal tools that you should download and run first, since your old card was also an ATI card.  They are catalyst-uninstaller.exe and smargart-uninstall.exe, both available on the ATI web site in the "utilities" section.  I'd remove these with the old card in place (use the catalyst uninstaller first), then shut down, remove the old card, install the new card, and see if you can boot up and get a vga screen (640x480 16 colors).  If not, put back the old card, but do not reinstall the drivers, then reinstall the NVidia NForce chipset drivers.  I can't guarantee that this will work, but it's how I'd proceed.
Also when rebooting use Safemode F8 just to make sure the VGA driver gets loaded.
You have to get the latest drivers from the web on this.  I had to for the NFORCE2 on another ASUS motherboard.  And despite what people might say, it is NOT as easy as you think to remove the older NFORCE2 drivers  -- it requires a lot of system level and registry surgery.  A clean install may be needed, but let's hope not, in your case.  Follow the normal procedure for totally removing the drivers from your system (must eliminate the INF files for this) and with the new drivers already extracted, reboot and try reinstalling from the new location.  With add on cards, there can be significant bus/irq conflicts too.
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stockhes

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*UPDATE* I installed a new 400w P/S and voila it booted immediataly with the new ATI card.
In fact it not only booted it stayed alive even after Windows loaded - but - it still isnt running in AGP mode and the AGP driver still refuses to install.
I will be following thru on the other suggestions re: the BIOS and voltages and removing prior drivers.
Thanks for the help so far - I will update you further
You can use Driver Cleaner : http://www.drivercleaner.net/ to remove the previous versions of the drivers after u have run the uninstallers just to make sure any previous remains of the drivers have been removed.

Once thats done get the latest drivers for ur new card and install them. I am sure the drivers shud take care of the AGP mode. You might wanna make sure that the AGP aperture size in the BIOS is at least twice your RAM on the video card to ensure maximum AGP compatibility. You can increase it further if you like. Also make sure that enhanced functions relating to the graphics part are enabled from BIOS. I dont see any reason why it shud work in PCI mode.

Dan



Hi Dan

One issue solved.

Next is driver thing

First thing to try is "add hardware wizard"
and see if anything is found, I don't think it will work with XP, but sometimes with Win98/ME it does.

Did you ever reset your BIOS ?

 
This is something that sometimes prevents driver installation, but normally you get a fault code/message
But its easy checked.

Its something about your registry regarding your GFX/chipset drivers has become restricted not letting you install new drivers.

Perhaps lets check it manually

__snip ___

The steps to configure the Windows Registry are provided AS IS and are NOT supported.
We strongly advise that you backup your system and any important data.

For more information, please see Description of the Microsoft Windows Registry.

To backup the Windows Registry,
Click START, select RUN, and type "REGEDIT"
From the menu bar, choose 'Registry', then 'Export'. Save the registry backup file to your desktop. Double-clicking the saved file will allow you to reverse any incorrect changes made to the registry.
To perform the changes,
Click on the (+) icon next to the word "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE"
Click on the (+) icon next to the word "Software"
Right click on the "NVIDIA Corporation" registry key
Select Permissions
Check Allow "Full Control"
Click Apply and reinstall the Nvidia software (forceware)
Close down the Registry, and restart the system to complete the changes.

end snip -----------


You could check for ATi as well