video card issues

[Shane]

Hi all, hopefully posting this to several groups isn't a problem. My parents
have an old dell from maybe 6 years ago, and their display recently started
getting vertical lines through it, so I assumed that the video card had
gone. I got a new one and threw it in (a better card than the one they had,
went from 16MB to 32), and I cannot get the OS to recognize it. It's an agp
card in an agp slot.

When I downloaded the driver for the card (ATI 128 Rage pro), I install them
no problem, but then it gives me an error wherein it states the "driver does
not support the display adapter." Irritating for sure. I then tried a bunch
of other video cards of varying types and MB, and it's always the same;
Windows refuses outright to see that there is a card there, so it only
allows me 16 colors and 600x480 screen res. I have NO idea why this is, and
any help or insight here would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!




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[Richard G. Harper]

Is their prior video card an onboard (built into the motherboard) adapter?
If so did you disable it prior to adding the new card?
--
Richard G. Harper [MVP Shell/User] ***@gmail.com
* In fond memory ... Alex, you shall be sorely missed
* http://www.aumha.org/alex.htm

Post by Shane
Hi all, hopefully posting this to several groups isn't a problem. My
parents have an old dell from maybe 6 years ago, and their display
recently started getting vertical lines through it, so I assumed that the
video card had gone. I got a new one and threw it in (a better card than
the one they had, went from 16MB to 32), and I cannot get the OS to
recognize it. It's an agp card in an agp slot.
When I downloaded the driver for the card (ATI 128 Rage pro), I install
them no problem, but then it gives me an error wherein it states the
"driver does not support the display adapter." Irritating for sure. I then
tried a bunch of other video cards of varying types and MB, and it's
always the same; Windows refuses outright to see that there is a card
there, so it only allows me 16 colors and 600x480 screen res. I have NO
idea why this is, and any help or insight here would be greatly
appreciated.
Thanks!
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.859 / Virus Database: 585 - Release Date: 14/02/2005

[Jeff Richards]

If this system hasn't used an AGP card before then you may have to enable or
adjust AGP settings in BIOS setup.

Post by Shane
Hi all, hopefully posting this to several groups isn't a problem. My
parents have an old dell from maybe 6 years ago, and their display
recently started getting vertical lines through it, so I assumed that the
video card had gone. I got a new one and threw it in (a better card than
the one they had, went from 16MB to 32), and I cannot get the OS to
recognize it. It's an agp card in an agp slot.
When I downloaded the driver for the card (ATI 128 Rage pro), I install
them no problem, but then it gives me an error wherein it states the
"driver does not support the display adapter." Irritating for sure. I then
tried a bunch of other video cards of varying types and MB, and it's
always the same; Windows refuses outright to see that there is a card
there, so it only allows me 16 colors and 600x480 screen res. I have NO
idea why this is, and any help or insight here would be greatly
appreciated.
Thanks!
---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.859 / Virus Database: 585 - Release Date: 14/02/2005

[Galen]

Post by Shane
Hi all, hopefully posting this to several groups isn't a problem. My
parents have an old dell from maybe 6 years ago, and their display
recently started getting vertical lines through it, so I assumed that
the video card had gone. I got a new one and threw it in (a better
card than the one they had, went from 16MB to 32), and I cannot get
the OS to recognize it. It's an agp card in an agp slot.
When I downloaded the driver for the card (ATI 128 Rage pro), I
install them no problem, but then it gives me an error wherein it
states the "driver does not support the display adapter." Irritating
for sure. I then tried a bunch of other video cards of varying types
and MB, and it's always the same; Windows refuses outright to see
that there is a card there, so it only allows me 16 colors and
600x480 screen res. I have NO idea why this is, and any help or
insight here would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Well, everyone else has added their thoughts. You state 32 MB VRAM. Yet the
card is 128...

Couple of thoughts on this. Does the AGP slot support the 6x or 8x card that
you have? If not then there may be jumpers on the card to slow it down. I
could be way off base and I'm not too sure of the math but I *think* you
need (need??? subject to being wrong on this one but I thought I'd throw
this out there so that if I'm wrong I can learn too) at least 4x for that.
Your MOBO is quite old and may only be 2x which means that the most you
could probably support would be 32 MB VRAM??? I'm really not at all sure
about this as I'm not really into graphics all that much. In other words I
think that the 128 might refer to the VRAM (video RAM) and that your
motherboard simply may not support it. Many video cards have jumpers on them
(though you might be able to control this in a limited fashion through the
BIOS as has been clued to you already by Jeff) which will allow you to set
the speed back down to what the motherboard can handle.

Again, I might be completely off base with this one but I thought I'd thow
it out there as an idea for you to check. As for the monitor going all funny
it could have been something so easy as an update killing it (unlikely) or
the drivers having become corrupted (more likely.) It could even be
something as basic as the monitor has reached the end of it's useful life
span and is to be no more which is not unheard of though I've monitors which
have seemingly lasted forever here.

Galen

[Shane]

Reply below....

Post by Galen

Post by Shane
Hi all, hopefully posting this to several groups isn't a problem. My
parents have an old dell from maybe 6 years ago, and their display
recently started getting vertical lines through it, so I assumed that
the video card had gone. I got a new one and threw it in (a better
card than the one they had, went from 16MB to 32), and I cannot get
the OS to recognize it. It's an agp card in an agp slot.
When I downloaded the driver for the card (ATI 128 Rage pro), I
install them no problem, but then it gives me an error wherein it
states the "driver does not support the display adapter." Irritating
for sure. I then tried a bunch of other video cards of varying types
and MB, and it's always the same; Windows refuses outright to see
that there is a card there, so it only allows me 16 colors and
600x480 screen res. I have NO idea why this is, and any help or
insight here would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Well, everyone else has added their thoughts. You state 32 MB VRAM. Yet
the card is 128...
Couple of thoughts on this. Does the AGP slot support the 6x or 8x card
that you have? If not then there may be jumpers on the card to slow it
down. I could be way off base and I'm not too sure of the math but I
*think* you need (need??? subject to being wrong on this one but I thought
I'd throw this out there so that if I'm wrong I can learn too) at least 4x
for that. Your MOBO is quite old and may only be 2x which means that the
most you could probably support would be 32 MB VRAM??? I'm really not at
all sure about this as I'm not really into graphics all that much. In
other words I think that the 128 might refer to the VRAM (video RAM) and
that your motherboard simply may not support it. Many video cards have
jumpers on them (though you might be able to control this in a limited
fashion through the BIOS as has been clued to you already by Jeff) which
will allow you to set the speed back down to what the motherboard can
handle.
Again, I might be completely off base with this one but I thought I'd thow
it out there as an idea for you to check. As for the monitor going all
funny it could have been something so easy as an update killing it
(unlikely) or the drivers having become corrupted (more likely.) It could
even be something as basic as the monitor has reached the end of it's
useful life span and is to be no more which is not unheard of though I've
monitors which have seemingly lasted forever here.
Galen
--
Signature changed for a moment of silence.
Rest well Alex and we'll see you on the other side.

Thanks for all the help gents, the answers are much appreciated. However,
the funniest thing happened. I had resigned myself to going over and doing
either soem hardware work or reinstalling win98, but when I sat down, I
decided to just reboot a few times for the hell of it. On the third reboot,
everything was fine. Card was recognized, exactly as it should have gone in
the first place. Saved me some work anyway.

Galen, in response to your post: the card itself does have 32 MB of VRAM,
but the logo on the card says "powered by ATI 128 Rage PRO," which I thought
was a bit misleading also. I guess it was their then name for the graphics
engine, but is not an indicator (for this particular card anyway) of amount
of VRAM on the card itself. Anyway, the problem seems to have resolved
itself. When in doubt, reboot!

Thanks all.

[Galen]

In news:Bwl6e.4870$***@news1.mts.net,
Shane <***@yahoo.com> had this to say:

My reply is at the bottom of your sent message:

<snip>

Post by Shane
Galen, in response to your post: the card itself does have 32 MB of
VRAM, but the logo on the card says "powered by ATI 128 Rage PRO,"
which I thought was a bit misleading also. I guess it was their then
name for the graphics engine, but is not an indicator (for this
particular card anyway) of amount of VRAM on the card itself. Anyway,
the problem seems to have resolved itself. When in doubt, reboot!
Thanks all.

Rebooting does do some interesting things at times. Maybe it was just having
a difficult time loading the drivers. I'm rather amused that the card would
say 128 in the title yet be only a 32 MB VRAM card. It's definately
misleading. I haven't purchased a new ATI in a very long time. I've been
sticking with nVidia for quite some time. Glad to hear that it worked for
you and that it's all good. I can't explain why it did that but I suspect it
was just being a problematic driver (or software) installation.

Galen