GeForce 4 not working.... Help plz

[Bossman]

I have an HP Pavilion 8590c with a P3 600mhz proc, 256 ram. Used to have a voodoo 3 card.

I bought a new GeForce 4 Ti4200 64 mg video card and a new 350 watt power supply. Went through the installation manual for the GeForce card, but when I reboot the computer, it freezes up on me almost instantly.

Any help?

Thanks,

B

[NUTNDUN]

Well good thing is the pc boots up, might wanna check the bios settings, when you first boot the pc keep pressing the delete key until the bios settings screen comes up and just double check all of the settings. Is the video card agp or pci?

[Bossman]

It didn't really boot. I'd get as far as the computer loading the icons and it would freeze. Yes it's an agp. I spoke with the techs at PNY.

They had me disable a bunch of stuff.... to no avail. They said it could be one of three things.

1. mobo doesn't "like the new card"
2. WIN ME "sucks for gamers, and may be the problem"
3. Bad video card.

The mobo may be the culprit, as I don't know which version agp I have and the video card requires agp 2.0. Any way to find out? (I tried HP, and they were no help as it's thrid party hardware)

Also, in the trouble shooting section of the video cards install manual, it says to change some bios settings. When the computer is booting it says on the bottom to press F1 to enter setup. When I do that, it looks like I entered the bios screen, but there's no settings like what they're talking about, such as PNP OS=NO or Assign IRQ to VGA.

[DreamCaster]

Greetings Bossman
I'm going to assume that your old voodoo card was PCI. I did some checking on my wife's system (she also has a Pavillion PIII 600, though not "exactly" the same) and sure enough, there were settings for both pnp OS and also a default primary video adaptor. What I'm not sure of is if you've got the same type of bios chip that she does. This is what I saw:

At the top of the screen it says:
Award Bios Setup Utility

Your choices under that are:
Main Advanced Power Boot Exit

In the advanced screen (use the arrow keys to navigate here) you should see the 2 choices on the left side about mid-screen. You should have the option to change your Default Primary Video Adaptor to AGP.

Hope this helps

~Peace
DC

[Bossman]

Just to add, I've been thinking of building a new PC. The trouble with the video card is just increasing that thinking.

I've looked at pricewatch to give me an idea of the costs, but came to a realization: None of the motherboards shown indicate which version AGP they use. I'll see things like AGP4x, AGP8x but have no idea if they're AGP 2.0, 1.0...... Ahh, my brain hurts. lol.

I was thinking at the bottom of the price range, getting something like an AMD 1900XP, but this motherboard stuff has me confused.

Any ideas as to how to figure out if the AGP port is compatible with the video card? (PNY GeForce 4 Ti 4200 64mb ddr) Or which boards have the right AGP?

Sorry about the newbie questions, but the last time I upgraded a video card, it was to a Voodoo 3 and that was a piece of cake!

Thanks for any help you can give.

Boss

[Bossman]

Hi Dream,

The Voodoo was an AGP card. I saw the area where you can change the port to VGA and that has been enabled. My HP also came with an onbaord video card. HP said to disable that I just had to eliminate that card in the Device Manager area, that there were no jumpers on the board itself.

PNY thinks this may not be the case, but I cn't find any jumpers on the board that are labled as jumpers for the video settings.


PS: I have the voodoo in again so I can actually use the computer, so I know the AGP port is working at least.


Thanks again for the help

Boss

[Bossman]

PS, mine at boot says Pheonix Bios

Boss

[DreamCaster]

Originally posted by Bossman
Sorry about the newbie questions, but the last time I upgraded a video card, it was to a Voodoo 3 and that was a piece of cake!

Thanks for any help you can give.

Boss

No problemo
This sort of stuff is why we're here
I'll see if I can dig up some more info on what's compatable here for your card and also try and straighten out this agp business

[Bossman]

I appreciate the help.

On a side note: I took a look at my motherboard to try to determine the manufacturer, hoping to get an idea from their website.

The board has ASUS printed on one of the chips with a long string of numbers, but it doesn't list it on the website.

Talking with HP, they say its a Harrier motherboard, but I can't find them anywhere.

My thinking is, if it's indeed an ASUS, they (HP) may be giving me incorrect info on how to disable the on board video, and that may be the problem.

Boss

[DreamCaster]

Ok Bossman, I've come across a few things here. The first is a link from the HP support site that refers to adding another video card to certain models with an on-board video chipset. I know your model is not listed here, but you may want to check this out anyway.
-click me-

Next up is an article I came across on a similar subject which may shed some light for you
-clickety click-

And finally an explanation of AGP version specs
-link-

As far as a board recommendation goes, I'd say based on what the agp specs say that a board that supports 4x or greater should work with your card. As far as manufacturer goes, my preferences are Abit or Asus

Keep us posted on what happens

~Peace
DC

[Bossman]

Ok, between your searching and mine, here's what I come up with:

HP renames their mobo's why I don't know. The mobo is called a harrier but is made by ASUS. By the time HP gets done with it though there's little resemblance. So, ASUS doesn't list HP boards as their own.

Seems my AGP port will support up to a 4x video card but is only 1.0 compliant (GF4 requires 2.0)

Which is where the problem is coming in. GF4 is NOT backward compatible, so I need an AGP port that is 2.0 or higher, which means a new mobo (and case, and while I'm at it, new proc, new mem, new cd drive. lol, wife should love this. I'm gonna build a new computer!!)

Now to figure out which boards have the 2.0 AGP port.

Thanks for all the help.

Boss

[NUTNDUN]

Not trying to pimp anything from our site either but if and when you want to look for hardware check out our price checking site, pretty much same idea as pricewatch but better I think, you can check it out here

[Bossman]

Ok,

Here's the question I can't seem to answer:

Why doesn't the info on the boards listed include which version AGP it has? They'll say AGP4x, AGP8x, but rarely will they say if it's an AGP 2.0 slot, an AGP PRO slot. etc.

How the heck are you supposed to tell if the slot will accept what you're putting into it? For instance, the computer I'm using now will support up to AGP4x, but has an AGP1.0 slot, so my GF4 will not work in it. (although it fits. lol)

The only boards I've found that list which AGP slot they have are the SOYO Dragon boards.

Any help in fuguring this out?

Boss

[DreamCaster]

A sure fire way would be to contact the manufacturer of the mobo that you're interested in for a definate answer if it's not listed. I'd say that any of the latest athlon xp boards are at least 2.0 compliant. Also, try a search for mobo reviews or comparisons (anandtech, tom's hardware, etc...) to try and narrow your choices down and get the best bang for your buck

You could also try and contact pny about it and ask them if they have a list of "approved" mainboards for their product

[Bossman]

Here's the mobo I've been thinking about to solve my problems with the video card. Any suggestions:

Albatron KX400+Pro W/2100 AMD cpu

There are others out there like ASUS cards with the nforce chipset, but they're still expensive. The albatron combo is only 175 and the details listed on tigerdirect state its has a 2.0 compliant AGP slot running up to 4x speed.

Thanks for the help.

Boss