Video problem with new build

[Tanker]

Hi Everyone,

Here are my specs:
Apevia X-Telstar Case
Gigabyte GA-P35-Ds3R MB
EVGA 256-P2-N615-TX Geforce 7600GT 256 mb PCI Express x 16 video card
Antec NeoHE 550 ATX12v 550w Power Supply
Intel Core 2 E6750 Processor
Crucial Ballistix 2 GB DDR2 SDRAM
WD SE16 WD2500KS 250 GB Drives (2)
Lie-On 20x DVD Burner
Creative Sound Blaster SE 7.1 sound card
LG 1933TR 19 in LCD Monitor
MS Win XP Home (OEM)

My problem is poor video quality. No matter how I tweak the NVIDIA settings, small print appears "broken" and faint. In MS Flight Sim 9, the colors and objects don't appear as sharp as they were on my old Viewsonic 19 in CRT. I've tried adjusting with the monitor controls and the NVIDIA control panel.

I first installed the video drivers that came with the EVGA disk. I later downloaded and installed the latest for 7x cards from EVGA (NVIDIA shows the same driver as most current) I used Driver Sweeper and CCleaner to remove the old driver. None of this showed any improvement.

I am running the recommended resolution and frequency (1280 x 1024 and 60 Hz).

I switched out to a 17 in CRT I had on hand and lowered the resolution (1024 x 768) and this showed a slight improvement, but not as good as it was on my ancient DEll.

Do I have a bad video card? Is there something I missed in the BIOS?

The PC booted up with no errors and the OS loaded without a hitch. Case temperatures are around 32 C.

Any suggestions would be most welcome.

Tanker

[Lespaul20]

Is the LCD new and known to be good?

[Cricket]

Originally Posted by Tanker Do I have a bad video card?

It''s a possibility. Do you have access to another video card you can swap in to test with?

Cricket

[Tanker]

Originally Posted by Lespaul20 Is the LCD new and known to be good?

Yes, the LCD is new, but I suppose that doesn't mean it
s proven to be good. I think I will try swapping it out with the Viewsonic on my old system and see how it does.

Tanker

[Tanker]

Originally Posted by Cricket It''s a possibility. Do you have access to another video card you can swap in to test with? Cricket

The only thing I have is an ancient TI4600, which probably won't provide the required resolution.

Tanker

[pam123]

Does that LCD monitor have a driver ?

[glc]

A Ti4600 can output 1280x1024 without even breaking a sweat. However, it's AGP and won't fit in that motherboard.

[Katreat]

Test the monitor on your other computer. If you dont have another system to test the video card you might shop around for a local shop that will do it for you. I had to test an AGP vidoe card once and think they charged me like $10 to put it in a system and load up the drivers to see if it was working. It worked perfectly and I got some free instructions on how to take the old drivers off my computer to get it to work at home.

Kat

[Tanker]

Originally Posted by pam123 Does that LCD monitor have a driver ?

Yes, I loaded the driver from the disk that came with the monitor. Checking the monitor in the control panel, it shows the driver as LG, version 1.3.0.0.

Tanker

[Tanker]

Here's an update: I connected the LCD monitor to my old system (P4 2.55 ghz, Radeon 9800 Pro AGP) and it looks quite good. The only adjustments I made was to set the resolution rate to the monitor default.

I hooked the old monitor (Viewsonic G90f 19 in CRT) to the new system, and it looks darker and images are less well defined. I'm taking this to mean the monitor is ok and the problem is with the video card, the motherboard, or some setting I haven't yet figured out.

Here's perhaps a dumb question - should the LCD monitor on the new system be EGA or VGA? The BIOS section of the Build it Yourself Guide indicates I should set it in the CMOS, but I never found an option for it.

Tanker

[glc]

That CMOS setting went away years ago.

At this point I'd exchange the video card.

[Tanker]

Well, I took the video card over to a local shop. They will run tests on it tonight, should have the results back tomorrow. It cost me $15 but I don't have any other way of checking it. I'll post the results.

tanker

[Tanker]

The Video card checked out ok. Apparantly, the monitor and the graphics card are simply not a good match, so I returned the monitor and went back to my Viewsonic G90f CRT. It's big and bulky, but it displays small detail quite well.

I still want an LCD monitor, but I'm limited to an 18.5 x 18.5 size because of my computer hutch, so a widescreen is out.

Tanker

[Lespaul20]

A 19" will fit, my 20" is 18.75" wide so a 20" will be close depending on what brand you look at.