Driver and AGP problems.

[Farflame]

Couple of probs, need any advice please.

1) I have a GF4 ti4200. When I install the drivers from the CD, it gives me some older drivers. I've downloaded the latest ones from Nvidea, and although they appear to install properly, the driver version never updates. And I'm getting pretty crappy 3dmark results, worse than I was getting with a lesser 3d card.

2) How do you alter AGP settings? My mobo can go to 4xAGP and my 3d card has 8xAGP, but as far as I can tell I'm running at 0x (at least, that's what 3dmark reports). How can I check or alter the AGP settings? It says in the manual that I can do it from CMOS but there are no options in my CMOS.

Any advice appreciated.

System info. P4 1700, 512mb RAM, Windows ME, GF4 ti4200, 28.8gb hd.

[ktkendall]

Yes you should find options in your BIOS, thats what is meant by CMOS.. I assume you understood that though, and have been into your bios, check around in there again cause the settings are in there,, I think usually under advanced chipset page...

Also what Motherboard have you got, and did you install all the proper MOBO drivers, like the via 4in1 if you have via chipset???

[Farflame]

Well, can't say I'm an expert on BIOS stuff, but I did get into the BIOS and looked around every screen and there's no mention of AGP anywhere. I do have the very latest mobo drivers, but I'm not sure what this 4 in 1 stuff is. The mobo is brand new, it's a Matsonic MS9327E+(USB) and definately supports AGP 4x. It has flash BIOS stuff, but I dunno how to do that either.

Any idea about the driver problem? Is there any way of totally clearing old drivers from the computer, because it seems that if you uninstall them, they stay there anyway. When I uninstall the latest driver, then try to install it again, it just says I'm overwriting a file that already exists, yet Windows won't update to that version. Admittedly I've been tinkering with the drivers alot and have probably caused this problem myself.

[Alienware_Dude]

Did you un-install the previous drivers through the Add/Remove Programs applet?

[ktkendall]

It depends upon the chipset that your motherboard has. I just used the via 4in1 as an example but there should have been a disk with the board that has the chipset drivers, mant times those nees to be installed to realize the full potential of the board...Also especially since you say your board has an agp slot and supports 4x ther should be settings in the BIOS for 4x or 2x and along in there should be settings pertaining to AGP....

[ktkendall]

I looked here:
http://www.matsonic.com.tw/eng/produ...s9327e+usb.htm
and it shows onboard graphics comes with that board so did you disable it, that should also be done in the BIOS....
That could be the problem why your new AGP card isn't fully realized because the settings are not optimized for that card yet since it probably comes with settings optimized for the onboard graphics and maybe that is why you don't see the settings for agp slot cause the onboard is not yet disabled... Just a thought...

Also, that board has SIS chipset so sis drivers for agp may need to be installed...If you chech device manager you may also get a clue if everything is installed proper.. Do you see something refering to AGP in device manager under system...

[Farflame]

Yes, under device manager I have 'SIS Accelerated Graphics Port' and it reports no problems, but still no sign of AGP in BIOS. Is there another way to check if the AGP is being utilised?

Haven't checked for the onboard graphics, I didn't even know about that. I'll try disabling it and see what happens.......

[Farflame]

Well, I did find something in BIOS that said 'Primary Graphics Adapter' and it was set to PCI, but also had an AGP setting. So I changed it to AGP, but it's made no difference and I'm still getting poor 3dmark results. There are still no other options in BIOS to change AGP to 2x or 4x. I've just reinstalled the very latest AGP drivers for my motherboard and it makes no difference.

Could it be detecting it automatically? 3dmark still says 0x AGP, so I'm assuming it's not working. It's kinda frustrating having two pieces of hardware that support this, but being unable to utilise it. How much difference would 4x AGP make? Is it just a tiny difference, or very noticeable?

[ktkendall]

Yes 4x should make quite a difference, but are you actualy experiencing any real problems when gaming or with other apps?? Could it be that the software your benchmarking with is not reading correctly?? Other than latest drivers in windows and being sure the SIS drives for AGP are in and being sure BIOS is optimized settings for the hardware you actually are running then after all that my only next thought would be defective vid card perhaps...Sounds like that board is going to use autodetect for that card since you can not find even a setting for 4x or 2x.. Did you see anything in there (The BIOS), called graphics arpreture?

There should also have been a settting to set the amount of shared mamory for that onboard graphics, and you would definately want to disable that, Maybe your board doesn't have the onboard graphics but if so i believe that is causing the problem...Did you just upgrade the graphics from using the onboard to the new GFti. perhaps give a little more backround on this PC...

[Farflame]

Well, it's working absolutely fine, but I expected to get better 3D fps than this. I'm having no problems with any games or apps, it's not crashing or anything. I was just hoping to tweak it further, and the AGP seems to not be working. 3dMark still says 0x AGP, so either it's not working, or 3dMark can't detect it.

I've managed to fix the driver problem - there was an option to ignore the warning about the uncertified driver, so I did that and it's working fine now. So I have the latest Nvidea drivers, and that boosted my 3dMark by 100 points.

The only issue now is the AGP. As you say, perhaps it's working and there's just no visible sign of that. It seems likely that it is using autodetect, since there are no BIOS options. It would be nice to know for sure though.

There is an option to alter the shared memory for the onboard graphics, so I'll try putting that down later - it can't be disabled, but it does have a much lower setting so I'll see if that has any effect. Apparently changing the Primary Graphics Adapter setting to AGP does disable the onboard graphics. I did that but it didn't make any noticeable difference.

Anyway, thanks for your help, I think it's probably fine now. I'll try to look around for ways to detect/alter my AGP settings, but hopefully it really is autodetecting them.

[ktkendall]

Were you using the onboard Graphics and have now upgraded?? Since the onboard can not be disabled in the bIOS which is a common trait among some MOBOs with onboard graphics and they pretty much just use autodetect, I would check windows device manager and under display adapters see if both are present, and if so I would highlight the old one and go into properties and disable it there...

[Farflame]

No, I was never using the onboard graphics alone, although I have upgraded from one graphics card to another. Infact, I sent this card back to be fixed, put it an old one, then put this one back in again, but I've always had a gfx card in the system.

There's only one display adapter listed and that's my gfx card. As far as I can tell from the mobo manual, the onboard graphics either supports the main card, or does nothing. I think that switching it to AGP totally disables it, but I'll try knocking down the shared memory aswell.

I'm getting 1350 3d marks, which is ok really, and games run fine, but I want to tweak it for some games because it's performing badly on some. Considering I have a P4 1700, 512mb RAM and a 128mb GF4, I was expecting alot more, but maybe I was expecting too much!

[ktkendall]

Originally posted by Farflame No, I was never using the onboard graphics alone, although I have upgraded from one graphics card to another. Infact, I sent this card back to be fixed, put it an old one, then put this one back in again, but I've always had a gfx card in the system. There's only one display adapter listed and that's my gfx card. As far as I can tell from the mobo manual, the onboard graphics either supports the main card, or does nothing. I think that switching it to AGP totally disables it, but I'll try knocking down the shared memory aswell. I'm getting 1350 3d marks, which is ok really, and games run fine, but I want to tweak it for some games because it's performing badly on some. Considering I have a P4 1700, 512mb RAM and a 128mb GF4, I was expecting alot more, but maybe I was expecting too much!

Yes I agree you would expect better, and the shared memory may help and I would knock it down to min setting but it may not even matter since you not using the OB GRAPHICS.. You may be looking at a motherboard upgrade to really get the most from that GPU...

[Farflame]

Hmmmm, frustrating thing is, I just upgraded to this mobo! My old one was bust, so I took it to the store to be fixed and they put a new mobo in. I should've demanded a certain type of mobo but I wasn't really sure so I trusted to their judgement. Maybe it was a mistake

[ktkendall]

I think the only mistake was to get a model with onboard graphics when you did not really need that....And of course to fully realize that card which can do 8x you will obviously need a better board... When the time comes get a good ASUS, or Comparable board with an Intel chipset and no onboard graphics... You will be looking at 120 to 150 but will see the difference...

[Farflame]

k, thanks for that advice. Actually, I had a bit of a result lately, because I sent my Geforce4 ti4200 (64mb) back to be fixed, and they sent me a 128mb version as a replacement (brand new). Thanks Gainward! I can't remember, but I don't think the 64mb version was AGP 8x either. So that's half the reason why I was expecting a performance boost, but I'm only getting 100 3dmarks more than before. Still, it's good enough for most games.

I didn't really know anything about mobo's, gfx cards etc, but the last few weeks have taught me alot. In about a year, I'll probably do a full upgrade again and now I have a better idea what sorta thing I need to be looking for. Infact, before I upgrade next time, I'll ask on these forums for advice

Thanks.