Directinput??DirectX??Memory reference?? What is going on!!!

[meskalin]

What do you want to know as far as setting up the XP.
I have two harddrives where I split the 80 gig into a 15 gig system and a 65 gig for programs like logic or simply games, I also download stuff onto a seperate drive (mp3, etc etc.)

What else do you want to know?

[pam123]

Okay, I'm making some assumptions but here goes.
Basic hardware : you've replaced the motherboard, replaced the video card and tested the ram. Everything passed.
Your ps is a good one.
You've checked out all the cables and you know your mouse and keyboard are good and you're not using any mouseware programs.
I think you've shown it isn't hardware.
Something is corrupting your XP installs either before they're complete or very soon after.
So install XP, check.
Install recent mobo drivers, check.
And now install DX 9, I'd burn it to a cd and use that.
Check again. It should show up on dxdiag first page. Don't run dxdiag until you've loaded the drivers for the 9800XT.
If all is well in go the video drivers and then do glc's trick, reinstall DX 9.
So you have motherboard drivers, DX9 and video drivers.
If it turns around and gives you the same error you won't have to search far for the culprit.
Since XP is so picky about hardware I'm betting it's a program or something about how you set it up that's causing the trouble.
My only other suggestion is that you load "optimum defaults" in the bios and save any special adjustments for later.
The fewer things you have to sort out the better.

[meskalin]

OK I have finally solved the two main issues that were causeing a lot of headaches on my part. The dinput8.dll and the cd check erorr (cd error-post).
I am 100% sure that the dinput8.dll was corupted by my wireless keyboard. Since I went back reformated, reinstalled everything, step by step updating, graphic, sound chip set driver etc. and I would still get that damn error. Since dinput8.dll is a dll for input devices I just decided to try with a diferent keyboard and a mouse and can you belive it, it works. I have acctually put my wireless keyboard on again since now I can use the dxdiag or anything with out any problems and if they come up again, now that I actually know what was causing it, it's gonna be easy to repair/fix it.

One other thing I am concerned about is the Nvidia SW driver (came with my giagbyte instalation cd and follows up the chipset instalation).
The Nvidia SW driver replaces the ATA drivers that come with WIndows with drivers that are optimized for nforce2 based hardware.
Sw supposedly reduces the storage sub systems bottleneck, enabling the processor and other sys. level hardware to be more productive and efficiant.

"...nforce2 platform processors can significantly reduce the CPU time requird to retrive data from/ or store on HD (or other IDE devices) using the IDE logic inside nforce2 MCP and nforce2 MCP-T"

Now my other problem with this mobo was the IDE device communication, like the cd not being recognized even if it is in the cd rom. Like I said before I have set the primary/secondary chanells to PI0 and the problem was solved but in all acctuallity it didn not work because of the SW drivers. When I choose not to install the Nvidia SW driver, that error doesn't show up and under IDE ata/atapi controllers I end up with Nvidia MCP2 driver.
Now you might think its all good since I have actually fixed the causes of my pc problem but...I dont know if I am imaginig this that my pc is slower with out the SW driver.
The cd instalations seems to take longer, burning a cd takes longer, browsing is slower or pretty much everything ..if I did not go crazy I'd say that I really need that SW driver...but if I put it on the system doesnt work right and just like gigabyte said in the SW read me file....that it is a "as is" and "may cause problems"

I contacted Gigabytes tech support today and ofcourse ..they were really helpfull. What a waist of 30 minutes, it would have been better if I called myself and talked to myself for 30 minutes lol. Blah blah they can't help me the regular b s***.

NOw I guess I need to know since I don't have enough knowlege about this ...is my system gonna be fine with out the sw or ...what should I do.
Nvidia also offers a unified driver, but I read that it fixes mostly the audio (dolbydigital) issues and I use audigy 2 so....


Thanx

[pam123]

Wow !!!
You got it !
There are new Nfoece drivers just out :http://www.elitebastards.com/ go here and scroll down till you see the news and the link.
They may be the answer to your questions or your alternative may be the custom install ( which is tricky but you can ask one of the other Nforce2 owners to walk you through it. My upgrade won't happen till later this month so my experience with NF2 boards is limited, also I don't have a wireless keyboard).
Just a suggestion though.
There is a sticky over on the processor/motherboard forum about NF2 boards.
I think your post would be a classic.

[meskalin]

Hey Pam

Since everything is working fine, I decided to make things worse lol. I am not a gambler but I went and installed the 3.13 over the old drivers without unistalling anything.
I did create a restore point.
To my surprise everything worked out fine! So far so good, even the SW driver is installed now and I don't get my usual error, but like I said so far so good...hope my pc is not going to melt into a yellow blob when I power it on next time.
I am going to sleep for a couple of days and nights, you know just to catch up with all the sleepless nights I have been infront of my LSD I mean LCD monitor, surly I'll dream about overclocking my Gigabyte to a whooping warp speed and I will have about trilion fps with the 9800XT.

Good night and until the next time

[pam123]

Glad to hear it.
Just copy your solution to the sticky in Motherboard/Processors ( the one that reads Nforce )and you will have added to everyones' fund of knowledge.

[meskalin]

How do I do that with that sticky?

[pam123]

Doing it for you now.

edit : Okay, you're on the thread.
This was a highkight>edit>copy--and then unhighlight.
This goes to the copy board.
To paste it, when you get to the point in the new post where you want it it > edit >paste. And there it will go.

[meskalin]

I was looking around in my BIOS settings and I was wondering if you know what :

advanced AGP aperture size -64M- (set to 64 but can be set from 32 to 512)
and AGP fast wrtie cababilty _enabled

[pam123]

Aperture setting is a legacy from when video cards had 4mb of ram.
The old rule that it should be half your ram is now really out of date. For most uses 64mb will do or, if you're a really major gamer, you can up it to 128mb.
Fast writes enables the video card and the processor to talk to each other directly.
It doesn't really give much speed and it's a notorious cause of sysem instability even with boards that support it properly. Thus the standard advice for smartgart is " turn off fast write both there and in the bios ".

[meskalin]

I had to go back to the 2.41 drivers since actually my system was performing better then with th enew 3.13 drivers.

Anyway Pam, I told you I am an beginner so I am going to ask a beginners question. You know my system specs so ...how much improvment will I see if I max out my memory from 1,5g to 3g (thats the max I think). In what "departments" will I be able to see the improvments? This much memory and 9800XT what wil that do?

[meskalin]

Anyone???

[mjkovis]

You wont see much of a difference from 1.5GB to 3GB of RAM because there is nothing out there that even needs to use that much space. I have 1.5GB and the highest memory usage I have seen was 27%. And that was using a lot of programs at once. You may see some help in the internet side, but nothing drastic or noticably different.

[meskalin]

Thanx

[pam123]

Hi meskalin,
Acid-Klutch is pretty much right.
Unless you have some professional level CAD programs, or you're a home movie enthusiast who likes to craft his own special effects, 3GB of ram is overkill.