Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Hi there,
There is an issue with role permissions that is being worked on at the moment.
If you are having trouble with access or permissions on regional forums please post here to get access: https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058365403/you-do-not-have-permission-for-that#latest

[COLOR=red]GRAPHICS CARD ADVICE??[/COLOR]

  • 05-05-2004 9:59pm
    #1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 80 ✭✭


    Hey all,

    I've a computer question for you guys.....
    I upgraded my computer a while ago from a 500Mhz to an AMD TB XP2400
    but the computer doesn't seem to be running as fast as it the 500Mhz
    did!

    My computer's basic specs are;
    AMD Athlon XP2400
    Motherboard: Asus A7v8X
    Memory: 256MB PC2100 DDR Ram
    Graphics: Gainward Geforce4 MX440 (128MB)
    Hard Drive: 60GB (72000rpm)

    Why do you think the computer isn't performing. I suspect the
    graphics card, it says it's a Geforce4 but it doesn't seem to act as
    one! When I go into DirectX it says "AGP Texture Acceleration:
    Not available".....this is a problem with quite a few games. The
    RAM is 266MHZ but my motherboard can handle 333Mhz, is it worth
    upgrading this??

    I hope you can give me some of your expert advice on this!

    JOE


Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,317 ✭✭✭CombatCow


    Hi,well about your gfx card if its a pci card you wont be able to enable agp texture acceleration ''natch'' but if it is a agp card then make sure you have the agp drivers for your mobo installed from the driver cd you got with the motherboard.

    make sure you have the latest nvidia gfx card drivers "http://www.nvidia.com/page/home '' aswell as directX 9.0b ( found on recent game cd's ).Not sure if faster memory would make much differance to your system...im sure one of the other lads will know more bout that.


    CombatCow


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,761 ✭✭✭Col_Loki


    If your talkin about general performance then id be lookin at the hard drive TBH. Is it full? Have you formatted it lately (ie reinstalled fresh)?

    Check for a virus using up your system resources.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,754 ✭✭✭Big Chief


    xp also uses up about 256 mb of memory pretty much no problems at all..

    more memory is an option

    plus you seem to be misunderstanding what a MX card is, its the budget version of the geforce range basically, it isnt really upto scratch, it wont support dx9 and will generally not play very well unless your games are 5 years old (generall speaking ofcourse)

    you seem to be expecting it to be a GF4 Ti card or something? even they they are getting pretty much out of date nowadays never mind the MX range :p

    also maybe try a clean reinstall like loki says, but i would upgrade the ram and/or gfx card myself


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 771 ✭✭✭Sir Random


    Did you format the HD when you installed the new mobo?
    It sounds like you haven't installed the latest Hyperion 4in1 drivers for your chipset.

    These 4 in 1s are recommended for the KT400:
    http://www.softwarepatch.com/utilities/viahyp4in1.html

    Download and install those drivers, and that should get your AGP slot working full speed.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,943 ✭✭✭Mutant_Fruit


    The latest 4-in-ones would do wonders if you havn't installed them. But i would whole-heartedly recommend at least 256mb more ram if you want to run XP on that rig.

    The difference between an Athlon XP1800+ with 256mb and 512mb of ram is very noticeable.


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,984 ✭✭✭✭Lump


    More Ram is needed tbh


    John


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,943 ✭✭✭Mutant_Fruit


    one thing i should tell you, you don't need faster ram, upgrading to 333mhz ram (DDR2700) won't help, as your processor is only a 266mhz FSB chip (i believe), what you need to do is just buy more of it, 512 would be the min for XP, and i'd recommend just buying another 512mb chip, and end up with 768mb in your computer. THat'll future proof slightly, for not that much extra.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 80 ✭✭.-=MR. JOE=-.


    Thanks guys,

    I didn't format the hard-drive when I upgraded. I'm no expert so I wanted to avoid anything radical. I'm running Windows 2000 Professional (I don't like XP).
    I'm not too worried about gaming. But will a bad graphics card slow down a computers speed for just general use (surfing, image editing etc). The computer takes about about 90seconds to startup. This seems slow to me but I haven't booted many other machines. My old machine used to start in 45seconds!

    Mmmmm....


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 80 ✭✭.-=MR. JOE=-.


    Just installed the drivers suggested and that seems to have fixed the Graphics problem. Everything in DirectX is enabled now.
    The computer is still sooooo slow. I timed it starting up.....To start from off and open internet explorer - 2min 50sec.!! <<Tell me that can't be right for a computer that's meant to be running at over 2GHz.

    I defrag the harddrive regularly. I'm only using 19GB of it (60GB). I've had a look at shop4memory.com . There are two 512MB sticks for about the same price. Would it be a good idea to get one of these (which)? Just want to make sure I don't make the same mistake I made with the graphics card!
    http://www.shop4memory.com/products/ddr-ram.asp

    Thanks again.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,400 ✭✭✭TacT


    Originally posted by Big Chief

    you seem to be expecting it to be a GF4 Ti card or something? even they they are getting pretty much out of date nowadays never mind the MX range :p

    also maybe try a clean reinstall like loki says, but i would upgrade the ram and/or gfx card myself

    I upgraded recently to an XP3000+ Barton core at 400fsb running on an A7N8X and I must say -- I'm shocked how well my ti4200 is doing, I'm going to hang on to it a while longer :D

    I'm guessing you need a clean fresh format and install of windows from what you're describing MR JOE. You still have all those old drivers messing with the OS which in turn could be causing your slow boot up problems. Other thing is that with some of the detonator drivers -- they can slow down your boot up time as well.

    You'll need to try them and decide which one is working out best all round but you won't know this until you do a fresh format and install of everything from scratch because any residual drivers from your old install could be conflicting with them and making your pc seem much slower than it should be.

    Your graphics card will not be a bottleneck running most software and your browser or whatnot but you'll notice it in games. That card is a big bottleneck for that system and I suggest you try and get yourself a ti4200 or 4600 2nd hand and do a clean install to get the most out of that system with some additional ram.

    With regards to the ram -- get any pc2100 512MB stick and you should be flyin.


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 17,441 ✭✭✭✭jesus_thats_gre


    Format the bugger and start fresh.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 771 ✭✭✭Sir Random


    Have you installed USB drivers?
    Try disabling USB in the BIOS and disconnect any CD/DVD drives, then restart.
    If it's still slow, remove any PCI cards (just leave the gfx card) and try again.
    If it's still slow, then
    Originally suggested by jesus_thats_gre
    Format the bugger and start fresh.


Advertisement