Hey there I recently bought an AGP x8 motherboard (Asrock K8Upgrade-NF3) with and AMD 3000+ CPU for a friend. When I first wanted to fire up the PC, I had an ATI Radeon 9800 PRO 128 MB, the screen wouldn't come on. I tried a couple of times and still nothing appeared on the screen. So then I decide on fetching my 32 MB nVidia card (don't know how I still have it) and stick it in, it works. I install windows and all the drivers for the motherboard. After this I assumed that it was my ATI card which wasn't working anymore so the next day I took my friend's nVidia FX 5700 Ultra 256 MB (which normally works on his pc) and stuck it in, nothing on the screen. So put back the good old 32 MB card and check if there is anything I can do in the BIOS. So I go into "Chipset Configuration" and change a couple of things there and stick in the 5700 again. It seems to work now, windows boots and I proceed by installing the correct drivers. Then I restart the computer and the BIOS and POST and everything is distorted and colored, red, blue, green pixels all over and I can barely read what it says, and from then on I never got it to work again so I had to stick in my 32 MB card again. And that was it. But now, there are a few things in the BIOS chipset configuration that I have no idea about. Here they are: AGP DATA RATE AGP APERTURE SIZE AGP FAST WRITE AGP SIDEBAND ADDRESS PRIMARY GRAPHICS ADAPTER Could you please help me this, thanks, and here is the link to the motherboard manual: http://www.asrock.com/manual/K8Upgrade-VM800.pdf Good day.
Hi, Before you placed the 9800 card in, did you uninstall your old graphics card drivers? Try resetting the Cmos aswell via a jumper that should be near the Cmos Battery on the board. Oh also, i belive the 9800Pro has an extra power connector on it and you are required to plug a molex connector into it (just a normal plug form the power supply), have you done this? if not i would do that aswell. ***Edit**** Ah, so you had this card working before?, at what point did this card stop working? after inserting new motherboard and cpu? also i think its worth mentioning, after inserting new motherboard and CPU you need to re install windows, or repair windows as it wont work straight away with a new motherboard and cpu. So i would reccommend re installing windows too.
Thanks for the reply. Yes I did do a fresh install of windows and I did plug in the 4 molex connector, I think this is a BIOS problem, because the 5700 did not work at first but did for a bit when I changed something in "Chipset Configuration" (had no idea of what I was doing) and then those pixels appeared. I didn't try the 9800 after I changed stuff in "Chipset Configuration" and that is what I am going to try today.
Ok, i would try Resetting the Cmos, do you know how to do this? turning the computer off, either placing a jumper on the 2 pins, or taking it off (different for some motherboard) and then turning the computer on for about for about 5 seconds and then turning it off, take jumper off or on depending which oen it is with your motherboard. as i said, it should be near the Cmos Battery. Resetting Cmos will set everyhting back to factory defaults, better than loading default config in bios.
Ok I shall try that, but the thing is that I first put the 9800, so I am guessing if I reset the BIOS, it wont work too.
Cmos is the chip i think, and bios is on the screen, i dont really know, but resetting bios is doing it through the bios, resetting cmos resets it all and you use the jumpers, i think its the way to do it if your bios is messed up, its worth a try at resetitng cmos though.
its basically the same thing, the CMOS is if u cant get the computer to start properly ie after a bad overclock. put the 32meg canrd in, reset the bios (if its easier that ways for u) and save settings. restart and then switch off the computer. Put your 9800 in and start the computer and pray.
