ARCHANGEL Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 Here I am, one or two days before the final CM arrives in my mailbox, and I cannot even play the beta or the Gold or ANY %*#^$@$ game or sim on my rig. They all load up, but I get the famed black screen with moving cursor and, in the Gold, the cannonade and bird sounds. (GRRRRR!!) There was a power surge here the other night. My surge-capable plugs held up pretty well, tho I just replaced them after the surge cuz they seem to have been damaged. Anyway..I took my rig to Computer Renaissance to be sure it was ok and it was seemingly without damage. We didn't (stupidly) check CM et al, just the basic systems. It wasn't until I got home that the inability to play CM, EAW,RB2 and MA became evident. I have a Dell XPS D300, 128 RAM, STB 128 sound card, 9 gig HD, Creative 3D Blaster Voodoo 2, W95 with Office 2000. THe office 2k was just added yesterday. I am forming a suspicion that O2K may be the culprit here. I got Direct X 7 drivers reloaded...on the Creative page I cannot find ANY Voodoo 2 drivers...they don't seem to go back that far...even a keyword search turned up nothing on Voodoo 2. I did a "black screen" search and looked at most of the 49 threads that were loacted...I did what was recommended and I am still suffering from black screen... I need help here, or I will be absolutey dejected if CM arrives on the morrow and I am unable to employ it.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mark IV Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 Well, Voodoo 2 is from 3dfx, not Creative. Try here: http://www.3dfxgamers.com/view.asp?PAGE=V2drivers Also, DirectX7a might be a little better than plain old 7 and is a fairly painless upgrade. Dunno what O2K would effect unless it changed your driver configs. Assume you've been to the Control Panel and verified device and driver settings? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pathfinder1 Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 him...maybe checked system folder to see if anything has that big bad ol' yaller exclaimation point too... ------------------ this is pathfinder's evil twin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Schrullenhaft Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 ARCHANGEL - do you have two cards for your video or just one ? The Voodoo 2 based cards provide 3D features only. Your system is dependant on another card to provide your actual 2D/day to day video. If you have only one card then you may have the Creative Blaster Banshee. This is the Creative site with the latest drivers for the Creative Voodoo2: http://www.creative.com/support/files/download.asp?prod=db_voo&OS=Win95®=0&select=Get+Files I just thought of something here. If you actually have a Voodoo 2 you may need a cable that hooks up externally between your video card and your Voodoo card. I believe that the monitor actually hooks up to the Voodoo 2 and a video cable hooks up from your main video card's output over to the second connector on the Voodoo card. Check to see if this cable is hooked up. If not you may need to call Computer Renaissance to see if they took off the cable and forgot to put it back on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LeBlaque Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 I just happened to stumble upon this: Hope it can give you a clue to resolve BLACK SCREEN DEATH! (tho banshee probably appropriate for all cards) Occasionally the Banshee driver installation results in a situation where an invalid refresh rate is generated on first reboot. The solution for this involves booting into Safe Mode, opening Device Manager and checking that the Monitor selection is correct. If correcting this does not resolve the black screens, then there is a problem with improper setting of default refresh rates. Reboot into Safe Mode and set the monitor refresh rate to 60 Hz and reboot. If you succeed on getting into Windows, but the screen goes blank when you attempt to change resolutions, download the 3rd-party refresh rate setting tool, HzTool from: http://hem.passagen.se/doxx/ You can use this to set all refresh rates to specific values within the capabilities of your monitor. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ARCHANGEL Posted June 18, 2000 Author Share Posted June 18, 2000 FIXED !!!!! I want to thank all of you for your kind assistance in resolving my problem. I truly appreciate the help. Schrullenhaft was right...it was simple...and dumb as hell on my part...the cable he mentioned was not hooked back up... I spoke to Rookie via phone and he talked (computer semi-literate) me thru the reattaching (in the correct places and order) and I now have CM and all the others back in operation. (WHEW!) The thought of having Cm arrive and NOT being able to play it until a new computer was procured, was nearly tooooooo much to comtemplate... Thanks Again, Lads...see you on the beach... [This message has been edited by ARCHANGEL (edited 06-18-2000).] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rookie Posted June 18, 2000 Share Posted June 18, 2000 Six, Glad to have helped. Frankly,I did not even think of the pass thru cable I am glad you're back up and running.. Your Humble Lackey, -Rook Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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