Help with graphics card

[umlaut]

Hi

I´m getting my PC ready for CM:Normandy and so I´m trying to install a new graphics card, as the old one is not up to speed.

But I´ve encountered a problem: The card I bought doesn´t work in my computer. The vendor has tested it and says that the card itself works fine. So it seems it´s simply not compatible with my PC somehow. So I´ve now accepted I´ll just have to buy another card

:-(

Now my question for you is this:

Is there some sort of software (or other solution) that can help me determine which cards that will work in my PC and which won´t (like for instance Crucial scan that determines which kind of RAM you PC can use).

I can´t afford to end up with another useless card.

Cheers

Umlaut

[Schrullenhaft]

There's no piece of software that I'm aware of that would be able to determine the video card compatibility of your system. The variables involved are several and often a software program wouldn't be able to discern all of them.

Some of the details that determine compatibility would be:

1) Physical bus (AGP, PCI Express, etc.)

2) Power supply wattage. Faster video cards are often going to need more power. This would be supplied directly to video cards with PCIe 6 or 8 pin connectors. The PCI Express bus increased the power available to video cards over what AGP could provide, but high-end video cards need even more power. Typically your power supply will have to supply 350+ watts or more for many video cards. Along with the power supply may also be the motherboard's capability of handling the higher power requirements of some video cards. Typically a motherboard should meet the full power requirements of the PCI Express bus, but on occasion some of them don't.

3) Chipset and BIOS. This is where software could potentially help, but on occasion even that won't be enough to determine full compatibility. When it comes to PCI Express it is usually the much older chipsets that may have issues with newer PCI Express video cards. With PCI Express you have the 1.0/1.1 standard and the 2.0 standard. Typically you should be able to run PCI Express video cards in either bus slot, but some PCI Express 1.0/1.1 chipsets may not support some PCI Express 2.0 video cards. This is a fairly rare situation, but it does exist. Occasionally some BIOSes have to be updated to handle certain video cards. This is generally some oversight on the motherboard manufacturer's part.

What motherboard or name brand computer do you have and what video card have you attempted to use with it ? What problem did you run into that you determined to be a compatibility problem ?

[umlaut]

Thanks for the detailed answer, Schullenhaft. I´ll try to reply as detailed as I can:

1) PCI-Express

2) Power supply: 550 watts. Should be more than sufficent. The graphics card requires 450 watts.

Regarding the motherboard, I´m not entirely sure, what info you need. Here´s what I´ve got from CPU-Z:

Mainboard:

Model: 775Dual-VSTA 1.00

Chipset: VIA PT880 Pro, rev. 00

Southbridge: VIA VT8237A

LPCIO: Winbond W83697HF

BIOS:

Brand: American Megatrends Inc.

Version: P1.90

Date: 09/14/2006

Graphic interface: PCI-Express

Link Width: x4, Max supported: x16

The card is a Club 3D Nvidia GeForce 9800GT 1024MB Green.

I´ve just noticed that the box says "System requirements: PCI-Express 2.0 or PCI-Express compliant motherboard with one x16 graphics slot". Could the 16x be the cause of the trouble?

The problem that occures with the card is very simple: When the card has been inserted the screen is only turned on for about one second when I turn the PC on. Then it goes into "power saving mode". Judging from the sound of the computer, it doesn´t go through the normal start up procedure. But I´m not entirely sure of that.

I´d really appeciate any help I could get.

Cheers

[Schrullenhaft]

Your VIA chipset "PT880 Pro" is potentially one of the chipsets that supports PCI Express that may have problems with PCI Express 2.0 cards. Asrock has a VGA compatibility list for 775Dual-VSTA that doesn't mention the 9800 series. However that wouldn't mean that it isn't compliant. The GeForce 9800's are VERY similar to the 8800's, with one of the differences being PCI-E 2.0 bus on the 9800's, while the 8800's were either PCI-E 1.1 or 2.0 depending on the revision of the GPU on the video card.

The Asrock 775Dual-VSTA is a bit of a strange board that supports both AGP and PCI-Express. Though the support for each bus is somewhat limited and not fully fledged. The PCI-Express bus only supports 'x4' channels/mode, so it is short a few channels. That could cause problems with some video cards while for others it will just mean a bit of a bottleneck in terms of data transfer.

I'm not sure if it will help, but you may want to update to the 775Dual-VSTA 3.10 BIOS. Most of the BIOS updates have related to ATI/AMD video cards though.

You are plugging in the PCI-Express power plugs on the card, correct ? If they are not plugged in you will get behavior like your seeing. Some cards will even make a 'buzzing' error sound.

[umlaut]

Once again: Thanks a bunch for the detailed reply.

The power plug you´re referring to, is one of those plugs that provides the card with extra power from via one of the cables from the PSU, right? My 9800GT card has no socket for such a plug.

I will definetely try update the BIOS as you recommended, but I´m not that optimistic - I´m afraid I´ll just have to buy another card.

So I was wondering if you - based on the info in my previous post - could recommend a card that you be good for CM:N - and compatible with my PC? (CPU: 3,08 ghz, RAM: 2x 1GB DDR2 RAM).

I´ll of course regard your reply purely as a recommendation and (this time!) check the compatibilty with the manufacturer before purchasing.

Cheers

[jcmil]

I may be mistaken but the image on the Club 3d site seems to show an extra power socket - black in the middle (I wondered cos my 9800 has these on tho its not an identical card, & I haven't seen one without that power lead) [pic from their listing.] So maybe ask vendor if it needs the 6-pin leads??

You might also want to verify the 12v cos amps on this are critical for modern cards. You can have all sorts of issues if the rails/amps aren't put to the card correctly. There should be a table showing values on the side of the psu.

Club3d say -

Minimum 450W or greater system power supply (with 12V current rating of 26A)

[umlaut]

Thanks jcmil, but the card you´re talking about is different. There IS no no power socket on the card - I´ve even asked the guy who sold it to me to be absolutely sure that this was not the problem. He was actually a bit surprised to discover that there wasn´t on this version.

Regarding the PSU, I bought that at the same store - specifically for this card :-/

But I´ll check again.

Thanks

[Schrullenhaft]

Asrock provides a list of video cards that they have tested with the motherboard in the 775Dual-VSTA VGA Compatibility List. They've sub-divided this list between Windows XP and Windows Vista. I'm not sure why they did that. As you can see the Windows Vista list is much smaller than the XP list.

I found your particular Club 3D 9800GT card. I couldn't find the PCI-Express power connector on it either in the photos provided by Club 3D. It's a G92 GPU, but interestingly it's made to consume less power. I'm not exactly sure how they do that (unless they're down-clocking it). The PCI-Express 2.0 standard has increased the power available over the PCI-Express bus/slots and this video card may be dependent on that higher power over the slot. If it had a power connector, then it MIGHT have worked. But without that power connector it is dependent on what the slots provide for power and the PCI-Express 1.0/1.1 standard only provides 75W. However this specification PDF for the CBNX-G9824G lists a maximum of 75W.

Anyway, for a recommendation. You'll need to find a video card that is only PCI-Express 1.0/1.1. This would probably be a GeForce 8800GT/GTS/GTX that has 320 or 640MB in VRAM at the high end. These will be G80 GPUs which are PCI-Express 1.1. However you'll probably only be able to find them used.

For ATI/AMD, the 5000, 4000 and 3000 series video cards are all PCI-Express 2.0. The 2000 series were PCI-Express 1.1, with the 2900XT probably one of the faster video cards. However they are probably only going to be found used and there probably aren't too many of them out there. The ATI/AMD drivers tend to have a few more problems than Nvidia when it comes to OpenGL, so I don't recommend them for CMSF as frequently. Sometimes they can work well, but in the case of the most recent drivers, 10.2 Catalysts, they have broken the driver again it seems. Nvidia is not perfect either, with a lighting bug in the current 190 series drivers.

I'm not sure of its compatibility since it isn't on the list (no new video cards are on Asrock's compatibility list), but it may be worth trying the GeForce 9500GT PCI-E x1 Edition. The GPU on this card is PCI-E 2.0 compliant, but it is only communicating with x1 lanes (whereas your x16 slot communicates at up to x4 lanes). The 9500GT is going to be significantly slower than the 9800GT you currently have. Your motherboard is going to severely restrict what will work and there may be no real good guesses as to what may or may not work. You might find that some PCI-E 2.0 video cards DO work and others don't. You may even find that the same cards from different manufacturers may or may not work with your motherboard. Asrock has tested a number of MSI video cards with the motherboard, but that isn't an indication that a majority of MSI video cards will consistently work.

Generally with the GeForce series you will have to stick to the 8000 series at the highest end. Even among these you have to be careful since some of the GPUs are PCI-E 2.0 (usually these are in the 8800 series). With the 8800 series you'll want G80 GPUs (older ones with 320 or 640MB VRAM) and NOT G92 (newer ones, with typically 512MB/1GB of VRAM). The 8600 series would probably be the next best bet; the 8600GT or the faster and rarer 8600GTS.

You might find some of the newer 9000 series GPUs MIGHT work, but it may be random chance to find one that does since the entire series is PCI-E 2.0 (one of the big differences between the 8000 series and the 9000 series).

[umlaut]

Wow!! Thanks a lot, Schullenhaft - this is looking really useful.

:-)

[umlaut]

Hi Schrullenhaft

After reading your detailed and very informative answer regarding video cards and the shortcomings of my motherboard, I´ve begun wondering whether I´ve been looking at this problem from a completely wrong perspective. What I mean is:

Is main problem actually my motherboard?

You might not remember, but a couple of months ago we talked in this forum about a problem regarding Open GL 2.0. (http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=89664) The reason was that I had tried to play the CMSF demo, but could not initiate Open GL 2.0 - even though my current video card should be Open GL 2.0 compatible. I never managed to solve the problem – and I´ve got the impression from the disussions in the earlier thread that the fault was somewhere in my motherboard and/or BIOS.

So now I´m wondering if I will just be facing a new problem, once I´ve managed to get a working video card. Namely, that Open GL 2.0 might still not work on my PC, because of the problem with my rather outdated motherboard - and then I still wouldn´t have gotten any closer to playing CM:N.

Thus, I´m now wondering if it wouldn´t be wiser to replace my motherboard instead of buying a new video card? The pro´s in my view would be:

1)The video card compatibility should then be solved.

2)The Open GL problem should be solved

3)My motherboard would be updated and my PC should the be more ready for further updates later on (like inserting more RAM for instance)

The price of a motherboard is roughly the same as a video card - and since I already have a working video card (only not with my current motherboard) I think I would get more value for my money by buying a new motherboard.

So now I´m contemplating to “simply” change my motherboard and move my CPU into the new board and reinstall windows. Only, I´m a bit afraid I might have misunderstood something in the process - I am after all a real novice in this field.

So the question I hope you could help me anwer is this: Is my analysis correct – or can you see any flaws in my plan?

Then I´ll hopefully be done asking questions

Cheers

[Schrullenhaft]

The Asrock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard has BIOS updates from 2.90 - 3.10 that updates compatibility for ATI/AMD PCI-Express video cards of the 2xxx, 24xx, 34xx, 36xx and 38xx series Radeons. I'm not sure where the 43xx series falls in terms of this compatibility (it took Asrock a couple of updates to cover those listed series). It's strange that the Radeon 4350 would work except for OpenGL. It's a PCI-Express 2.0 card also, which can cause some further complications with your Asrock motherboard.

A motherboard upgrade would allow you to keep your new GeForce 9800GT and have it work. However the problem with finding a new motherboard is finding one that is compatible with your CPU. While it is a Socket 775, I believe you said it was a 3.06GHz, which is a 533MHz bus, along with an older 'power specification' ('04A'). The problem becomes that there are no motherboards that support your current Pentium 4 CPU and PCI-Express 2.0. You would probably have to find an older motherboard that would support your CPU AND work with PCI-Express 2.0 video cards. This basically means an older chipset/motherboard that doesn't have a VIA chipset. It would mostly like be just PCI-Express 1.1.

Do you know the exact model of CPU that you have, since this will be a crucial part of potentially upgrading your motherboard ? You could (if you're careful) possibly take off the heatsink/fan assembly and clean off the CPU to read it. There will be a 5-character code called the 'sspec' that will identify your CPU (something like SL8ZZ). However you will need to be very careful (especially with static discharge) and you would need to clean up the 'thermal interface material' and provide some more. A simpler (though not fully exact) method of identifying your CPU is to use CPU-Z (the download is part way down the page), which will identify most of the details of your CPU (providing family, model, stepping codes) from which it would be possible to determine the exact model number (and a guess on the sspec), such as 524.

With the specific CPU, I could search for compatible motherboards. You already have DDR2 memory, so that is good (and will be needed by somewhat newer motherboards). You may need to specify the brand, speed, capacity/size and model number of the RAM you have and how many sticks you have.

Another issue to be concerned about with a new motherboard is your boot drive. Is your current boot drive a Parallel ATA (IDE) or SATA ? Many newer motherboards are going to work primarily with SATA hard drives (with only one Parallel ATA/IDE port that you may need for optical drives). Many will not be able to boot with an IDE drive (since they use external chips to support the IDE port).

If you keep your current CPU, then you're most likely you're going to need to get a 'used' motherboard. One such board I've seen on eBay is the Intel D915GEV (may also be labeled D915GEVL - the last character indicating '10/100 LAN'). There are others too that will work with your CPU and DDR2.

The other possibility, which increases your costs, is to purchase a new CPU and motherboard that uses DDR2.

[umlaut]

Thanks again for the quick answer. It was as always very helpful and useful - though a bit discouraging too this time: Just when I thought, I´d figured it out. :-/ But nothing´s ever straightforward when it comes to computers, it seems.

I just need to clear up one thing, though: You say that "there are no motherboards that support your current Pentium 4 CPU and PCI-Express 2.0"

As far as I have understood, my CPU is a Celeron D - or maybe I´m misunderstanding something here?

Would it make a difference if my CPU is not a Pentium 4?

Here´s what CPU-Z says:

Processor 1 ID = 0

Number of cores 1 (max 1)

Number of threads 1 (max 1)

Name Intel Celeron 347

Codename Cedar Mill

Specification Intel® Celeron® D CPU 3.06GHz

Package (platform ID) Socket 775 LGA (0x2)

CPUID F.6.4

Extended CPUID F.6

Core Stepping C1

Technology 65 nm

Core Speed 3079.6 MHz

Multiplier x FSB 23.0 x 133.9 MHz

Rated Bus speed 535.6 MHz

Stock frequency 3066 MHz

Instructions sets MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, EM64T

L1 Data cache 16 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size

Trace cache 12 Kuops, 8-way set associative

L2 cache 512 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size

FID/VID Control no

Cheers

[Schrullenhaft]

There is a difference between the Pentium 4 3.06 and your Celeron 347. Unfortunately it still results in a very limited number of motherboards that support that CPU. Most of the Intel 945 motherboards don't seem to support the Celeron 347 specifically (the 915 and 945 motherboards listed earlier DO NOT work with this CPU). Unfortunately many of the more modern motherboards based on Intel 3 and 4 series chipsets do NOT support 533MHz FSB CPUs like your Celeron 347.

One board I've found is the Intel DQ965GF. Some other Intel 965 chipset-based motherboards would also possibly work. One board I found on eBay is the MSI P7N SLI Platinum that supports your Celeron 347. So potentially Nvidia 750 chipset-based motherboards may also work. Either of these motherboards or boards based on the Intel 965 or Nvidia 750 will work with your GeForce 9800GT and DDR2 memory.

[umlaut]

Well. as I said: "Just when I thought, I´d figured it out". Maybe I should just get a new CPU with the motherboard...

But thanks a lot again for being a great help. Hope BFC are paying you well.

:-)

[umlaut]

Hi again

I´ve now succesfully replaced my motherboard (and CPU) - and downloaded the CM:SF demo. It runs like a dream - with the infamous graphics card :-D

So thanks again, Schrullenhaft - couldn´t have done it without your help. Now I´ll go learn how to play CM2 - and join the choir of those impatiently clamoring for CM:N. ;-)

Cheers