SL has no graphics: AMD K7 1200, nvidia fx5200, 768 MB Ram

Hi! Maybe someone has experience with this one:

My daughter is new to SL, and she specially upgraded her computer to be able to play. She now has an Nvidia FX 5200 instead of the integrated SIS graphics, 768MB instead of the 256 it came with, and got Broadband Flatrate at 2000mbps.

What happens is, SL will start correctly exactly once after a system reboot; on logging in, everything downloads ok (the progress bar), and when it has all finished, SL crashes with a Micosoft Windows C++ Runtime Error.

She is running Windows XP SP2.

I downloaded all the patches I could find for her main board (Pcchips 810ml-r), for VGA, AGP, Lan and Bios. No real difference. The latest NVIDIA drivers are also installed. The BIG improvement that we s<aw was that her disk is addressed as DMA 5 now, not PIO.

The second time she tries to log on to SL, she gets the SL login screen with NO characters visible, no graphics, and though the menus are in the right place, no text is visible. The colours of the SL screen are greytones.

This is very disappointing, especially since every time she tries SL after rebooting the computer, the login screen comes up PERFECTLY! Only to crash with a c++ runtime error again. And no debug messages for SL, either.

The Graphic Card and Memory Chips have been reseated, system memory test (and general system stability) tends to show that the memory is OK.

It COULD be a hardware prolem, in that the main board does not supply enough power for the FX 5200 to run properly; all other graphics stuff is OK, but of course SL really USES a graphics card.

Anyone have any useful advice? She is DYING to get on world, but up to now she has to visit me and use one of my 3 perfectly stable SL enabled computers...

Hi ya, are you running any firewall software that will prevent connection with the sim, also there were new nvidia drivers released yesterday which you could try, also make sure the integrated video card is disabled in the motherboard bios

yes check power supply rating, i upgraded my p.s. when installing my vid card. most newer onboard video auto detects the presence of an agp card and automatically disables it, but check bios for the option...also try windowed mode and see if it runs that way, also go to start run, and go to dxdiag run the display tests and they all need pass, disregard any whql messages regarding driver signing.

go to the more help page in dxdiag and check for disabled device, or if there is no option, older dx version use dxdiag -ghost in the run line...

hope this helps some.

Thanks, Nathan. The firewall WAS running, (XP integrated) and it complained about SL, allowing me to permit access. I did so, and then disabled the firewall, since the network access is via a dsl router with NATing, so the firewall functionality is already given.

The Nvidia Drivers I have seem to work OK in my other 3 computers, running the same card, 2 on intel and one on an AMD Duron.

However, on MUCH newer motherboards! All AGP4, my daughters is AGP2.

My suspicions are beginning to focus on that, or power supply, see my next reply.

Thanks!

Thanks! The DXDIAG especilaly is a good tip!

I have read elsewhere about Power to the Card being too weak, acausing SL failures...

and some motherboards just plain CAN'T give the card the juice it needs

I will see abourt a new motherboard for the computer (new! lol...) that has AGP4 on board. But if the Power Supply needs an upgrade too, I am approacing the costs of a new puter... lol!

Thanks

If you can, let me know her avatar name, so I can check the crash logs that she's (hopefully) submitting.

my pleasure, did games and hardware support for 4 years...i miss it...

Hi Lee! That is a GREAT offer!

In the cases where SL crashes, it crashes with a Windows c++ runtime error, not from SL. It is a pure Windows message and no SL Error report is produced.

In the cases where SL starts with lousy graphics (no text, no colour), SL is perfectly happy with itself. SL itself has no problems; it seems either windows or the graphics have "switched back" (???) to a state that it finds acceptatble.

The Avatar's name is Tanya Hemingway.

The crash logs are set to "send automatically". I think one actually got through! However, after the bios and windows patches for the motherboard were applied, no more crash reports have been produced, as far as I remember. And although SL crashes with the c++ error, it does not know it has crashed when it next starts.

This could be because of a strange phenomenon: the usual cache directory does not exist under her windows user. I thought that was because of a messed up user, so we created a new windows user, and tried again: same thing, no Second Life cache directory visible . It seems to crash at the point where it should create this directory. (? I find that SO strange, I was nervous to mention it! ) *edit* Or at least, I cannot FIND the directories, and I clear them often on my own computer, by hand. * end edit *

She has been able to get on two or three times using my computers. The period where all this, which is reported above, started is from Tuesday September 18.

I would be grateful for any help!

Useful could be a parameter with which to start second life, to force an error report or dump. We can always reproduce the condition where SL starts with full graphics and crashes. Only a reboot is required.

And of course the "graphicless" condition is always available!

Just one more point: The bios has the option for "onboard AGP" and "PCI" as graphics, though the board has an AGP slot, which was originally taped shut with a sticker telling you which graphic cards work well (and the Nvidia works OK). Since onboard AGP is definitely false, I set it to PCI, and also (just i case) assigned it an IRQ. It takes IRQ5, the card reports no problems in Device Manager, with Very Recent Nvidia Drivers (have to be selected manually). Windows XP has its own video drivers for this card. I know you are supposed to remove other drivers before installing new ones, but I did not do that on any of my upgrades, and they work, and I hesitate to remove a video driver from Windows itself. I know removing the old driver was CRITICAL under windows 95, less so in 98, but in XP I have up to now had no problems.

The AGP card was NOT recognised in Plug and Play The last time I tried tho was before I did all the bios / XP patching to get the system up to level. And that is ALSO strange, for me. I am more and more convinced that I have a cheapie motherboard here that just doesn't cut it.

I have sent a Text to my daughter, that we can try the DXDIAG by phone - telephonic Pc support, lol!

And I will definitely write up here, how the adventure ends...

I discovered years ago that the older K7 Athlons were very picky about memory. If you use off brand memory, the system will boot, but if you try to run certain resource hogging applications (like a "game", the system will crash.

Older K7 systems were also very picky about power supplies. AMD originally specified that you needed at least 300w to run a stable Athlon system. Also make sure that its an AMD approved power supply. Personally, I like Antec power supplies, because they tend to rate them realistically. If the system is a pretty basic configuration, 300 to 400 watts should be adequate. If there are plans to upgrade to a more modern motherboard/processor, get at least 500w.

I have found that most of my problems dealing with Athlon systems tended to be directly related to power or memory. I think the newer Athlons are more forgiving, but avoiding cheap generic memory and power supplies is generally a step in the right direction.

An update: we deinstalled the nividia driver (78. something or other) and the graphic cards, and reinstalled the nvidia driver. We left the refresh rate at 60 Hz this time, only set the resolution to 1024 x 768, and depth to 32 (only 16 or 32 available).

a) All dxdiag tests passed ok. DirectX 9.c is installed. The tests were faster than on my P4 2200MHz, with the same graphic card.

b) The first start of SL crashed. The second start produced a Log for Lee to look at Perfectly visible was the mini map. Not visible was any text, either the buttons, nor the fields where you log in. I guided her remotely to click the area where the Connect Button is. Everything was grey...

c) The third start produced an almost normal SL. I could TP her in SL, and she saw herself, and lots of the environment, and me. It got better with time, which is normal rezzing. Not clearly visible was the text when typing in the Chat line, it looked "half erased", she said; in the history box, it was perfectölly visible.

d) The fourth and subsequent starts had the problem with all text on the gui being invisible again.

Prime suspects I can now with relatively high certainty eliminate:

1) The memory seems OK, since no more crashes, aside from the reliable "first start" crash.

2) The graphic card seems ok, since this fluctuation by its nature is very unlikely to be a graphic card hardware or driver issue.

Prime suspects whose guilt is becoming more and more apparent:

1) POWER SUPPLY - the card is getting starved of juice, and "loses it" when it get hammered too hard; thanks for the ranges of power that the Athlon demands! I will probably go for a 450W upwards power supply. A BIG thanks to Teeny Leviathan and Ashley for emphasising this to me. I tend to forget all the possible sources of error, I get fixated on my favorites... I will have to visit her agin (she is in the next town) and look at it, and order a new one. I doubt very much that her power supply is much above 250W.

2) Main Board (additional to, but not instead of, power supply) - it cannot deliver the power the graphic card plus SL need in order to work properly. The main board is a 2 PCI Slot board, normally a board like that is not laid out for performance, which is what we need here.

Why prime suspects? Because of the "analog" type variation in the performance. Overloaded power supplies vary their voltage with load, and if it is just above the borderline, we get some joy, just below, no joy, and way above, no problem.

My daughter is starting to get really excited! I have told her to try to get in often, so she can maybe get a "usable" sl, and get back in touch with her greeter... At least she can let her greeter know what is happening.

She thinks SL is the best thing since peanut butter, and can't WAIT to get on properly! And I have to agree, 100%!

The power supply is 300W. Should be ok, but when I check the hardware monitor in the bios, all volatges are below spec, and the -12v is way below spec.

Lee, I have produced several new crash logs for you.

I will be getting a 450W plus power supply for the computer.

That may take a while, so keep up with the great suggestions, and I will report back if anything changes.

Hrm, I don't see any crash logs that successfully were sent to us. This could be a firewall problem, but if she's never successfully logged in, it's probably just because SL doesn't know what name to file the crash log under. (It still sends it for our crash log systems to process and forward to developers, but it's not filed under anyone's name.)

Let me know how the power issues turn out!

Here is my .02L$ to try:

Downgrade the physical ram to something like 512 or 256, sounds nutty but I have seen issues with AGP arpeture size and physical ram, like the AGP bridge chip is not very good at handling the data caching between CPU/AGP Bus and GPU. From your posting, the video card is using IRQ 5 if I recall correctly, disable all audio and remove any removable audio cards if present, also disable any on-board POTS modem or remove any added Modems. Even though Windows isn't reporting a hardware conflict with IRQ's the physical devices may be fighting each other for system resources, IRQ's is one of the biggies and past experience has shown me that IRQ sharing isn't the greatest of technologies. This could also explain the PnP issue as well. One other thing I will mention again, check the mainboard manufaturer's Hardware Compatability List for that mainboard, verify that the video card is listed on there as being compatable with the mainboard. If the video card is not listed and there is not a BIOS update to add compatability, then there is a good chance you are outta luck with that vid card, would need to get the best card that is on the list.

Hi Mike,

Thanks for your very sound advice.

Since we are currently trying to convice our Pig's Ear Motherboard to think it is a silk purse, none of the "highest compatibilty" and "most memory" and IRQ Conflict as well as non recognition of the Card at boot are being taken into consideration.

I have steeled myself to be arrogantly removed from such trivialities...

Joking aside, if any of your points is an issue, I will replace the motherboard with something more modern. And your points ARE well taken, thank you. I am doing something here that no software or hardware manufacturer could or would support.

If it works, stably, that the power supply replacement delivers a functioning SL, I will leave the motherboard until my daughter can afford it.

If not, the pressure will be on her, either to wait for SL until she has money, or to conjure money out of a hat.

Either way, when choosing a new mothercoard, I will get somthing that by spec supports AGP4 / Nvidia 5200.

But thanks for the suggestions. I can see a large amount of professional experience here...

300w with Onboard AGP and PCI as your options in BIOS...

Sounds like an eMachine? We'll hope not .

Try the 80 series beta drivers from nVidia, that might help.

Your PSU might be able to push that but K7 1200's use the T-bird core, if I remember correctly, and that thing eats power like Sally Struthers at a BBQ. I'd upgrade your PSU to a 400-420w.

eMachines and similar motherboards sometimes react funny when you first seat an AGP video card. Try resetting the CMOS battery, then restart. Try leaving "Onboard AGP" on the BIOS, and disabling the onboard video in Windows. Restart, with the monitor now plugged into the 5200 FX, and see if that works. If it doesn't, set to PCI mode.

If that still doesn't work, go to the motherboard manufacturer's website and download a BIOS flash program to update your BIOS. That's a scary thing to have to do sometimes, so save it as a last resort. You'll get an EXE or ZIP to make a boot disk floppy, so run it, let it make the floppy, and restart using the floppy. It'll update your BIOS. Restart, and if you're having the same trouble, make sure there's not a new option in the BIOS for "AGP Slot".

IMHO it sounds like your PSU. You're getting enough push for 2D windows screens, but when you try to do 3D graphics the card doesn't get the power it needs and can't process the instructions it's sent.

I just hope it's not an eMachine, because those things have a tiny power supply mount that is a PAIN to replace.

Well, here is the reportback, as promised.

The 450W PSU made no difference. The BIOS Monitor still reports the identical under-voltage that it did before; that indicates to me, that the motherboard cannot carry any more power than it is already doing, regardless of what PSU I have.

And the computer exhibits the identical behaviour with SL as before... once in a while, a full colour full text screen comes up, and crashes with a C++ runtime error near the very end of preloading cache, the rest of the time, no text (or very distorted), no graphics other that jagged vertices. With luck, the mini map shows the green T's and dots clearly, but that is really all.

I have ordered a used motherboard from ebay, that supports SDRAM (of which we have 768 MB) as well as DDRAM (of which we have none - expensive option, to replace all the RAM), and has an AGP 4x slot.

When it comes, I will be backing out all the Windows patches for the old chipset, and unplugging and replugging everything. I may have to do a reinstall of Windows, too.. I will see. I have changed a mainboard in the past, and Windows never even noticed the change, except to reinstall all the onboard PnP hardware.

And yes, it IS a Thunderbird K7 - very very fast, and apparently also a bit tricky...

I live in hope.

Lee:

I have sent myself copies of the crash logs I got yesterday; it MAY possibly be something in the Windows environment. Can I send them to you somehow, to look at? As you mentioned, the logs are not getting through to LL; but I do have copies of 2 sets available now. Internet research seems to say this type of error is only really solved by changing the chipset, however... Timing problems or something on the chipset seem to cause the C++ error in resource hungry (especially GRAPHICS resource hungry) programs, at least the only solutions I have seen to this error were as a result of either a) downgrading to an older version of the program, or b) upgrading the chipset, which I plan to do. The log DOES list a few missing fonts, and other unexpected things. How critical they are, I cannot say though, which is where I would appreciate your assistance.

If you like, I can cut and paste the things that look strange directly into this thread.

Well, here is the reportback, as promised.

The 450W PSU made no difference. The BIOS Monitor still reports the identical under-voltage that it did before; that indicates to me, that the motherboard cannot carry any more power than it is already doing, regardless of what PSU I have.

And the computer exhibits the identical behaviour with SL as before... once in a while, a full colour full text screen comes up, and crashes with a C++ runtime error near the very end of preloading cache, the rest of the time, no text (or very distorted), no graphics other that jagged vertices. With luck, the mini map shows the green T's and dots clearly, but that is really all.

I have ordered a used motherboard from ebay, that supports SDRAM (of which we have 768 MB) as well as DDRAM (of which we have none - expensive option, to replace all the RAM), and has an AGP 4x slot.

When it comes, I will be backing out all the Windows patches for the old chipset, and unplugging and replugging everything. I may have to do a reinstall of Windows, too.. I will see. I have changed a mainboard in the past, and Windows never even noticed the change, except to reinstall all the onboard PnP hardware.

And yes, it IS a Thunderbird K7 - very very fast, and apparently also a bit tricky... And the 80 series drivers from Nvidia, now Microsoft Certified, were also not the problem.

I live in hope.

Lee:

I have sent myself copies of the crash logs I got yesterday; it MAY possibly be something in the Windows environment. Can I send them to you somehow, to look at? As you mentioned, the logs are not getting through to LL; but I do have copies of 2 sets available now. Internet research seems to say this type of error is only really solved by changing the chipset, however... Timing problems or something on the chipset seem to cause the C++ error in resource hungry (especially GRAPHICS resource hungry) programs, at least the only solutions I have seen to this error were as a result of either a) downgrading to an older version of the program, or b) upgrading the chipset, which I plan to do. The log DOES list a few missing fonts, and other unexpected things. How critical they are, I cannot say though, which is where I would appreciate your assistance.

Edit:

I posted here at a friend's house, and she was still logged on to the forum, so under her name by mistake So I deleted it. Sorry for the confusion...

I upgraded the motherboard this weekend (finally - my daughter needed the computer weekends) and SL works now.

The new motherboard has one tiny problem: it takes several (5 to 10) attempts at starting the computer, before Windows will start - motherboard timing problems, apparently. It is a mixed SDRAM / DDRAM Motherboard, and they can be touchy. After its starts, Windows is perfectly stable, and fast. It may be temperature dependent - on a warm system restarts are much easier.

The computer will also only run with 100MHz bus speed, despite having 133 MHz SDRAM. That means the AMD Thunderbird only runs at 900 MHZ instaed of 1200. Ah well, it is STILL very fast in SL - faster than my 2.2 GHz Pentium is, with the same NVidia FX 5200 card, even though my Pentium has 1024 MB main memory, and the AMD only 512.

Thanks to all who helped. That was a great assistance in prioretizing the changes I needed to make, and getting me clear on what is going on altogether.

Addendum: The instability is apparently due to flaky memory. This motherboard is touchy about memory, it is a highly optimized board. I will be replacing the "old" SDRAM with new DDRAM.

So I guess, alls well that ends well