Video card issues

Second Life has always worked fine on my computer, but lately whenever I start it up I get an error saying that my video card drivers are out of date or incompatible with Second Life. I've tried reinstalling Second Life and rolling back my video card drivers since I updated them recently, but I still get the same error.

first appraisal suggests we need to know: 1, what the video card is, 2, what drivers you are using.. and 3, what SL version.
The three need to be compatible.
If they are all compatible.. then we can remove three possible causes.. until we know.. its a guess in the dark.. You dont want to walk that road do you?...

Take a look at this short thread:

/111/d9/216718/1.html#post1718066

There is definitely some impasse here, with SL programming and computer technology. how severe the problem is going to be in the future, or if they are going to fix it anytime soon is an unknown.

We can only hope, or SL will go down the tubes fast. Its bad when a Pristine and updated, $7000.00 computer is bumped off SL every 10 minutes.

OK, I'm using an Nvidia 7900GT with the latest drivers available. Second Life version is 1-18-1-2.

Thats a good card, try selecting the 'Auto Detect' my GC in SL preferences. What resolution are you running in?

Quote"try selecting the 'Auto Detect' my GC in SL preferences."

Agrees.. i have an NVidia 7950 GX2 card.. it runs fine with SL.

SL say, in the pop up box that appears when you mouse over Auto detect in Advanced Graphics in preferences, that one should use it if the hardware has been changed.. though you have only changed the driver, SL may not recognize the card now or perhaps the correct settings. Im thinking SL still has old settings, and hasnt updated to the new settings you are using. Even if you go back to the old driver SL may still not recognize what has changed, so Auto detect on next startup would be my first try.

if you get SL to run.. you can see what its using in preferences About.. bottom left of the preferences window. heres mine:
Second Life 1.18.3 (5) Sep 20 2007 11:41:23 (Second Life Release)

You are at 283474.9, 272958.2, 21.6 in Trueblood located at sim3060.agni.lindenlab.com (64.129.44.79:13004)
Second Life Server 1.18.3.71877

CPU: Intel Core 2 Series Processor (2938 MHz)
Memory: 2048 MB
OS Version: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)
Graphics Card Vendor: NVIDIA Corporation
Graphics Card: GeForce 7950 GX2/PCI/SSE2
OpenGL Version: 2.1.1
LLMozLib Version: 1.1.0 (Mozilla GRE:1.8.0.12_0000000000)
Packets Lost: 0/3030 (0.0%)
Viewer Digest: 90685140-2f12-8f78-b80a-1d453326d7c2

am having the same problem as Spiked, Auto detect GC, would be good solution, unfortuneatley the client not let you get that far before error message....the client not start.... if that makes sence..
driver version 163.71

here's the info of my machine if it helps.

NVIDIA System Information report created on: 11/01/2007 05:01:22
System name:

[Display]
Processor: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4200+ (2204 MHz)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP (Service Pack 2)
DirectX version: 9.0c
GPU processor: GeForce 7600 GS
ForceWare version: 163.71
Memory: 512 MB
Video BIOS version: 5.73.22.16.29
IRQ: 16
Bus: PCI Express x16

[Components]

nvCplUIR.dll 1.4.310.02 NVIDIA Control Panel
nvCpl.cpl 1.4.900.10 NVIDIA Control Panel Applet
nvExpBar.dll 1.4.900.10 NVIDIA Control Panel
nvCplUI.exe 1.4.900.10 NVIDIA Control Panel
nvViTvSR.dll 6.14.11.6230 NVIDIA Video and TV Server
nvViTvS.dll 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Video and TV Server
nvDispSR.dll 6.14.11.6230 NVIDIA Display Server
NVMCTRAY.DLL 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Media Center Library
NVOGLNT.DLL 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Compatible OpenGL ICD
nvDispS.dll 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Display Server
NVCPL.DLL 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Compatible Windows 2000 Display driver, Version 163.71
NV4_MINI.SYS 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Compatible Windows 2000 Miniport Driver, Version 163.71
NV4_DISP.DLL 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA Compatible Windows 2000 Display driver, Version 163.71
nvGameSR.dll 6.14.11.6230 NVIDIA 3D Settings Server
nvGameS.dll 6.14.11.6371 NVIDIA 3D Settings Server


any assitance would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers and Beers

I had this recently (after updating my drivers) and this fixed it...

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\OpenGLDrivers\ati2dvag]
"Version"=dword:00000002
"DriverVersion"=dword:00000001
"Flags"=dword:00000001
"Dll"="atioglxx.dll"

...basically I'd lost the registry entries to the OpenGLDrivers.

This is only going to be good for the ATI Catalyst driver but it may offer a clue. There were also lots of 'cannot find' type errors in the SecondLife.log

you'll notice i say solution as it got me going again....(not sure is fix)..
in Add/Remove software .. removed all Nvidia (video applications)-reboot(it looks ugly)
uninstalled all Nvidia video drivers in Hardware profile- display adapter- reboot( it looks really ugly for a bit)
-(started Sl to check..on default driver...is ok.. yeah...Phew)-this step not neccessary I guess..

Hardware profile... display adapter.. update driver.... - reboot..

started and logged into Sl.... seems ok (not much seems to be different ..no huge change in FPS).. but i no expert....*smiles*

reset my screen settings to what usualy have set at... and all is good..

hope this helps.

Cheers and beers

That was a helpful exchange of information for once. Usually a question like that is answered with, "Obviously your PC is far inferior to my CRAY Quintuple-Core running at 50 Billion GHZ."

Nice to see people actually trying to help each other with a problem.