Windows 7: Radeon HD 4350 not reconized by Windows

I have a 32-bit system currently set up, a Sony Vaio VGC-RA820G. My friend recently gave me a Radeon HD 4350 video card to put in it. It has a 3.2GHz Pentium 4 HT and 3GB of RAM. The PSU is 350w which should be more then enough for the 4350 as my friend used it with a 300w on a much more power hungry system (Quad core with 4GB). The video card currently in it, A Radeon X300 works just fine with the system. There is NO on-board display adapter and the bios and CPU-Z see the 4350 just fine. Windows does not list the card as anything in the device manager, not even as a standard video card, though video works on the card but the FPS is choppy and no support is given for DirectX or OpenGL. I know the card is not dead, though I am unsure why Windows doesn't recognize it as any video card at all. Any help is greatly appreciated.

EDIT: I have tried multiple installs of the official drivers form ATI and they recognize the card and install, but Windows doesn't use the drivers, it uses generic ones and because the card is not listed in device manager, I can't change them.

Questions:

1- Is this your system - Sony Vaio VGC-RA820G

2- Do you still have to old video card (X300) installed?

2- Or did you actually replace the old video card with the 4350?

1. Yes, it is a Sony Vaio VGC-RA820G
2. Yes, I have the old card but it is not currently installed though I can switch it out with the 4350 if need be.

The 4350 works as a "Standard VGA Adapter" but it does not appear in the Device Manager so I can't update the drivers to the official Radeon ones

I'm a little confused by the above statement. If the card is working (you get video) then it should be showing up in Device Manager as a "Standard VGA Adapter"

In this case you just have to install the drivers. Try and use these here - ATI Radeon (these ar for Win XP). You should uninstall the drivers first.

Let me know.

I've tried the official drivers many times, and they always say they were "successful" installing. The problem here is that for an odd unknown reason, the card doesn't update the drivers automatically. You'd expect to go into Device Manager and be able to update it there, but it doesn't exist in Device Manager. Any other video card I put in there shows up just fine in Device Manager. I've tried a Radeon x300 (The original card that came with the computer) and a Radeon 9250. Both of these show up just fine, but the 4350 does not for an unknown reason. On other forums people say that the on-board graphics card often conflicts with the 4350 and you have to turn it off in the bios, but this computer has no on-board graphics card. I'm just as lost about this situation as you. I think I may try reinstalling the OS however, as maybe some other driver is conflicting with it, and when I orrigianly installed it, the x300 card was installed, not the 4350.

Ok, I'm completely confused. You don't need to go into Device manager to update the drivers.

When you put the 4350 in the PC did you hook your monitor to it?

Do you get a video signal?

And is this an XP machine? Yes or no???

Also can you post a screen shot of your device manager with the 4350 installed in the PC.

Thanks.

Go to the Sony site and get the latest video drivers from Sony for your laptop. That's what needs to be installed.

If your laptop or desktop's hardware is an X300 chip I don't know that you'll be able to install "retail Catalyst drivers" for a standard "retail ATI video card". As you've seen, it can claim to be installed successfully but somehow never really gets attached properly to the hardware. Something about the "Mobility" version of Radeon hardware that does not allow the main Catalyst drivers from being installed. You need "Mobility" drivers.

There's something very odd about these OEM installs of Windows, in terms of what the manufacturers do to them somehow to actually prevent "retail Catalyst drivers" from being installed.

The only way I think you may be successful is if you erase C and install a brand new "retail Windows 7" from scratch. Then the hardware will be detected, and a retail Catalyst driver package will work. But with the OEM version of Windows somehow there is a lockdown.

Note that this also happens with desktop machines. I've now seen exactly the same thing on both a new Compaq and Lenovo desktop machine, both of which have modern ATI video cards (an HD540 in the Lenovo). Both have triggered automatic Windows updates but only going to 11.2. You cannot install a newer Catalyst driver downloaded from the ATI site and have it "work", although it seems to install properly. The drivers shown will still be the ones provided by Lenovo out-of-the-box, or automatically updated with Windows Update.


At least that's been my experience fighting with this very issue over the last few years. The only real solution is to eliminate the OEM version of Windows 7 running on the hardware, and install a retail Windows 7. Then you can do whatever you want.

EDIT: just noticed that your Sony Vaio is a desktop machine, not a laptop. But still... based on my similar experience with Compaq and Lenovo desktops and the same issue of wanting to install more recent drivers than 11.2 for the ATI video hardware in both machines, it just does not work with the OEM copy of Windows 7 that's installed by the manufacturer.

It's a desktop so no mobility drivers need be installed.

I'm awaiting an answer as to whether the machine in question is running XP or not. See my prior post(s).

Thanks.

It's currently running Windows XP Home SP3 (Not the XP MCE 2005 that originally came with the PC) I'll try and get some screenshots up as soon as I can.

In response to your earlier questions, yes I'3ve connected a monitor to the card and get a signal, however the drivers don't appear to work with the card even though they are supposedly installed and therefore I don't get the direct3d or opengl support the card has to offer.

I still plan on trying to reinstall the OS to see if that fixes it.

Use the stand-alone AMD driver. Use 7-zip, extract the AMD driver package to a folder on your desktop.
Go to the device manager and select Update Driver Software, and select Browse for driver software on your computer
and point to the folder you created on your desktop.

It may work.
Good Luck.