This computer's video card can't play themes

[Antman]

I have a PowerColor (ATI) HD3850 512MD3 PCIe video card on an ASUS P5B Deluxe WiFi. WEI Graphics scores of 6.9/6.9. I cannot play themes in Windows Live Photo Gallery (my screen saver or stand-alone). Windows reports "This computer's video card can't play themes" in the screen saver setup box.

When I was still using an older card, GeCube (ATI) X700 Pro, it worked in earlier releases of Win7, but I do not recall which builds. It failed in a newer build but a registry tweak to the WEI score re-enbled it. I am currently build 7229.

I do not believe that this is a hardware problem. Vertex Shader 2.0 seems to be a fairly old technology - I can find references to it's inclusion in ATI hardware circa 2002. ATI has yet to respond to a service ticket.


I have [7232.0.amd64fre.winmain.090610-1900.client_en-us.ultimate.SoLoR-custom] but have yet to install it.

I am a new dad. My beautiful wife and our wonderful girl, Lovie Anjolina Rose, really like to watch the slideshows. It is almost like my computer serves no purpose currently

I will use Google Picasa3 - in spite of my reservations regarding their EULA. It supports the Ken Burns effect and includes a cool fade transition. Because Picasa works, I can surmise that the "problem" exists within Windows Live and not Win7.

 

[Antman]

It is a WEI bit annoying

So, no matter what I tried relative to WEI, I could not bring back the Ken Burns Effect, aka Pan and Zoom, or any theme support. I do not know how to delete a WEI score entirely.

But I did a clean install to 7232 x64 and themes are back. It is confirmed that this is not a hardware issue.

The problem began when I did a second WEI assessment to reflect a mild overclock ( I just wanted to bump my WEI scores for CPU and RAM from 6.1 to 6.6 w/o a hack).

I will do some casual research into eliminating all traces of of an existing WEI score and report back. And, even though this not a hardware issue, I believe that this post is in the correct category as Win7 will adise the user that it is.

Good ol' MS. God bless 'em. Just another thing I can fix at a billable rate.

 

[Antman]

Arrrrgghhh!

Theme support is gone again?!?

 

[jfar]

Hi, just a thought, have you got SmartDoctor for your graphic card installed.?

 

[Antman]

Hi, just a thought, have you got SmartDoctor for your graphic card installed.?

No, I do not. At first glance, ATI CCC seems to provide the same functionality, but I have no need to OC my graphics card.

ATI CCC is not running on my machine.

 

[TheRone]

Antman,

FWIW, I'm having the exact same problem. The themes worked fine for about a day after I downloaded and installed the Windows Live photo gallery. The next day.."This computers video card can't play themes".

I'm running Win 7 64 bit on an ASUS P6T Deluxe V2, Core i7 920, 6GB DDR3 1600, Sapphire Vapor-X Radeon HD4870 graphics. I don't think its hardware related either but I don't have a clue where to start troublshooting this one. Any help is appreciated.

By the way, Themes worked fine with Vista 64bit on this same computer.

 

[efishinsea]

1. Right click 'Computer'
2. Select 'Properties'
3. You'll see your Experience Index listed there.
4. Click to re-rate, and then the themes will work again.

 

[JohanA]

It could have been me writing what "TheRone" did. Exactly the same problem, but it's not enough to do what "efishinsea" in Windows 7. I tried, so thanks for the tip anyway.

I think Windows 7 and 4870 not are compatible. I downloaded latests drivers for my card yesterday.

<a href="Windows 7 not compatible with HD4870? picture by JohanL - Photobucket" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/Windows764bitincompatiblewithHD4870.jpg" border="0" alt="Windows 7 not compatible with HD4870?"></a>

 

[torrentg]

I think Windows 7 and 4870 not are compatible. I downloaded latests drivers for my card yesterday.

They are perfectly compatible as are all HD cards.

 

[JohanA]

Thanks for the advise torrentg. I hoped that something maybe had been missed and was hoping it would be settled in e.g. a new release of drivers for the card. But since they are perfectly compatible this is not the case.

Anyone else knows what could create this problem?

 

[torrentg]

Thanks for the advise torrentg. I hoped that something maybe had been missed and was hoping it would be settled in e.g. a new release of drivers for the card. But since they are perfectly compatible this is not the case.

Anyone else knows what could create this problem?

Your video card scores are a little low in WEI, for what they should be. My 3850 gets 7.0 rating for both. Your card should be > 3850.

Check device manager to see what version of the driver you're using and date. Double click the card then go to driver tab, then let us know about it.

 

[chev65]

Maybe just installing the Windows live photo gallery caused this problem to occur.

I can't believe that Antman actually overclocked and I also can't imagine why he would still be using any build other than the 7600.

 

[carlharsch]

Have you done a deep viurs/malware scan?

 

[Frostmourne]

Does dxdiag report any problems? Hardware acceleration turned up? Did you use driver sweeper to properly install new drivers?

 

[JohanA]

Thanks for all of your replies! and sorry for not answering earlier (I actually missed that a page two popped up, I've been here several times).

torrentg:
I have driver version 8.661.0.0.
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/ATIRadeonHD4870PropertiesDriver.jpg
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/ATIRadeonHD4870PropertiesGeneral.jpg

chev65:
I would say that Photo Gallery did not cause any problems, more that I'm trying to find the same Photo Screen savers as in Vista. This is how it looked before Photo Gallery in Windows 7
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/Windows7HomePremium64PhotoScreenSav.jpg
And this is how it looked like in Windows Vista:
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/VistaHomePremium32and64PhotoScreens.jpg

carlharsch:
I'll run AVG-free, AdAware, Spybot and Windows Defender during the night and see, I hope it will be sufficient.

Frostmourne:
Interesting tool! never seen it before. It looks ok as far as I can see it but I add some screen dumps.
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/dxdiag_display.jpg
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/dxdiag_display_64.jpg
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/dxdiag_system.jpg
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/dxdiag_system_64.jpghttp://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/dxdiag_display_64.jpg

 

[Frostmourne]

Uninstall the drivers from control panel, run driver sweeper as admin in safe mode, then reboot into safe mode and install the newest drivers. Update your chipset drivers too.

 

[JohanA]

Thanks. I'll give it a shot tonight.

The virus scans did not find anything.

 

[DaWarden]

I have a theory, but I don't know how to test it...

Windows Live Photo Gallery was released before Windows 7. And I understand the ability to use its screen saver's themes is dependent upon the Windows Experience Index (WEI) Graphics score.

WEI was introduced with Windows Vista. I don't know what the minimum WEI Graphics score is to enable themes, but let's just call that the <minimum WEI Graphics>. In Vista, the maximum WEI score was 5.9. Yet in Windows 7, the maximum WEI score is 7.9.

Is it possible that the themes option is Windows Live Photo Gallery requires a WEI Graphics score between the <minimum WEI Graphics> and 5.9? Meaning, if you have Windows 7 and your WEI Graphics score is *greater* than 5.9 (i.e. between 6.0 and 7.9), perhaps that itself is causing the "Your computer's video card can't play themes"...? In other words, is this a case where Windows Live Photo Gallery just isn't compatible with Windows 7 and high-end video cards?

I ask because I have an NVIDIA GTX-295, and have a WEI Graphics score of 7.8. Yet I have this issue, too.

 

[torrentg]

I have a theory, but I don't know how to test it...

Windows Live Photo Gallery was released before Windows 7. And I understand the ability to use its screen saver's themes is dependent upon the Windows Experience Index (WEI) Graphics score.

WEI was introduced with Windows Vista. I don't know what the minimum WEI Graphics score is to enable themes, but let's just call that the <minimum WEI Graphics>. In Vista, the maximum WEI score was 5.9. Yet in Windows 7, the maximum WEI score is 7.9.

Is it possible that the themes option is Windows Live Photo Gallery requires a WEI Graphics score between the <minimum WEI Graphics> and 5.9? Meaning, if you have Windows 7 and your WEI Graphics score is *greater* than 5.9 (i.e. between 6.0 and 7.9), perhaps that itself is causing the "Your computer's video card can't play themes"...? In other words, is this a case where Windows Live Photo Gallery just isn't compatible with Windows 7 and high-end video cards?

I ask because I have an NVIDIA GTX-295, and have a WEI Graphics score of 7.8. Yet I have this issue, too.

I have 7.0 for both graphics scores in WEI. Gallery works well here. Good thinking but theory doesn't pan out.

 

[JohanA]

torrentg: Can you confirm that you have the theme option available in the Photo screen saver in Windows 7 as shown in Vista below?

So it looks like this (Vista):
Windows Vista with Windows Live Photo Screen saver (see the Theme option):
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/WindowsVista32LivePhotoGalleryPhoto.jpg

And not like this:
Windows 7 with Windows Live Photo Screen saver (see the absence of Theme Option):
http://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/Windows764bitincompatiblewithHD4870.jpghttp://i1016.photobucket.com/albums/af281/JohanL/Windows7PhotoScreensaver.jpg

This is valuable information for narrowing down the problem for us.