Solved Can't use my Radeon 4830 win my HDTV

[brocks]

We just got a new HDTV for Christmas, and the picture is beautiful with both TV and the PC. But my Radeon 4830 won't talk to it. Here's the deal:

- Win7-64 SP1, all important updates applied, plenty of memory, CPU, and disk space.
- Connection from the 4830 to the TV is via VGA cable.
-With the ATI driver disabled, i.e. using Windows generic driver, I can get a bunch of resolutions up to 1600x1200, very sharp and clear.
-With the ATI driver enabled, the screen goes blank between the "Starting Windows" screen and the logon screen. The TV displays a "No Signal!" message.

I've spent the last two days on Google trying to find a fix for it, and the best explanation seems to be here. Apparently I need to get into Device Manager and manually change the monitor to digital flat panel non-pnp. But there is no entry for the monitor in the Device Manager unless you are running on the ATI driver, rather than the Windows driver. And I get no picture when I'm using the ATI driver.

The link I gave above says you need to uninstall and then reinstall the ATI driver, but I can't even get the uninstall to take. After I go into Device Manager and tell it to uninstall and delete the ATI driver, it does so, but then Windows cheerfully reinstalls it the next time I restart. It doesn't give me any option; it just says driver installed.

I tried reinstalling the newest Catalyst driver today, and it didn't help. I then tried deleting that and installing the Windows version of the ATI driver that has been an optional update on Windows Update since last June. That didn't help either. Then I tried booting from a backup image that I took before all this started, and that didn't help either. The only difference was that when Windows stubbornly reinstalled the ATI driver after I deleted it in Device Manager, I got an ATI popup saying it wasn't the right driver. So it's an older driver from God knows where. But it was right enough to give me a black screen after the "Starting Windows" screen.

All versions of the ATI drivers work fine with my OLD monitor, so I know they aren't corrupt. I tried plugging my old monitor back in and then setting the resolution to a nice safe 800x600, but even that won't work with the new TV (although that resolution works if I use the generic driver), so I guess the problem really is that the monitor is not being recognized correctly.

But with the new TV, every time I boot Windows with an ATI driver installed, I get no picture, so I have to restart in Safe Mode and disable the driver. Then it works fine. That tells me that the problem is the driver and not the cable or something, and the generic driver is great for text and office apps, but I can't play games or watch movies with it.

One thing I thought I might try after getting some advice from the experts here -- I can't find anything in C:\Windows\System32\DriverStore dated today, but there were a couple of folders that had ati in the name. If I delete the inf files in all of those, would that prevent Windows from reinstalling an ATI driver, or would it set my PC on fire?

Or can anyone give me some other suggestion, or point me to a website that tells how to fix this?

Thanks for any help.

PS - forgot to mention that if I hit F8 during the bootup and choose "Enable low resolution 640x480" from the repair menu, that doesn't work either. If the ATI driver is enabled, the screen still goes black. However, starting in Safe Mode does work.

 

[scrooge]

have you tryed a hdmi cable? i think that will fix it for you.

scrooge

 

[Qdos]

Not sure an HDMi cable will show the boot process on any screen as surely Windows doesn't have generic drivers onboard for that purpose?

I've had issues with connecting to TV panels in the past. There's no "hardware signature" for Windows to grab, so the device is unrecognised and nothing displays either during boot, or in some cases at all - regardless of using a D-SUB or DViD connection (both of which you would imagine should work).

One television which frustrated me to hell was a Sony Bravia. No matter what I did, and the unit was said to be compatible as a PC monitor, you could not get a signal to display.

There's also the question of what default input the TV reverts to. If the firmware on board tells the TV to look first and foremost for an internal signal then it may require manually switching to the D-SUB/DViD input.

Whenever I've found TV's which won't "play nice" with a PC I've alway's RMA'd them.

 

[brocks]

have you tryed a hdmi cable? i think that will fix it for you.
scrooge

If you read the link I posted, you will see that it doesn't.

 

[brocks]

Not sure an HDMi cable will show the boot process on any screen as surely Windows doesn't have generic drivers onboard for that purpose?

I've had issues with connecting to TV panels in the past. There's no "hardware signature" for Windows to grab, so the device is unrecognised and nothing displays either during boot, or in some cases at all - regardless of using a D-SUB or DViD connection (both of which you would imagine should work).

One television which frustrated me to hell was a Sony Bravia. No matter what I did, and the unit was said to be compatible as a PC monitor, you could not get a signal to display.

There's also the question of what default input the TV reverts to. If the firmware on board tells the TV to look first and foremost for an internal signal then it may require manually switching to the D-SUB/DViD input.

Whenever I've found TV's which won't "play nice" with a PC I've alway's RMA'd them.

The TV works just fine, in several different resolutions, with the generic Windows driver. The problem is the ATI drivers.

I guess my post went on too long to hold a reader's attention. Maybe I'll try simply asking how to keep windows from automatically installing drivers in the install forum.

 

[scrooge]

Not sure an HDMi cable will show the boot process on any screen as surely Windows doesn't have generic drivers onboard for that purpose?

I've had issues with connecting to TV panels in the past. There's no "hardware signature" for Windows to grab, so the device is unrecognised and nothing displays either during boot, or in some cases at all - regardless of using a D-SUB or DViD connection (both of which you would imagine should work).

One television which frustrated me to hell was a Sony Bravia. No matter what I did, and the unit was said to be compatible as a PC monitor, you could not get a signal to display.

There's also the question of what default input the TV reverts to. If the firmware on board tells the TV to look first and foremost for an internal signal then it may require manually switching to the D-SUB/DViD input.

Whenever I've found TV's which won't "play nice" with a PC I've alway's RMA'd them.

mine works fine with the hdmi on my rca tv . but i don't have that same video card .

scrooge

 

[brocks]

Any way to prevent Windows 7-64 from installing a driver at startup?

I posted in detail about my specific problem here, but the responses suggest that I went into so much detail that readers can't figure out what I'm asking.

So let me just ask this:
I am trying to remove the driver for my ATI Radeon graphics card from Win7-64. I go into Device Manger, right click on it, and say "uninstall," then check the box that pops up that says "delete from system." It is uninstalled and deleted.

The problem is, when I restart, Windows automatically reinstalls it. I deleted all the ATI folders from Program Files and Program Files(X86) and tried again, but Windows found an ATI driver somewhere else and installed that. It doesn't ask me, it just does it as soon as it starts up.

Note that I'm not talking about the generic Windows display driver, that's what I want to use (see the post linked above for details). I'm talking about ATI drivers.

Is there any way to prevent Windows from doing this?

 

[Qdos]

The TV works just fine, in several different resolutions, with the generic Windows driver. The problem is the ATI drivers.

Do you have the opportunity to try another, perhaps newer, graphics card is the obvious question then?

mine works fine with the hdmi on my rca tv . but i don't have that same video card .

scrooge

I must admit I've never tried booting to any display using HDMi, but I didn't think Win7 had native drivers for doing so.

 

[Qdos]

Presumably you have used the correct tools to remove the ATi drivers from your system?

Perhaps you should have simply made that your stated objective...

Ati Uninstall Tool | CRYSTALIDEA Software

 

[AllOnTheBus]

Above posts have been heavily modified therefore making this pre edited post
look like a ridiculous idea which is why this meaasgae now appears here- so thanks very much for that!

I do believe that my post originally appeared as the third post at this thread also - don't
know how that works - maybe I'll go and start a thread but when I do I just hope
that it doesn't get bumped down the list making it look like a question about an answer.

 

[Vertex]

What problems do you have with that driver? On the device manager, why don't you just right-click it and disable it rather than uninstalling if Windows keeps reinstalling its driver after reboot anyway.

 

[brocks]

Presumably you have used the correct tools to remove the ATi drivers from your system?

Perhaps you should have simply made that your stated objective...

Ati Uninstall Tool | CRYSTALIDEA Software

I appreciate the response, but I would rather not install a single use tool from someone I haven't heard of. I am looking for a Windows solution, not a third party solution. Thanks anyway.

 

[brocks]

What problems do you have with that driver? On the device manager, why don't you just right-click it and disable it rather than uninstalling if Windows keeps reinstalling its driver after reboot anyway.

The link I gave in the OP explains the problem.

 

[brocks]

Well, I finally got the new TV working by plugging the old monitor back in and then following the procedure from the link in my OP to tell windows it's a non-PNP flat screen monitor. Obviously this wouldn't have worked if my old monitor was broken, rather than just being changed out. I can't believe that with all that has happened in the computer industry, ATI doesn't have a way to let you use new monitor when your old one breaks, but judging from my lack of success in both my own posts and looking at others I found on Google, it really doesn't. I saw a few guys with the same problem who reported that NVidia cards worked could handle this, but ATI cards don't. It seems I would have had to reinstall Windows in order to get ATI to work with my TV.

Anyway, I now have a great picture at 1680x1050 and several smaller resolutions, but I thought I should be able to get 1920x1080. THAT problem is probably specific to my TV, which is a new model, so I won't bother people here with it.

Thanks to everyone who responded; I appreciate your efforts.