Graphics Card Problem - NVIDIA GeForce 8800GTS

[mirrorman]

Hello…
This is my first time on the forum, thanks in advance for your help.
I have a GeForce 8800 GTS graphics card in a machine that I built and I can’t get the graphic card to work properly. I’ve installed and enabled the drivers – when I reboot the machine, I get the Windows 7 startup screen and then it goes blank. I reboot in Safe Mode – disable drivers – reboot, and it works fine with the integrated onboard drivers. My 6yr old HP monitor is connected to the graphics card using a DVI to VGA adapter (would this cause a problem? I was told no). The motherboard doesn’t have a dedicated video output, so the video I’m getting from integrated drivers is passing through this card. Everything in the machine is working fine except for this problem. I’m not a gamer, but I would eventually like to do video work on this machine and would like to get this card to work properly. In a couple of weeks I will have the opportunity to put this card in another machine but until then is there anything I can do to diagnose the problem?

OS – Windows 7 Ultimate Service Pack 1
CPU Type - DualCore AMD Athlon 64 X2, 2600 MHz (13 x 200) 5200+
Motherboard - Gigabyte GA-M57SLI-S4 / Latest Bios
Motherboard Chipset - nVIDIA nForce 570 SLI, AMD Hammer
System Memory - 3328 MB (DDR2-800 DDR2 SDRAM)
Video Adapter & 3D Accelerator – nVIDIA GeForce 8800GTS – Windows 7 compatible
Corsair TX650W power supply

 

[bobkn]

"Integrated drivers" - I suppose that you mean the generic Windows VGA drivers.

Has your hardware ever worked in Windows 7?

Windows 7 is pretty good at including drivers, but it may not include drivers for your nVidia nForce 570 SLI chipset. (I had that with my nVidia/AMD laptop.)

They're available at www.nvidia.com. Make sure that you get the correct bit depth (32 bit, from what you've posted), and the AMD version (not Intel).

NVIDIA DRIVERS 15.58 WHQL

 

[mirrorman]

"Integrated drivers" - I suppose that you mean the generic Windows VGA drivers. Yes

Has your hardware ever worked in Windows 7? No...It did work with Vista

Windows 7 is pretty good at including drivers, but it may not include drivers for your nVidia nForce 570 SLI chipset. (I had that with my nVidia/AMD laptop.) The NVIDIA Smart Scan tool says I have the latest motherboard driver.

If the graphics card was shot would it still pass through video from the generic drivers??

 

[bobkn]

"Integrated drivers" - I suppose that you mean the generic Windows VGA drivers. Yes

Has your hardware ever worked in Windows 7? No...It did work with Vista

Windows 7 is pretty good at including drivers, but it may not include drivers for your nVidia nForce 570 SLI chipset. (I had that with my nVidia/AMD laptop.) The NVIDIA Smart Scan tool says I have the latest motherboard driver.

If the graphics card was shot would it still pass through video from the generic drivers??

No.

There is no video to "pass through".

 

[James7679]

Have you tried hooking something (tv) to the other video out on the card? You may need a vga cable for the initial setup.

 

[mirrorman]

Have you tried hooking something (tv) to the other video out on the card? You may need a vga cable for the initial setup.

Hooked up LCD TV with VGA input - same results. I believe TV was getting some type of signal because resolution parameters appeared on screen (1024 X 768).

 

[James7679]

A couple of questions, has this card worked correctly previously? If so, did it stop working after you updated the BIOS or after you updated the GPU driver?

Here's the thing, the card is working. Since you are seeing the post screen and Win7 splash screen, you probably have a bad driver. Try booting into safe mode with networking and uninstall the GPU(go into device manager and right click the GPU and select uninstall). Then go to Drivers - Download NVIDIA Drivers and click on "update drivers" this will automatically find the appropriate drivers for your system.

 

[mirrorman]

A couple of questions, has this card worked correctly previously? If so, did it stop working after you updated the BIOS or after you updated the GPU driver? It worked with Vista, hasn't worked w/ Win7. I rebuilt computer with new 1TB HDD and new 4 GB memory, upgraded from Vista to Win 7. BIOS and GPU have been updated.

Here's the thing, the card is working. Since you are seeing the post screen and Win7 splash screen, you probably have a bad driver. Try booting into safe mode with networking and uninstall the GPU(go into device manager and right click the GPU and select uninstall). Then go to Drivers - Download NVIDIA Drivers and click on "update drivers" this will automatically find the appropriate drivers for your system.

I'll give this a shot.

 

[mirrorman]

Didn't work. When the machine rebooted after I uninstalled drivers it would reinstall the original drivers before I had a chance to install the latest version. I scanned the computer to see where these were being launched from but I couldn't find it.

Here's the Everest summay for the Graphics Card:

nVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS Video Adapter
nVIDIA GeForce 8800 GTS 3D Accelerator

[ PCI Express 1.0 x16: EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB ]

Graphics Processor Properties:
Video Adapter..... EVGA e-GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB
BIOS Version..... 60.80.0A.00.01
GPU Code Name..... G80GTS
PCI Device..... 10DE-0193 / 3842-C821 (Rev A2)
Transistors..... 681 million
Process Technology..... 90 nm
Die Size..... 484 mm2
Bus Type..... PCI Express 1.0 x16 @ x16
Memory Size..... 640 MB
GPU Clock (Geometric Domain)..... 198 MHz (original: 513 MHz)
GPU Clock (Shader Domain)..... 1188 MHz (original: 1188 MHz)
RAMDAC Clock..... 400 MHz
Pixel Pipelines..... 20
TMU Per Pipeline..... 1
Unified Shaders..... 96 (v4.0)
DirectX Hardware Support..... DirectX v10
Pixel Fillrate..... 3960 MPixel/s
Texel Fillrate..... 9504 MTexel/s

Memory Bus Properties:
Bus Type..... GDDR3
Bus Width..... 320-bit
Real Clock..... 396 MHz (DDR) (original: 792 MHz)
Effective Clock..... 792 MHz
Bandwidth..... 30.9 GB/s

 

[bobkn]

You could try Driver Sweeper:

Guru3D - Driver Sweeper

in Safe mode. That won't just uninstall the drivers - it'll delete them.

When you restart, the generic Microsoft VGA drivers should install.

(Note: I think that this tool is OK for nVidia drivers, but I'm leery of using it with AMD/ATI. I worry that it gets rid of some files that it should not.)

 

[James7679]

Did you
1. Boot into safe mode with networking?
2. While still in safe mode with networking, uninstall the gpu and delete the drivers?
3. While still in safe mode with networking, log into nvidia driver updater and scan for correct driver?
4. While still in safe mode with networking, install the new drivers, using the "clean install" option?

 

[mirrorman]

Did you
1. Boot into safe mode with networking? Yes
2. While still in safe mode with networking, uninstall the gpu and delete the drivers? Yes - Also used Driver Sweeper to get rid of left overs
3. While still in safe mode with networking, log into nvidia driver updater and scan for correct driver? Yes
4. While still in safe mode with networking, install the new drivers, using the "clean install" option? Tried....I got this message "NVIDIA Installer cannot continue
This graphics driver could not find compatible graphics hardware"

Computer reverts to Windows drivers - WDDM v1.1, which I also have to disable. I tried a clean install while Windows was running normally, and when I rebooted I saw Win7 welcome screen and it went black again, but I did see some flickers of light on the bottom of the screen. On a Nvidia blog, a comment to a similar problem suggested it may be the refresh rate or resolution??

 

[James7679]

Hmm, I wonder if windows is just failing to load the drivers for the GPU. Go into safe mode and open an elevated command prompt and type sfc /scannow

As for refresh rate and res, I don't think that's your issue. Windows should default to 800x600 for a new install and then you would have to change it after.

And finally, are you sure you have the card installed correctly? Do you have the 6 pin Plug connected for power on the card?

 

[mirrorman]

Scan came back clean......Card is connected correctly in the pci-e plug is connected

 

[mirrorman]

I've seen post on different sites about "Black Screen of Death" in Windows 7 when generic MS drivers aren't used. Has anyone hear heard of this, and is there a fix that may help me out. Thanks........

 

[writhziden]

I have been following this thread with interest as I am trying to diversify my area of help. I do have a suggestion that has not yet been tried. Since you mentioned in your original post that you are using an older monitor and were told it would work, I got the impression that you may be somewhat skeptical about this being the case.

Have you tried a different monitor or a television to see if you have the same problem?

 

[mirrorman]

I have hooked it up to a new LCD TV. Same thing. As with my monitor, I have to use a DVI to VGA adapter.

 

[James7679]

Have you had multiple displays hooked up at once? I am remembering an issue I had with a 9800/750i sli mobo, that I needed to have two displays hooked up to the GPU to get it set up correctly. I know it sounds weird, but give it a shot. Also, I don't remember, does your MoBo have a vga out?

 

[mirrorman]

I haven't tried 2 monitors at once - I'll give it a try. MOBO doesn't have vga out.

 

[James7679]

Any luck?