Problem with GeForce 4 Ti4200

[itjttc]

This one is a doozy. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

I bought a nice new GeForce Ti4200 (128) from Prolink. It arrived, I installed, no problem.
The card produced no signal - though it did power up. The monitor remained blank, and the motherboard beeped 4-5 times, signaling a video error. The system then powered itself off.

I replaced the old card (GeForce 2 MX400) and it worked fine - ruling out a AGP slot problem.
I repeated installing the new card 3 times, same result. I assumed the card was dead and set it back.

The manufacturer was wonderful in taking the card back (Prolink is a good company in my book), tested the card - and suprised me by saying that it worked great. They tested it on a Pentium, and it functions well. So they are sending me a new one free of charge. Nice, eh?

Problem is, it will not work on my system as far as I know. Does anyone have any ideas? The motherboard is a VIA based ASUS A7V133 with a Athlon 1.33 Ghz processor on it. Everything still works well with my old card (also a GeForce) so I have no idea what the problem could be.

Thanks for any help you can offer!
Michael

[iisbob]

Off the top of my head i would say it's a power supply problem, the Geforce 3 > cards require more power than the older G2 cards.

You need at least a 300w PS. You may alwso want to check the forums at ASUS for some answers.

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iisbob

Hike naked!-it gives color to your cheeks!!

[itjttc]

Well, I have a 300w supply - would that be enough for a GeForce 4? (Its a 4 not a 3).

I had worried about that too, but a 300 seems as though it would be enough.

I wish I could figure this one out.

[saphalline]

You did set your desktop settings to the standard VGA settings before replacing the card, right? One way to do this is to go into the display settings > advanced button > change adapter > show all devices. Now pick a standard display type, AGP if available, PCI otherwise, apply settings. This will set your desktop to (I think) 640 x 480 in 16 colors. It looks ugly, but every video card since the 256KB ones will be compatible with it and may ease the transition.

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"No, we do not gnaw on our kitty." - Dr. Evil

[saphalline]

By the way, if you get it to work let me know how well it performs. I'm in the market soon for a Ti 4200 to replace my "aging" http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/wink.gif GF2 Ti, and I'd like to know how much better it would perform vs a GF2-class card.

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"No, we do not gnaw on our kitty." - Dr. Evil

[iisbob]

i said geforce 3 and greater , that's the > symbol. { remember math clas?! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif }

You may want to try and reset your NVRAM ( or BIOS as most people commonly say ) to defualts, insert the new G4 card and try restarting with the original default settings in your BIOS.

This will let the BIOS rebuild it's resource table, it's possible that it just simply didn't recognize the new card off the bat.



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iisbob

Hike naked!-it gives color to your cheeks!!

[Whyzman]

One other thought,

The newer card and drivers might be conflicting with other devices. The A7V133 has some definite ideas about sharing resources.

What other devices do you have plugged in and into which slots?

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May all your dealings in life be win/win!


Whyzman
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Reserved for Punishing Humor...A Pessimist's blood is always B-negative!

[Rick]

Power may still be an issue here.
300 watts on an A7V with what else installed and leaching off the mother board?
Are your fans connected to the M/B or directly to the power supply?
The fans if connected to the M/B leach power down across the buss to a point than it will cause the fans to run slower.
Take into consideration the number of drives , ram, and fans.. That 300 is a minimum .
Add a power hungry AGP card and you may be over taxing the Buss power supply converters

If you have the fans hooked to the M/B try connecting them to the power supply directly
By way of the extra (Unused) drive power connectors

[itjttc]

Still waiting for the card to turn up again, thanks for the suggestions http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif

I did indeed on last install set BIOS to defaults. I did set to Standard VGA Adapter. No luck.

It may indeed be the power supply issue. I did not poke around much inside the case (to see where fans were hooked up) as I did not build this system. So, to avoid screwing my warranty, I pretty much ignored everything else but things that could short the card directly (by touching it).

So, if I still cannot get it to work, maybe a 400w supply will be better.
And sorry I missed the sign, Rick. LOL, I was not paying attention.

[itjttc]

Oh yeah, and the only other thing I have plugged in are my USB mouse, and my soundcard. Thats it.

And if I get it to work, I will 3DMark it and let you know how much better it is than my GF2 http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/smile.gif