AlexanderK

Greetings all,

After much frustration (), I've decided to come here for some help. I have an older AMD system that I built back in '04 and I just recently upgraded from an nvidia GeForce FX 5900XT to an HIS Radeon X1650GT (Specs Here) to try and squeeze a bit off life out of my system. Anyway, here are the rest of the relevant specs on my system:

Power Supply: Thermaltake Purepower W0100RU ATX 12V 2.0 500W (Specs Here)
Card: HIS Hightech H165GTQT512GDDAN-R Radeon X1650GT 512MB 128-bit (Specs Here) GDDR3 AGP 8X IceQ Turbo
Ram: 1.5GB DDR 400
Processor: AMD Athlon 64 | 3200+
Mobo: ASUS K8V Deluxe 754 VIA K8T800 ATX

When I first installed the card, everything booted properly, I uninstalled my old nvidia drivers, rebooted, then installed the drivers from the disc. After rebooting, I fired up Battlefield 2 to test settings and after about 10 minutes the game locked up. The mouse freezes, and nothing can unfreeze it except a reboot.

Anyway, I attempted to do some things in the 2D environment for a while and to my surprise, boom, it freezes again in Firefox. This time showing a thin red line at the top left of the screen with a blotchy red box where the mouse pointer used to be. Once again, the system is completely locked, even the keyboard lights.

So then I go on a hunt for newer, then older drivers after reading some post, all of which give me the same freezing problem after a random, but short period of time.

I finally stumbled upon the OmegaDrivers. I uninstalled all previous ATI drivers, rebooted and installed this pack. On a positive note, it did allow me to play my game for a good 15 minutes this time before freezing, but yes, it froze again anyway.

I'm wondering what's going wrong here? I have all the requirements for the card (esp the 500w power supply with two 12v rails). Is something overheating? I don't belive it is being overclocked because I'm using all of the default settings. Could it be interacting with one of my other components? What are these red artifacts I saw in the 2D environment???? I am completley lost here (and out a lot of money if this is fubar'd). I would appreciate any help anyone can give me because my system is inoperable right now and I'm forced to use my girlfriend's crappy laptop in the dark while she's not lurking on Facebook.

Seriously, if someone can help me resolve this there is a case of any beer you want in it for you (as long as you live in the bay area)! If not, free props.


Thanks!
A

temeteus82

Hi there and Welcome to DriverHeaven!

You have the newest drivers for your motherboards chipset? And I've read that people with VIA's chipset and AMD's AGP card has a ton of issues. You might want to test the newest official drivers from amd.
Anyway your PSU is ok.
And you could set the AGP mode to 4X in bios to see would that solve the issue.

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tcman

I still suspect the psu, since you already have used the latest omega drivers which includes an agp fix for the ATI AGP videocards.

Yes, it's labled as a 500 Watts psu and there are two 12V rails, but that doesn't say much about the quality of the amps it can deliver and the real wattage and/or amperage. Also if I am right this Thermaltake Purepower 500W W0100RU is a very low-end CWT (ChannelWell) oem.

But the high-end Thermaltake Toughpower series (which are also CWT oems but with much higher quality components) are great power supplies, but also more expensive.

Anyway, what you also can try is disable "AGP fast write" in the bios and see if it solves the problem.

AlexanderK

Thanks for the suggestions guys. I will test both of these theories out and get back to you. What a quick response!

AlexanderK

OK, so I went into the BIOS, turned Fastwrite OFF and AGP speed to 4X.

Same freeze. Happened in around 10 minutes just using Firefox.

Anyway, I think I'll try to get some upgraded chipset drivers today after work and report back.. GRRRRRRRRR!

AlexanderK

Just one quick note in response to tcman regarding the power supply:

In searching the internet for topics relating to this card, I've found that people seem to have gotten this thing to work fine on much smaller, cheaper power supplies (350w-400w!). Not sure if this is true or not, but just something to think about..

AlexanderK

!!!!

Update: I tried booting up in safe mode with networking to track down the newest VIA chipset drivers (as suggested above) and the fricken thing FROZE in Firefox in safe mode!! I can't even use my computer to get new drivers.

Am I screwed here? Should I return the card? Is there some other miracle that can fix this? If I return the card, what would be the best replacement that would work with my system + power supply? (I only have an AGP slot, no PCI-E, and I can't afford to upgrade the entire machine)

Someone please help! I'm going through serious withdrawal!!!

AlexanderK

Ok, just when I thought things couldn't get worse, the unthinkable happened. Windows will not boot because the system file is corrupt. Not in safe mode, not any way. I have to try and repair the installation. I'm guessing my best bet at this point is to try and salvage my files and return the card.

What a nightmare!!!! NEVER BUY THIS CARD. I'm potentially facing losing everything on my hard drive.

Beerdude26

Heh, to be honest, it's probably not the card, but incompatibilities between the card and your motherboard. Or maybe the IRQ settings are kinda messed up...

Anyway, if you think it's an issue with the card, your computer should definitely not freeze in safe mode, because there are no special drivers used for the card at that time.