Integrated video works, ATI and Nvidia cards don't. Why?

[lib319]

I got an Asus P5KPL-AM with an Intel E5200, 2 gig of OCZ ram and XP pro. The motherboard has integrated graphics which works as it is supposed too. The other day I thought I would put in an Nvidia 8400 GS card as a step up from the integrated Intel G31 video.

Desktop and Windows Explorer use were fine but whenever I tried to watch TV or play video the computer would hang ending up in me having to reboot, (sometimes other software triggers off this fault but it is guaranteed to happen when opening up the TV card software or trying to run video playback.)

I thought this might be a problem with the card so I changed it to an ATI 4670. This results in the same problem.

The Asus board chooses whichever is set in the bios ie initiate PCI express or integrated or old style PCI so this motherboard appears to not need a specific ‘disable onboard video’ command but will switch between whatever video is set to boot first.

All the drivers seem to be installed ok and device manager sees no conflicts. The ATI card works as it should up to a point. It managed a 3Dmark06 score of over 8000 and works as it should with games.

Switching back to the onboard Intel G31 graphics adaptor will enable me to run video and watch TV and works perfectly.

I thought this was a conflict between the integrated and the installed card but now I’m not sure what it could be. Perhaps the power draw for video or TV is too much for my 450W PSU (although I would have thought 3D Mark would use a lot more juice)

Some headway. Did a full install of everything including codecs and the TV reception is working. Did dxdiag and it reported a Direct Show problem. Put the slider for hardware acceleration to the middle position for disabling direct draw and direct 3d and the card will now play video files.

This full install includes the November Direct X 9c, .net 2, klite codec pack, latest ATI drivers and Catalyst software.

When I test direct draw and direct 3d in dxdiag it passes.

Windows Media Player will let me play video with hardware acceleration turned on.

Is this just a codec problem? Sony Ericson PC Suite hangs the system too.

 

[OCOCOC]

it's probably a PSU problem cos when you are trying to power up the graphic acceleration, wattage demands will boost up and your PSU might not cope with that. my second thought is the driver's problem. you might have not uninstalled the old graphics drivers completely before installing the new ones. Good luck!

 

[hp7909]

That PSU is more than enough for those GFX cards because they don't need the extra PCI-E power.

Just to clarify, you have a TV card? If so, you running latest drivers for that? Think you need to also uninstall its drivers before installing new GFX (& drivers).

But get latest chipset drivers, BIOS, Windows updates, etc. Also try a different codec pack.

 

[Big.Wayne]

I got an Asus P5KPL-AM with an Intel E5200, 2 gig of OCZ ram and XP pro

Hi lib319,

welcome to OcUK Forums, please read the FAQ and enjoy your stay!

I built a system similar to yours a few weeks back, ASUS P5KPL-VM, E5200, Sapphire Radeon HD4670 powered by an ANTEC Earthwatts 380, absolutely 0% issues and worked great!

I didn't have a TV card installed like yours and was using Crucial/Micron D9GMH based memory instead of OCZ.

Not sure the problem is obvious in your scenario, um when running off the Intel® GMA 3100 is the system rock solid stable then? Have you tend some Prime/IBT stability testing (memory, CPU, Chipset etc?).

 

[bledd]

check in the bios, for the vga priority

had the same issue recently when i added a pci-e card to my mum's pc (so i can play tf2 when i go visit )

it was set to 'onboard' only

other options were things like..

pci-e/onboard
pci/onboard

when i change it to pci-e/onboard and rebooted, it kicked in

 

[errata]

The problems seem mostly to concern applications using video decoders, I would strongly suspect you need to check the settings for those applicatins and codecs codecs (if possible) or consider reinstalling those applications. There is a very high chance they something is wrong with the codec/applications use of video overlay/vrm modes.

 

[lib319]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I didn't fix this issue as such. Reinstalled XP with ACPI set in the setup instead of standard computer. Issue hasn't repeated itself.

cheers

lib

 

[lib319]

What sort of 3DMArk score are you getting Big.Wayne? I got over 8000 when I was having the video card issues and now I'm on 6600 with XP running as it should. Odd!

 

[Rroff]

Big.Wayne does your board have any overclocking options in the BIOS? I built a media PC around a similiar P5KPL G31 based board and even with latest BIOS it has none at all - tho as its a media PC that doesn't really matter too much.

 

[Big.Wayne]

The VM doesn't have any voltage options but I can select FSB, Memory divider and timings, basically just enough to push a little extra from the chip using its stock voltages. Clocked an E5200 to 3.0GHz rock solid stable, only clocked it because the board was giving the chip 1.225vCore regardless so I thought may as well use it!

I think the CM has the most options there. All the ASUS G31 boards are great value for money!

 

[Rroff]

I have an Asus T3 barebones with the P5KPL-VM motherboard inside - but the official asus BIOS for this system has no options except to change the memory speed from 533, 800, 1066.