Best Graphics Card With Win98SE Drivers?

[rloew]

I have a 7950GT with 512MB RAM and have never been able to get it to work in Win98, even ith rloew's patch

Partly, I can't get any driver to recognize the card, but it may be a problem with the 512MB thing.

One problem I have is, for some reason, my Win98's VMM32.VXD is not recognized by his patch so I had to kludge it...

If you get it working, I'd love to see the steps you went through.

At the moment I have 3 cards in here (Well, 4 technically; Voodoo2 SLI, Radeon 9200SE PCI and the 7950GT AGP!) so I can boot between Linux, Win2k and Win98 and still play all my games!

I would like to know what you did to "kludge" my Patch. Was your configuration normal or did you have an atypical VMM32.VXD File. What is the size of the VMM32.VXD File?

Only the Unofficial 82.69 Version of the NVIDIA Driver will recognize the 7950 Card. The 77.72 and 81.98 Versions need the Device ID added to the .INF File.

[Cyker]

Well, by 'kludge' I mean rloew ended up having to send me a VMM32 that would patch and I've been using that ever since (This was some time in 2008!)

I can't seem to find where I backed up my original (eek!), but according to the e-mail I sent the VMM32 I had was 2,228,235bytes. The one I'm using atm is 472,564bytes and has been patched.

I think the current version of patchmem I have is 6.1

I bought it because I wanted to be able to have 2GB RAM for my Linux and Win2k partitions. I'd been one of the lucky people able to use 1GB without any problems or hacks aside from the vcache limiter, but with >1GB rloew's kickass patch is really the only way to go!

As for drivers!

Ones I have tried include:

+ One with an archive name "nVidia GeForce 7xxx Hacked Driver.GF678_98ME.exe" that I got from the some laptops forum (19,161,143 bytes)

+ A set of 82.69-based drivers made by someone called ZakMcKracken

+ An 82.16-based driver from BFG which they hacked to support their 7800GS (But not the 7950 by the looks of things!)

+ Several different versions of the NV8269 from the mdgx website

They all install (Either they detect the card or I force '98 to use n the case of the BFG driver) but with all I am greeted by the nasty 640x480@4 screen of... VGA failure!

As you can see I've had a few goes at it, but I've yet to read or hear about anyone getting a 7950GT w/512MB RAM work in Win98 (As opposed to those smug 256MB owners! )

I must admit, by the time rloew's /a mode came out, I'd pretty much given up and gone down the multi-card-per-OS route so I didn't give it much of a test, but if you get it working please tell us!

You will bring hope to this random internet person!

TBH tho', I'm slowly (*very* slowly admittedly) trying to move over to Linux. About the only thing I use Win98 for now is for older games like MechWarrior 3 that doesn't work properly on any other OS...)

(Whew, thank smeg for the forum post saver! Dang thing timed out while I was typing this... thought I'd lost the whole post!! )

Edited June 22, 2010 by Cyker

[rloew]

As for drivers!

Ones I have tried include:

+ One with an archive name "nVidia GeForce 7xxx Hacked Driver.GF678_98ME.exe" that I got from the some laptops forum (19,161,143 bytes)

+ A set of 82.69-based drivers made by someone called ZakMcKracken

+ An 82.16-based driver from BFG which they hacked to support their 7800GS (But not the 7950 by the looks of things!)

+ Several different versions of the NV8269 from the mdgx website

They all install (Either they detect the card or I force '98 to use n the case of the BFG driver) but with all I am greeted by the nasty 640x480@4 screen of... VGA failure!

As you can see I've had a few goes at it, but I've yet to read or hear about anyone getting a 7950GT w/512MB RAM work in Win98 (As opposed to those smug 256MB owners! )

I don't think the 512MB is the issue. I have successfully used a 7200 GS 512MB with Windows 98.

More likely, the 512MB Card has a newer Device ID that is not in the .INF File.

You can get the Device ID by Pausing the BIOS when it shows the PCI Device List. It will be listed as a "Display Controller" and the Vendor ID will be 10DE.

The 82.69 Driver recognizes only one version of the 7950 GT. Post the result and I will tell you how to edit the .INF file.

[dencorso]

Or he can use one of Craig's PCI programs to get Device ID in DOS or Win 2k, directly from the PCI Bus.

[Dave-H]

Well, my card has arrived!

I'm going away for a few days, so I won't be trying to install it until the beginning of next week.

One slightly puzzling thing.

It is an actual nVidia card, not badged by someone else, and the box says "Drivers included for Windows 2000, XP, XP (64bit), Vista", which is what I expected.

However, in the box is a CD which says on it "nVidia VGA Card Driver version:7.0" which claims to include a Windows 9x driver!

There is also in the box an installation instruction leaflet which has instructions for Windows 9x installation!

It does look very much like a generic leaflet and disk though, and when I unpacked the Windows 9x installation file on the CD (which is version 56.64) there was actually no mention of the 7950 in the inf file!

So, why are they including software with the card which won't actually work with it, at least not under Windows 98?!

At least that explains why the seller stated that it included Windows 98 drivers.

It does, they just won't work with that card!

Anyway, I will open the machine up on Monday and see how it goes!

Wish me luck.....

[Cyker]

Device ID is 02E4.

I don't think the problem is the drivers; As I said, they mostly detect the card okay (I tried it just now and it instantly detected it as a "NVIDIA GeForce 7950 GT AGP". It even detects the monitor attached to the card and everything!)

The problem is when you reboot the machine, it hangs after "Starting Windows 98... blah blah completing installation etc." appears and you have to boot safe mode and delete the card (Can't disable graphics cards in safe mode! :angrym:) and stop it installing again to get '98 to boot, otherwise it keeps hanging "Starting Windows 98...".

It does this whether the card is primary or secondary. If it's secondary, I can see that the card has been initialized (There is a nice text saying something along the lines of "If you can read this Win98 has initialized the card correctly and you may use it once the system finishes loading", but of course it has hung by this time and just sits there...

If Dave-H can get it to work I might try removing all the other cards to see if that helps, but it's a bit of a palava and I'm pretty pessimistic so I'll wait and see how he gets on first...

@Dave-H - LOL! Sounds like you got the same card I did!!

Mine looks exactly like this one:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/nVidia-GeForce-7950-GT-7950GT-512MB-AGP-DVI-Video-Card-/360273503903?cmd=ViewItem&pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item53e1f9669f

Edited June 23, 2010 by Cyker

[Dave-H]

@Dave-H - LOL! Sounds like you got the same card I did!!

Mine looks exactly like this one:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/nVidia-GeForce-7950-GT-7950GT-512MB-AGP-DVI-Video-Card-/360273503903?cmd=ViewItem&pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item53e1f9669f

Yes, although there's no picture of it, it does sound like exactly the same thing!

They claim it's got Windows 98 drivers too I see!

I paid £85 for mine from amazon.co.uk BTW, including postage.

I do think your problem is very likely not having the latest version of Rudolph's patch installed properly.

I'll let you know how I get on when I try installing it on Monday with the latest version of the patch.

If it works for me, it should for you!

Edited June 23, 2010 by Dave-H

[Cyker]

I wish you good luck!!

:

[rainyd]

I have a question (mainly to rloew): it's technically possible to install PCI-E graphic card with 512 MB of VRAM (e.g. HD 5670) using bearwindows Universal VESA/VBE driver (with help of your patch too)?

[rloew]

@Dave-H - LOL! Sounds like you got the same card I did!!

Mine looks exactly like this one:

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/nVidia-GeForce-7950-GT-7950GT-512MB-AGP-DVI-Video-Card-/360273503903?cmd=ViewItem&pt=PCC_Video_TV_Cards&hash=item53e1f9669f

Yes, although there's no picture of it, it does sound like exactly the same thing!

They claim it's got Windows 98 drivers too I see!

I paid £85 for mine from amazon.co.uk BTW, including postage.

I do think your problem is very likely not having the latest version of Rudolph's patch installed properly.

I'll let you know how I get on when I try installing it on Monday with the latest version of the patch.

If it works for me, it should for you!

I have my doubts about using the /A and/or /M options to resolve NVidia Card problems. It was of no help with an 8400 Card or to use a 7200 GS with the 77.72 Driver Version. I added the /A Option after running some tests on an ATI Card Driver.

Edited June 23, 2010 by rloew

[dencorso]

Let me understand this right: The NVIDIA GeForce 7950 GT AGP with 512 MiB RAM would normally take 512 MiB in the System Arena (i. e., somewhere at adresses comprised between 0xC0000000 and 0xFFFFFFFF). Using the /A switch would move this AGP addresses to the Shared Arena, uncluttering the System Arena. Do you envisage problems due to a half-full Shared Arena? I cannot right now reread those old threads (but will do so soon)... did you reinvestigate the 512 MiB video problem since then?

[rloew]

Let me understand this right: The NVIDIA GeForce 7950 GT AGP with 512 MiB RAM would normally take 512 MiB in the System Arena (i. e., somewhere at adresses comprised between 0xC0000000 and 0xFFFFFFFF). Using the /A switch would move this AGP addresses to the Shared Arena, uncluttering the System Arena. Do you envisage problems due to a half-full Shared Arena? I cannot right now reread those old threads (but will do so soon)... did you reinvestigate the 512 MiB video problem since then?

When I first heard about the 512MB Problem, I ran some tests on an ATI All-In-Winder 128 PRO AGP Card. I observed that it immmediately allocated 128MiB of System Area Space. I knew that this would be a major problem at 512MiB. I have not seen the Shared Arena get used so heavily, so I added the /A Option in the hope that it would help. When I finally obtained a 512MiB NVidia Card, with Windows 98 Drivers, I observed that this did not occur. I assume that the Driver banks the AGP Aperture using a smaller window to avoid tying up resources. This is why I DON'T think the /A option will help.

[dencorso]

I have tried a 512MB 8400GS in my ECS 6100SM and Gigabyte MA78GM Computers with the 82.69 Drivers. Both crashed in bootup on the second initialization of NVCORE.VXD. The Motherboard Video on the ECS 6100SM also failed in the same manner, regardless of AGP Aperture size.

Tests with a 512MB 6200 show that the VRAM size is not an issue with the 77.72 or 81.98 Drivers, so it is unlikely an issue with the 82.69 Drivers.

Unlike my 128MB ATI Radeon card, these drivers do not allocate all of the AGP space at one time. This is the likely cause of problems using 512MB Graphics cards, that other people have reported, since this would exhaust System Arena Memory unless the File Cache is made very small. I also tried reducing File Cache without result.

I'm now looking at the old threads, so I've singled out that relevant old post by RLoew to quote here just for easier reference for everybody involved.

That said, the existing unsolved problems are:

(1) There is no known driver for 9x/ME that supports any Series 8 or higher nVidia Cards (which is not relevant here).

and

(2) No one has ever got any nVidia Cards having more than 256 MiB to work with 9x/ME.

To solve problem (1) would require other yet unknown unofficial drivers to surface (very unlikely) or extensive reverse engineering of the extant XP and 9x drivers, followed by the correct porting of the new capabilities to the 82.69 driver (a possible but substantial work, even more unlikely to ever be undertaken).

Problem (2) may require more intensive testing, but still seems to be possible to solve completely, either by relocating memory or by somehow reversibly disabling part of it before loading windows 9x/ME (hence making it behave as a 256 MiB VRAM card, only for 9x/ME).

[rloew]

I have tried a 512MB 8400GS in my ECS 6100SM and Gigabyte MA78GM Computers with the 82.69 Drivers. Both crashed in bootup on the second initialization of NVCORE.VXD. The Motherboard Video on the ECS 6100SM also failed in the same manner, regardless of AGP Aperture size.

Tests with a 512MB 6200 show that the VRAM size is not an issue with the 77.72 or 81.98 Drivers, so it is unlikely an issue with the 82.69 Drivers.

Unlike my 128MB ATI Radeon card, these drivers do not allocate all of the AGP space at one time. This is the likely cause of problems using 512MB Graphics cards, that other people have reported, since this would exhaust System Arena Memory unless the File Cache is made very small. I also tried reducing File Cache without result.

I'm now looking at the old threads, so I've singled out that relevant old post by RLoew to quote here just for easier reference for everybody involved.

That said, the existing unsolved problems are:

(1) There is no known driver for 9x/ME that supports any Series 8 or higher nVidia Cards (which is not relevant here).

and

(2) No one has ever got any nVidia Cards having more than 256 MiB to work with 9x/ME.

To solve problem (1) would require other yet unknown unofficial drivers to surface (very unlikely) or extensive reverse engineering of the extant XP and 9x drivers, followed by the correct porting of the new capabilities to the 82.69 driver (a possible but substantial work, even more unlikely to ever be undertaken).

Problem (2) may require more intensive testing, but still seems to be possible to solve completely, either by relocating memory or by somehow reversibly disabling part of it before loading windows 9x/ME (hence making it behave as a 256 MiB VRAM card, only for 9x/ME).

Part 1 of that quote is still true.

Part 2 is out of date.

Almost immeditely after I said it, I heard that at least one person had succeeded.

Subsequently, I was able to use a 512MiB 6200 Card, and more recently, a 512 MiN 7200 PCI-E Card.

Apparently NVidia already implements your second suggestion for issue #2 by not loading all Memory at one time.

[Zollex]

Hello? You know if I can exchange on the fly with the integrated video card agp? That way I could use the Intel integrated on win98 without unplugging your video card agp.