ATI Graphics Crashing

[Dave-H]

Thanks guys, but I am pretty convinced now that it isn't a hardware problem, it only because I've substituted the card, and it made no difference, and also it all works perfectly on Windows XP and Windows 8.1.

There are no relevant BIOS settings that I can see.

 

The problem with going completely over to Nvidia cards, apart from the driver files clashing if I want to be able to use both cards on any of my operating systems, is that I also have an old Canopus DV video capture card, whose editing software uses hardware overlays to display the pictures.

I have never had any success getting this to work with anything other than ATI cards, and even recent models of those don't support it.

I had to put up without it when I had the single AGP Nvidia card fitted on the old motherboard, and it was very annoying not to have it, so I wouldn't want to go back to that, it would be only a very last resort!

 

I might PM rloew now to see if he has any suggestions.

Edited March 3, 2015 by Dave-H

[Drugwash]

There's always a skeleton in the closet.

 

Maybe you should build yourself a secondary machine for a specific purpose, such as video capturing, using perfectly compatible hardware and software, leaving the currently troublesome one to its own tasks with its own compatible hardware and software. Connect the two through a switch or router and you're a happy camper.

Unless there are more skeletons in your closet...

[buyerninety]

I wonder if the actions usually taken to mitigate the ATI 'hardware cursor bug'

might also act to mitigate this problem? (but probably not fix it). Worth a try -

set in Control Panel, Mouse Properties, Display Pointer Trails to 'on' (and its'

slider bar to minimum), and check 'off' Enable Pointer Shadow (then Reboot).

Edited March 5, 2015 by buyerninety

[Dave-H]

Not a gratuitous bump, just wanted to report, for anyone that's still interested, that I now have an ATI X600 card installed, and it doesn't crash!

I had tried an X700 card, and that did crash the same as the X800/X850 cards, but going all the way back to an X600 (the first ATI series that had PCI-E versions) seems to have finally fixed the problem!

Cheers, Dave.

[Drugwash]

So it was a hardware problem after all... sort of.

Glad you got it fixed.

[Dave-H]

Yes, it is very strange.

The only reason I tried earlier versions of the ATI card was because I was having system temperature problems, and I wanted to try a less powerful, and therefore less heat producing, card. My graphics card intensive work like video editing and rendering is all done now under Windows 8.1 with the Nvidia Quadro card, so I don't need a powerful ATI card as well. The ATI card is only really there at all for Windows 98 as there are no 98 drivers for the Quadro card of course.

All the ATI cards I've tried have had the same amount of graphics memory on them (256 MB) and are using the same driver (Catalyst 6.2, the last Windows 98 version) and yet the X800s and the X700 crash, and the X600 doesn't!

Maybe there is something different about how the X600 uses memory or something, I guess we'll never know. I wasn't expecting the X600 to solve the crashing problem, but I'm obviously pleased that it has!

[Drugwash]

Now that you mentioned 256MB of video RAM I'm thinking of Mr. Loew's findings in regard to NVIDIA cards, mentioned in his recent 512MB video patch topic. It's possible the newer ATI use a similar system that actually advertises 512MB while only sporting 256MB, which may lead to issues like you experienced. It's just a hunch though.

Anyway, all's well when it ends well.

[rloew]

That is possible.

If the X700, X800, or X850 doesn't crash when installed with the Standard VGA Driver, write down the Memory Range Resources used and post them.

[LoneCrusader]

Now that you mentioned 256MB of video RAM I'm thinking of Mr. Loew's findings in regard to NVIDIA cards, mentioned in his recent 512MB video patch topic. It's possible the newer ATI use a similar system that actually advertises 512MB while only sporting 256MB, which may lead to issues like you experienced. It's just a hunch though.

Anyway, all's well when it ends well.

 

 

That is possible.

If the X700, X800, or X850 doesn't crash when installed with the Standard VGA Driver, write down the Memory Range Resources used and post them.

 

As far as I know none of these ATI cards came in 512MB versions...

 

It is possible that these "last 9x supported" ATI cards and/or the last 9x driver package have some unresolved bugs with them. ATI only claims official support up to the 9800 XT and doesn't mention ANY X-series card as being supported. I am reminded of the issues I had with a DOS game and the X8xx cards. I don't have any X700 or X600 cards to check for the same issue.

Edited October 19, 2015 by LoneCrusader

[pangoomis]

http://www2.ati.com/drivers/Catalyst_62_ME_release_notes.html

 

They claim BETA support for X8xx and X6xx cards.

 

No X7xx mentioned, yet (only) in the C8_30314.inf they are clearly mentioned: http://s27.postimg.org/reh3gdpgj/Bez_tytu_u.png

 

I think the X8xx/X7xx support was not completed, resulting in the errors you've encountered.

Edited October 19, 2015 by MrMateczko

[Dave-H]

Thanks guys.

I no longer have the X700 card, I returned it to the eBay seller for a refund as there was a hardware problem with it.

Not with the graphics section, which worked fine apart from the crashing on Windows 98, which I expected would probably happen, but the VIVO Rage Theater on-board video capture hardware, which would not accept any drivers, with a "device cannot start" error in Device Manager on all three operating systems.

The capture hardware works fine on the X600 and did on the X800 and X850 cards, so I had to put it down to a hardware problem on the X700 card, even though the seller tried very hard to convince me that it couldn't be that, and had to be a driver problem! Well, I tried many different drivers, and not one worked, so back it's gone. If they get it to work I'll be very surprised!

 

All the cards certainly all worked fine with the basic MS driver, although only at a very low resolution of course.

Next time I have the machine apart I will temporarily put back the X850 and see what memory range resources it's using on Windows 98, and then do the same with the X600 card. Maybe that will provide a clue.

[ragnargd]

I prefer the NVidia 79xx series, as they are faster, use less power, and can be used even with Windows 10, if so desired (i.e. in Multiboot).

 

Do i assume correctly none of them provide that video capture capabilities of the ATI cards?

 

Cheers, Ragnar G.D.

Edited October 28, 2015 by ragnargd

[Dave-H]

If you mean on-board capture hardware, then as far as I know the ATI AVIVO system was unique to them, there was no Nvidia equivalent.