[Swiss Tony]

Hi,

I am a bit of a noob with graphics cards so would appreciate any help.

I get really bad colour flickering when playing LotR: Battle for Middle Earth.

I appreciate my system is only just man enough to play the game but graphically it is OK - it is just that the colours flicker horrendously which really hurts the eyes. It get it on the intro movies, especially the company logos on startup, the menu screens and the game itself.

I have tried fiddling with as many of the settings that look like they will help but to no avail.

I do get the same problem with Diablo II but only to a very minor degree - just on the "health ball" especially when I am poisoned and it is green.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Swiss Tony

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please post your system specs:
if you need help please check the pinned topics in this forum

are you running and lcd monitor or a normal crt monitor. if crt have you tried adjusting your refresh rates?

[starjax]

please post your system specs:
if you need help please check the pinned topics in this forum

are you running and lcd monitor or a normal crt monitor. if crt have you tried adjusting your refresh rates?

[Swiss Tony]

Hi

Thanks for responding.

I did put the specs on my profile and assumed that would do. I've attached the txt file that System spec produced.

Summary here anyway:
AMD Duron 1300
GeForce FX5200
Win 2000
LG L1750S LCD display.
I don't know the motherboard or chipset details and System Spec hasn't listed them either.

My monitor is now now also going to Power Save Mode on startup - just before displaying the wallpaper and icons. It stayed on the third time I started up earlier.

I have only recently upgraded from a Riva TNT2 32Mb graphics card which never gave me any problems but obviously wasn't up to much at all.

I have noticed that SysSpec is listing both my current and old graphics card although neither the device manager or hardware wizard list the old one. I am conscious that I did not uninstall the old card first and this might be causing a problem.

Like I said I'm a noob and need all the help I can get!!

It is probably also worth mentioning that straight after installing the drivers on the disk that came with the FX5200 I downloaded the latest drivers from the nVidia site but experienced serious lag while playing Diablo II with more than one or two creatures on the screen. Reverting to the drivers on the disk cured this but I still have the colour problem.

Looking forward to your reply.

Cheers

Swiss Tony

Attached Files

•  SysSpec.txt   1.07KB   127 downloads

[starjax]

lets try everest to see if we can find out what your chipset is:
http://www.geekstogo...a...ails&f_id=9

the newer nvidia drivers require the gart driver to be updated. this is part of the chipset drivers.

[Swiss Tony]

Hi

I downloaded Everest. By the way there was an error in the link on the "Everest" button. It had geekstogo spelt as geelstogo

Everest tells me my motherboard is PCChips ML810R, system summary report attached.

It also tells me that my AGP is currently running at 2x but my card supports up to 8x. I had a look around to see if I could find how to change this but couldn't. I hope this is not the highest my board will support. I recall that my old TNT2 was 2x and I hope that the current setting has been left over from that. Maybe this is the problem.

I will look for updated motherboard drivers while I wait for your next advice. I have learnt things already so thanks even if I don't get any further!

Swiss Tony

Attached Files

•  Everest_System_Summary_Report.txt   18.32KB   133 downloads

[starjax]

first go to http://sis.com/download. select your os, gart driver and then download it and install it.

If your are using a pc chips board then our options are probably limited. You should be able to go into the bios during bootup by hitting "delete key". or something like that. It varies from mb maker to mb maker.

It will probably be under advanced settings. hopefully you can change your settings. for agp.

[Swiss Tony]

Hi,

I installed the gart drivers even though it didn't list my SiS 730S chipset in the supported list. It doesn't seem to have caused any problems but doesn't seem to have helped either. Everest is still saying supported modes are 1x and 2x. The PCChips website does say though that it should support 4x. I have also in the meantime updated the motherboard drivers.

You are right to say that my options in the BIOS are limited. The only AGP options I can find are to specify the primary graphics adapter (PCI or AGP). I could update the BIOS I suppose but I have always been very nervous of doing this given the possibility of turning my computer into scrap metal. Unless you think this is worthwhile I will hold off on doing so (don't worry that I will try to hold you accountable if you advise me to do it and it all goes horribly wrong! The final choice is mine )

I am beginning to lose patience with all this and I am thinking of reverting to plan B - I have some money coming to me soon and had a plan to build something really nice from scratch - dual core processor - dual graphics cards - dual monitors.

I would add a ton of disk space to my old machine and use it as a server - minimal graphics requirement! I am worried a little worried though that the old spec (IDI) might slow the network down against a new super-machine.

On the subject of dual graphics cards - when I last read up on it the jury was still out on Crossfire vs SLI. Opinion was that Crossfire might come out on top and I liked that you wouldn't need matched cards. At that point there were very few Crossfire motherboards out.

I live in Switzerland now and finding english langauge computer magazines is near impossible. I need to sort out an international subscription to a mag (probably MicroMart) but wondered in the meantime if you had an opinion you would like to share with me? As for my choice of processor - AMD is a given. Money will not be a issue (within reason!)

Once again thanks for all your help even if the problem doesn't get resolved. I really appreciate that there are so many experts out there willing to give their time to help.

Swiss Tony

[starjax]

I definately think upgrading is your best option.

Intel: new platform is soon to be released. price points are not known yet. expectations are high, but no one can publish real info yet on it. gotta love the NDA's.

amd; the am2 was just released. msi and gigabyte have gotten good reviews. Those are my personal choices. I would go with the latest nvidia chipset for the platform. It offers a lot to the am2 platform.

video: nvidia or ati. your choice. just get the best you can afford. Realize that after 3-6 months either the prices will be cheaper or something new will be out. Most likely both.

I understand that newegg is looking to expand into europe. If they do then that will be a good thing for you. until then read up on the info. being informed is your best option.

http://anandtech.com/

http://tomshardware.com/

I think anand maintains a more objective and unbiased view. Tom's hardware tends to be more opinionated and is european centric. Both have lots of good info.

now 5 months ago I built an amd x2 3800, 1 gig of ram, 80gig sat hdd, 250 gig sata drive, evga nvidia 7800gt /256mgs ram. It runs really good and fast. easily outperforms my 2.66ghz p4 that I own. My motivation to upgrade was pci-express so I could enjoy the latest in video cards.

I almost forgot to mention that you would be better off going with 2 gigs of ram or more. That coupled with a fast processor and video card will allow you to run Vista when its released, should you choose to do so.