[Reactor]

Greetings to all!

My primary machine suffered a devastating motherboard damage, so I'm forced to use the secondary system now - the laptop, and I was happy beyond belief that even if my primary system fails, my laptop still can work perfectly. It had a Windows XP on it, an "altered" version of Windows XP, different in appearance. I don't know exactly what is it called. My laptop is an Acer Extensa 5635Z, so I'm not sure what distorted version of Windows XP was installed on it at the factory (the Start menu was a button with a circle, the system tray was grey and stuff). It worked flawlessly, so I was hoping that my datas are perfectly safe.

I spoke too soon.

When I turned my laptop on, it started to malfunction BIG time after booting. The Winamp opened only after minutes of waiting, and refused to play any of my songs with "Bad DirectSound driver" bullsht error message. I couldn't open My Computer or My Documents, not even the task manager was working! It simply showed an error message when I pressed Ctrl+Alt+Del. All in all, my system was completely crashed, I couldn't open even the simplest files (like TXT ones), and most of the programs didn't work.

I checked my system with MalwareBytes. No infections at all.

After this, and thousands of restartings, I decided that it's time for a full system reinstall. I have a Windows XP SP2 installer CD, which is different from what I had on this pile of junk, but it was an operating system nevertheless. First, I booted from CD, and tried to repair Windows. Didn't work - the two different Windows XP versions conflicted with each other. The next step was my ultimate solution - Format C:, and full system reinstall. Which I did.

Ok, this regular version of Windows XP Professional went up to my laptop without any flaws - this is what I thought first. It was frightening however, that there was no sound indicator at the bottom right corner of the screen (you know,the tiny speaker symbol). OK, I needed to reinstall the hardwares. I used the installer DVD I got along with the laptop, and started to install the previously lost drivers back. And this is where my problem kicked in.

No matter what I do, I simply CAN NOT reinstall my sound card drive and my nVidia 3D card driver back to the laptop under this regular Windows XP! I even downloaded the drivers from Acer customer support website, and they still doesn't work.
The sound card driver says:

"The installation was unsuccessfull: There is no device for this driver"

The nVidia driver says:

"The nVidia installer didn't find drivers which are compatible with the current hardware. The installer now quits."
I even tried connecting these drivers on the DVD with the Device Manager in the Control Panel - no luck. I don't have any money to take this garbage to someone who knows what the problem is, plus, this is my last stand - if this laptop fails to work, nothing more left which I can work on. Can you help me,what should I do to make these thrice cursed sound card and nVidia card to work again? I'm all out of ideas...

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What is shown please on Device Manager for the two items in question.
Pls either list or post a screenshot.
Driver installed. Warnings
Resources used or not using any resources
Name of device

[Macboatmaster]

What is shown please on Device Manager for the two items in question.
Pls either list or post a screenshot.
Driver installed. Warnings
Resources used or not using any resources
Name of device

[Reactor]

What is shown please on Device Manager for the two items in question.
Pls either list or post a screenshot.
Driver installed. Warnings
Resources used or not using any resources
Name of device

Sure thing, I show you right away.

At Screenshot #1, you can see that Control Panel says there is no audio at all.

At Screenshot #2, you can see my device manager. All audio stuffs say that "this device is working properly". At the video cards, nVidia doesn't even show up.

I downloaded the latest drivers from the Acer customer support, but they simply refuse to run! When I try to install them, they bomb out with a message that there is no such hardware, or no hardware is found for these devices.

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[Macboatmaster]

Send screenshot one again please on the AUDIO tab

[Macboatmaster]

http://www.acer.co.u...&CRC=2980211862
This link shows your drives. Are you sure you have downloaded the XP drivers and NOT the vista drivers
When you get to the link choosing notebook, extensa etc on the top bar above the drivers is the O/S it defaults to VIsta. You will note that the driver is different for Vista than for XP.
Make sure you click the arrow to the right of the top bar to change to XP

Edited by Macboatmaster, 22 July 2010 - 04:54 PM.

[Reactor]

Yes, I downloaded the XP drivers from the Acer website. It contained 2 folders - XP & Win2000 and an XP64. None of them works. The "normal" Windows XP installer initializes the application,then gives me the infamous "no device found" error message. The XP64 setup file will not run at all.

I attached the screenshot about the audio tab. As you can see, there is ABSOLUTELY no audio stuff detected, and no matter what I do, the built-in soundblaster and nVidia card simply doesn't work, because the laptop somehow doesn't know they exist...

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[Macboatmaster]

If you did a complete format of the hard drive have you installed the chipset drivers from the Acer site. If not I recommend you do so and then see this
Open My Computer
Right click the HDD carrying Windows
Click Properties
Click Tools
Click Error Checking
Click Check Now
Click to check box automatically fix file system errors
Click Start
You will receive amessage to reschedule for next restart
Click Yes and restart
DO NOT INTERRUPT the chkdsk and then see this:
How Do I Reinstall The Sound Driver?
It may help to refresh the sound driver. To do this click on Start > right click on My Computer > click on Manage. In the window that comes up click on Device Manager and locate the Sound, Video and Game Controllers heading. Click on the + next to the heading and then right-click on the device and go to Uninstall. After uninstalling, reboot and Windows should detect the sound card and reinstall.

Edited by Macboatmaster, 22 July 2010 - 06:27 PM.

[Macboatmaster]

See this please particularly initial boot para 3.
http://www.tweakhoun...allxp_myway.htm

You may find this site useful.
It has all the drivers on one page for your computer
http://www.nodevice..../download.html#

Edited by Macboatmaster, 22 July 2010 - 06:41 PM.