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Dell Dimension 4600 and new Video Card


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#16
Macboatmaster

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Well I am sorry

New power supply installed, same problem. No signal.


BUT I did say on post 8

Before you buy the PSU - to try and ensure you are not wasting money - lets try and establish that the rest of the system is OK


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#17
Troy

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Have you run a memory diagnostic yet? I find boot issues are often caused by faulty RAM.
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#18
Moose78

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Macboatmaster, no worries on the psu, only $30. It's just frustrating that something so simple is being so difficult.

@ Troy, replaced all the RAM several months ago.
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#19
Macboatmaster

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Many versions of that card had a separate POWER connector to ensure direct power from the PSU and NOT therefore reliant on the power supply from the AGP slot.
See this - and check if yours does. and if so of course do you have it connected.
Posted Image


Secondly if that computer came with onboard graphics have you tried those, ie the integrated grpahics on the motherboard as against a card in the Advanced Graphics Port - AGP.

The connection for the monitor on the integrated graphics will if it exists be on the I/O plate, rather than where the monitor presently connects, below the I/O plate.
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#20
Moose78

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Yes, power cable for card is hooked up and I've turned off the onboard graphics. It is literally hit or miss when it does finally work. I've adjusted the agp memory settings in the BIOS, again, hit or miss. Once it does work, it works fine until the pc is powered down.
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#21
Macboatmaster

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Altering settings in BIOS on a hit and miss basis is NOT a good idea.
Especially if you do NOT know what they were before you started AND all the more so if there is NOT an Auto ability.


Yes, power cable for card is hooked up and I've turned off the onboard graphics.

Read my previous please -

Secondly if that computer came with onboard graphics have you tried those, ie the integrated graphics on the motherboard as against a card in the Advanced Graphics Port - AGP.


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#22
Moose78

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I'm running it with the onboard graphics now; it works fine with the other card as well(pny geforce 6200). As far as the settings I'm adjusting in Bios; there are only two of them. I changed the setting for the graphics (Legacy control) from auto to agp. And the other is the agp memory settings; ranging from 32mb-256mb; it's worked at different times on the 32mb,64 mb, and 256 mb. The default settings for all of these are 128 mb and auto. Those are the only settings in Bios I've ever adjusted.

So I'm still lost as to why the card works sometimes and not others, thus my "hit and miss" comment. All the connections appear to be in good condition and connected properly as well; all drivers are up to date.
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#23
Macboatmaster

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There are facilities in BIOS, depending on your motherboard to alter memory timings and voltages etc. - THEY are to the inexperienced a DEATH TRAP.
Basically they are part of the overclocking procedure - to try and achieve the best - by driving the components to their limit.

I thought originally that it was to this you referred.

You can leave the AUTO on auto.
That means, most likely although you would have to check the manual for the computer, that if a card is inserted in the AGP slot, it will,use that card, if there is NOT a card it will use the onboard graphics.

The memory settings for the AGP slot are not really of that importance with that card. There were actually as far as I can ascertain either 256 ram or 512 ram available on that card. That is the actual memory chip on the card and NOT related to your physical ram in the computer.
Without getting two technical it will make little difference what you set it at for the AGP memory 128 would be best.
This is the definitive guide to the issue.

This BIOS feature does two things. It selects the size of the AGP aperture and it determines the size of the GART (Graphics Address Relocation Table).

The aperture is a portion of the PCI memory address range that is dedicated for use as AGP memory address space while the GART is a translation table that translates AGP memory addresses into actual memory addresses which are often fragmented. The GART allows the graphics card to see the memory region available to it as a contiguous piece of memory range.

Host cycles that hit the aperture range are forwarded to the AGP bus without need for translation. The aperture size also determines the maximum amount of system memory that can be allocated to the AGP graphics card for texture storage

Please note that the AGP aperture is merely address space, not actual physical memory in use. Although it is very common to hear people recommending that the AGP aperture size should be half the size of system memory, that is wrong!

The requirement for AGP memory space shrinks as the graphics card's local memory increases in size. This is because the graphics card will have more local memory to dedicate to texture storage. So, if you upgrade to a graphics card with more memory, you shouldn't be "deceived" into thinking that you will need even more AGP memory! On the contrary, a smaller AGP memory space will be required.

It is recommended that you keep the AGP aperture around 64MB to 128MB in size, even if your graphics card has a lot of onboard memory. This allows flexibility in the event that you actually need extra memory for texture storage. It will also keep the GART (Graphics Address Relocation Table) within a reasonable size.



On all the evidence available NOW if that card WORKS perfectly, albeit it may not provide the quality of graphics that the 7600GT will, then either the 7600GT is faulty OR there is a driver issue etc relating to it.

Do you still have the details of where you purchased the card from - I would like to look at them if you do.
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