Help installing AGP chipset driver

J

jkosmides

I'm not a hardware guy so I find this pretty confusing and maybe
someone can help. I'm trying to install a new video card (details
below) in my eMachines PC and step 1 of the instructions tell me to
"obtain and install the most updated AGP chipset driver" from the
manufacturer. I verified I have an Intel based AGP chipset but i can't
find what i need anywhere on the support.intel.com website. Do I
really need to do this step and where the frig is the driver that I
need?

Current hardware:
eMachine desktop T4155 (Pentium 4, 1.5 Ghz with a
32 MG GForce2 MX AGP card)

Installing: GForce MX 5200 AGP 128MB video card

(Step 2 states that I should uninstall the existing driver using
Add/Remove Programs, but I dont' see why I wouldn't do that using the
Device Manager under Control Panel -> System.... but I guess I 'll
cross that bridge next)

Help or ideas?
 
P

Paul

I'm not a hardware guy so I find this pretty confusing and maybe
someone can help. I'm trying to install a new video card (details
below) in my eMachines PC and step 1 of the instructions tell me to
"obtain and install the most updated AGP chipset driver" from the
manufacturer. I verified I have an Intel based AGP chipset but i can't
find what i need anywhere on the support.intel.com website. Do I
really need to do this step and where the frig is the driver that I
need?

Current hardware:
eMachine desktop T4155 (Pentium 4, 1.5 Ghz with a
32 MG GForce2 MX AGP card)

Installing: GForce MX 5200 AGP 128MB video card

(Step 2 states that I should uninstall the existing driver using
Add/Remove Programs, but I dont' see why I wouldn't do that using the
Device Manager under Control Panel -> System.... but I guess I 'll
cross that bridge next)

Help or ideas?

Your computer has an 845 chipset.
http://www.emachines.com/products/products.html?prod=T4155

I would remove the existing video card driver, while the old video
card was still in the computer. If you rebooted at that point,
the screen resolution would drop to 640x480. Then, I would shut
down, turn off the power, unplug the computer, and change the
video card. The new card will also come up in 640x480, until
you get some drivers in there.

You want to remove the driver via "Add/Remove", so the registry
is cleaned up properly. Just hammering it from Device Manager is
only a small part of the job the uninstaller will do. Also,
if the old card was Nvidia, and the new card was Nvidia, you
still uninstall the driver, as the installer will do something
different, for every kind of card installed. You want to give
the new installer a chance to set things up right.

On power up, you will need three things.

1) Chipset drivers. In the case of Intel chipsets, the package
is named INFINST.exe (there is also a ZIP version which is
useful for hacking). The chipset drivers change the names
seen in Device Manager, and you might see an AGP entry after
this is done. The OS or Service Pack you are using, may already
have installed chipset drivers, so this step could well be
redundant. (And in order for the old card to work in 3D properly,
the chipset drivers would have had to be there also.) But if
you want to look around, this would be a typical link:

http://downloadfinder.intel.com/scripts-df-external/Product_Filter.aspx?ProductID=757&lang=eng

2) Video card drivers for FX5200. They could be on the CD.
You can also check the Nvidia site, for more recent drivers.

http://www.nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp

3) DirectX9c can be installed at any time. The FX5200 installer
CD, may in fact attempt to install a version of DirectX
for you, before it attempts to install the Nvidia drivers.
You can install DirectX over and over again, without harm.
DirectX versioning prevents backtracking, so before applying
any DirectX installer, be aware that there could be consequences
from the upgrade (like maybe some old DirectX 5 game stops working
right). You can go to Microsoft and get a more recent version
than the one that is on the video card CD.

Generally speaking, the three steps above are self-enforcing.
For example, you could skip step (1), and try (2) and (3).
If you get an error message, telling you that something is
wrong, then you know that step n-1 was wrong, so you should go
back and fix it. The only thing you can really screw up, is the
bit about removing the old video driver. I've got myself in
an awful mess by forgetting to do that before changing cards.
I messed up one Win2K install so bad, that I could never get
DMA/DIME enabled on the new card. So don't forget to properly
uninstall the old driver first, before doing anything else.
Even after trying "driver cleaner" programs to remove the old
drivers, I still could not fix whatever the problem was.
(Hint - I'm the guy who hates to reinstall the OS, and I'll
do virtually anything to avoid doing so.)

HTH,
Paul
 
K

kony

I'm not a hardware guy so I find this pretty confusing and maybe
someone can help. I'm trying to install a new video card (details
below) in my eMachines PC and step 1 of the instructions tell me to
"obtain and install the most updated AGP chipset driver" from the
manufacturer. I verified I have an Intel based AGP chipset but i can't
find what i need anywhere on the support.intel.com website. Do I
really need to do this step and where the frig is the driver that I
need?


It's unlikely that you need an updated chipset driver, I'd
go ahead and ignore that instruction. Further, it's likely
better to not install that driver at all.

Go to nvidia's website
http://www.nvidia.com/content/drivers/drivers.asp
and get the current driver.
It's likely several generations newer and better overall.
However, if your current driver for the GF2 card is
significantly newer than the card is, you might even find
that you didn't have to uninstall the old driver at all,
merely powering off the system and swapping the cards would
result in Windows detecting the new card and using the same
driver for it- but that is an unknown variable for us and
those who wrote your driver instructions, the more
conservative choice is still to uninstall the old driver
first, then power off, unplug system, swap the cards.

If your system doesn't have DirectX9.0c installed, I
recommend installing that first (after above steps of
uninstalling the card and swapping in the new one, or even
before that). You can check which version of DirectX you
have by running "dxdiag" from the Start Menu -> Run option.
It'll show the DX version nearer the bottom of the first
(System Tab) page. You can get DX9c from Microsoft's
website,
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/...20-BFBB-4799-9908-D418CDEAC197&displaylang=en
among other places (Google search for "DirectX9c")

Current hardware:
eMachine desktop T4155 (Pentium 4, 1.5 Ghz with a
32 MG GForce2 MX AGP card)

Installing: GForce MX 5200 AGP 128MB video card

(Step 2 states that I should uninstall the existing driver using
Add/Remove Programs, but I dont' see why I wouldn't do that using the
Device Manager under Control Panel -> System.... but I guess I 'll
cross that bridge next)

Removing from Device Manager only removes the current PNP
detection of the device, it'll be redetected and the same
driver reinstalled if you don't uninstall that driver via
Add/Remove programs. Any driver that you *install* (Or was
installed by a 3rd party) should be removed by uninstalling,
with add/remove programs or the start menu folder for that
item if there was an uninstall shortcut placed in that
folder when it was installed.
 
J

jkosmides

Thanks for the guidance all. I plan on leaving the AGP chipset as-is,
removing the older driver (with add\remove) and swapping cards. The
new card came with a CD so I'll begin with the drivers on that cd for
the card and directX. If the vendor website (nVidia) has something
more current then maybe I'll move up later...

I really appreciate the advice as I've never swapped a card before.
I'll let you know how it goes.
 
K

kony

Thanks for the guidance all. I plan on leaving the AGP chipset as-is,
removing the older driver (with add\remove) and swapping cards. The
new card came with a CD so I'll begin with the drivers on that cd for
the card and directX. If the vendor website (nVidia) has something
more current then maybe I'll move up later...


This is what I suggest you not do.
Don't install an intermediate DirectX or the old driver,
immediately install the current versions of both. It might
work out fine the way you propose to do it, but IMO you may
end up installing the later versions anyway so might as well
cut to the chase and have the better support and bug
reductions now instead of later.
 
J

jkosmides

Wanted to let you all know that my video card install is done and went
fine. For anyone who wants to learn from this post and what worked for
me, here are the steps:

1. Bypassed the first step in nVidia instructions which applied only
to non-intel based motherboards (mine was intel based).
2. Bypassed second step which was to download the latest intel AGP
chipset from the intel website. I tried to do this but when I couldn't
not clearly identify the download or manage the risk to my system I
decided to pass on this.
3. Uninstalled the current video driver using Add/Remove Programs.
Rebooted (to complete the uninstall, I think) and saw video mode in
that big character mode (480x800 or something like that).
4. Removed old card and installed nVidia 5200 (128 ram). Also popped
in another 256 mb of RAM.
5. Rebooted and installed the card driver and directX driver from the
included CD. I have not visited the nVidia website yet for the update,
but agree with the other poster that this would be more direct than
installing from the cd first. In the interest of time and convenience,
I went for the CD.

Two other notes & lessons learned: I did not wear a static wriststrap,
but I did touch the chasis with the power cord still in (machine turned
off) to discharge a few times. Also, I'd recommend a can of compressed
air to clean things up when you're in there. My 4 year old pc was as
dusty as the midwest during the dust bowl.

Working well, and running faster thanks to the memory. Thanks again to
everyone for your support.
 

Ask a Question

Want to reply to this thread or ask your own question?

You'll need to choose a username for the site, which only take a couple of moments. After that, you can post your question and our members will help you out.

Ask a Question

Top