Need help: TV Wonder Pro/MMC 8.1/Dell Dimension XPS GEN4.

[John Peterson]

Hello all!

I have a newly-purchased Dell Dimension XPS GEN4 with a 256MB ATI Radeon X850 XT PE video
card. I purchased the ATI TV Wonder Pro separately, and am trying to install the tuner
card into the machine. However, I'm having a heck of a time and am hoping to solicit some
help.

I used the CD that came with the TV Wonder Pro. And it appeared to install the "universal
components" okay. However, when it was trying to install the MMC, it appeared as if the
installation just *stopped*, with no failure message (or success). At first, I thought it
was successful and installed the Remote Wonder drivers, which prompted a reboot.

When my machine rebooted, it hung on POST the first time. I powered off, and it hung on
POST *again* (in a slightly different place). The third time I cycled power, I got a
message stating that it couldn't load Windows XP because of a missing ntoskrnl.exe file.
I was getting pretty nervous, but a fourth power-cycle successfully loaded the OS again.

When I looked in the Programs folder, the only thing that got installed was the Remote
Wonder software. No MMC. Thinking maybe the MMC needed to be installed with*out* the
Remote Wonder, I tried installing it again. This time I noticed that it seemed like it
was failing, with no message or anything.

I happened to buy a MMC 8.1 CD from ATI, and I thought I'd use that instead of the CD that
came with the TV Wonder Pro. At first, I couldn't just install MMC by itself, because it
wants to load the Radeon drivers (which I'm assuming would *not* be the right thing to do
with the pre-installed X850 drivers from Dell). Instead, I navigated the CD and found a
directory called MmcDvd which had a setup.exe file in it. When I tried running setup.exe,
I get the exact same behavior that I was getting from the TV Wonder CD when the MMC was
trying to install -- it would unexpectedly terminate the setup process with no information
about *why* it failed.

When I rebooted my machine, I had the *exact* same problems: hung on POST twice, couldn't
load the OS, and the fourth time was a charm.

I'm not sure what's going on here, but if anyone has any advice for me (regarding either
the machine hang-ups or how to install MMC) I'd be hugely obliged!

Thanks!

 

[Paul Murphy]

Hello all!

I have a newly-purchased Dell Dimension XPS GEN4 with a 256MB ATI Radeon
X850 XT PE video card. I purchased the ATI TV Wonder Pro separately, and
am trying to install the tuner card into the machine. However, I'm having
a heck of a time and am hoping to solicit some help.

I used the CD that came with the TV Wonder Pro. And it appeared to
install the "universal components" okay. However, when it was trying to
install the MMC, it appeared as if the installation just *stopped*, with
no failure message (or success). At first, I thought it was successful
and installed the Remote Wonder drivers, which prompted a reboot.

When my machine rebooted, it hung on POST the first time. I powered off,
and it hung on POST *again* (in a slightly different place). The third
time I cycled power, I got a message stating that it couldn't load Windows
XP because of a missing ntoskrnl.exe file. I was getting pretty nervous,
but a fourth power-cycle successfully loaded the OS again.

When I looked in the Programs folder, the only thing that got installed
was the Remote Wonder software. No MMC. Thinking maybe the MMC needed to
be installed with*out* the Remote Wonder, I tried installing it again.
This time I noticed that it seemed like it was failing, with no message or
anything.

I happened to buy a MMC 8.1 CD from ATI, and I thought I'd use that
instead of the CD that came with the TV Wonder Pro. At first, I couldn't
just install MMC by itself, because it wants to load the Radeon drivers
(which I'm assuming would *not* be the right thing to do with the
pre-installed X850 drivers from Dell). Instead, I navigated the CD and
found a directory called MmcDvd which had a setup.exe file in it. When I
tried running setup.exe, I get the exact same behavior that I was getting
from the TV Wonder CD when the MMC was trying to install -- it would
unexpectedly terminate the setup process with no information about *why*
it failed.

When I rebooted my machine, I had the *exact* same problems: hung on POST
twice, couldn't load the OS, and the fourth time was a charm.

I'm not sure what's going on here, but if anyone has any advice for me
(regarding either the machine hang-ups or how to install MMC) I'd be
hugely obliged!

Thanks!

I've only ever installed one TV Wonder and it was the predecessor to the Pro
but I have 3 All In Wonders all running fine with MMC and this is how I did
it:

1) Download the latest drivers for the TV Wonder Pro off ATIs website.
2) Download the latest TV Wonder Pro compatible version of MMC (some MMC
versions such as the 8.1 on your MMC CD only support All In Wonders and not
full TV Wonder functionality) - again from ATIs website. Make sure you get
any prerequisite software as well. Back up all this software to a
cd/pendrive or other removable media.
3) I suggest - given the mix-up thats occurred that you use your Dell
recovery CD to restore the machine to a factory state and then commence
installing the cards software in this order:
a) Install the TV Wonder Pro drivers then reboot.
b) Install any MMC prerequisites (as mentioned on the MMC readme and
download page) rebooting where specified and certainly at the end at least.
c) Install MMC and reboot
d) Install the remote wonder software last but before plugging in the USB
receiver shut down, plug in the receiver and then switch on the PC.
e) Test it out thoroughly before loading any additional software!

Lets us know if you have any questions or probs with that.

Paul

 

[John Peterson]

I've only ever installed one TV Wonder and it was the predecessor to the Pro but I have
3 All In Wonders all running fine with MMC and this is how I did it:

1) Download the latest drivers for the TV Wonder Pro off ATIs website.
2) Download the latest TV Wonder Pro compatible version of MMC (some MMC versions such
as the 8.1 on your MMC CD only support All In Wonders and not full TV Wonder
functionality) - again from ATIs website. Make sure you get any prerequisite software as
well. Back up all this software to a cd/pendrive or other removable media.
3) I suggest - given the mix-up thats occurred that you use your Dell recovery CD to
restore the machine to a factory state and then commence installing the cards software
in this order:
a) Install the TV Wonder Pro drivers then reboot.
b) Install any MMC prerequisites (as mentioned on the MMC readme and download page)
rebooting where specified and certainly at the end at least.
c) Install MMC and reboot
d) Install the remote wonder software last but before plugging in the USB receiver shut
down, plug in the receiver and then switch on the PC.
e) Test it out thoroughly before loading any additional software!

Lets us know if you have any questions or probs with that.

Paul, thanks for your help! I decided to try your suggestions withOUT resorting to the
Dell Recovery CD. I don't know why, because I'm usually the *first* to hop on a web site
for newer/better/faster drivers, but after my experience on Sunday with the ATI TV Wonder
Pro, I never thought to try to download from the web.

Their web site gave me 4 files to try, in order:

* DAO/MDAC
* TV Wonder Pro drivers
* MMC
* Remote Wonder drivers

I installed each one and after each installation, whether it prompted me or not, I
rebooted for good measure. During the installation of the MMC, I got a McAfee dialog that
asked me if I wanted to permit the application to write in a system directory. I wonder
if this was the original snafu when the CD was trying to install? I never saw the dialog,
but maybe the CD-based installation was denied automatically for some reason? That makes
me wonder, too, if there would have been some indication of this in my Event Log (if I had
thought to look)? It kind of smells like that might have been the case. Though, at one
point, I thought that I disabled *all* programs before trying to install (but maybe McAfee
was still in the background?). I didn't ask Dell for McAfee, but I've got it. ;-)

After the reboot from the Remote Wonder, my machine froze again during POST (twice in the
same spot). But a third power-cycle seems to have cleared that up. I'm still a bit
nervous about that...

In any event, I now have TV tuner capabilities! I'm very pleased about that!

Thanks again for your help!

John Peterson