Vista - Lots of problems, not for the faint of heart!

[Guest]

I recently purchased a computer from a manufacturer, the specs are as follows

Nvidia 650i SLI chipset
intel e6600 core2duo @ 2.4ghz
2 x 1gb corsair ddr2 RAM
4 x 250gb toshiba hdd
Samsung Dual-layer DVD burner
2x Geforce 8800 gts 320mb
Windows XP MCE pre-installed

But before i received this system, i requested the retailer perform a number
of modifications, these are as follows

1---- 2 more gigabytes of EXACTLY the same 1gb corsair DDR2 ram was installed

2---- 1 more samsung dual-layer dvd burner was installed (also an excact
duplicate!)

As soon as i got this beast home, i immediately got on to upgrading to
Windows Vista Ultimate 32bit (after going through the setup for XP first, of
course). And ever since then i have been working out the kinks with driver
updates and so on, but i still have a couple of problems which i just can't
seem to get rid of, these ae as follows

1---- Windows explorer only recognises 698gb of the 1tb of hard disk space

2---- Vista only recognises 2814mb of the 4gb of RAM

3---- When attempting to install the latest nvidia 650i sli drivers, all i
get upon reseting is a momentary flicker of a blue screen and a crash

I consider these as major issues as i paid for all of these components to be
added to my pc by qualified technicians and i do not beleive i am getting my
money's worth if i cannot take full advantage of them, any help would be
appreciated!

Snoman

 

[Paul Smith]

1---- Windows explorer only recognises 698gb of the 1tb of hard disk space

Are the hard disks on a RAID? Did Windows XP report the correct size? Does
Disk Manager show any unpartitioned space?

2---- Vista only recognises 2814mb of the 4gb of RAM

Windows XP would also of only recognised 2814MB of RAM. This is because
32-bit processors are limited to a 32-bit address space, all the components
in the computer need memory and as such they eat into this 32-bit address
space.

If you want to be able to use all 4GB you'll need a 64-bit operating system,
with 64-bit hardware.

3---- When attempting to install the latest nvidia 650i sli drivers, all i
get upon reseting is a momentary flicker of a blue screen and a crash

nVidia's drivers are well known for being under-developed at present,
especially when it comes to SLI. I recommend anyone wanting to use a system
for gaming or the like to get a Radeon card.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User.
http://www.dasmirnov.net/blog/
http://www.windowsresource.net/

*Remove nospam. to reply by e-mail*

 

[Dave B.]

All of your problems are likely software or OS related, did it work fine
with XP installed? The mfg of the PC can hardly be blamed if you installed
Vista and can't get it to work. If you ordered it with XP preinstalled, why
did you have to "go through the setup for XP first"?

 

[babaloo]

You have a great computer but you need to learn more about how things work.
First of all, as noted previously, no 32 bit OS can see more than 2gbs of
memory effectively and no current 64bit OS can be used effectively for real
work. You will have to eat the cost of those two useless ram sticks.
As you have learned the hard way Vista is unusable in a wide variety of
configurations. In particular frequent problems with high end video cards
like the 8800 have been noted, most likely due to a combination of problems
with the Nvidia driver and inherent problems in Vista. There is nothing you
can do about this.
There are plenty of warnings out there about the problems with Vista.
I strongly recommend that you:
1. Install a second hard drive if you do not already have one. It does not
have to be large (60-120gbs).
2. Reformat both hard drives.
3. Reinstall XP and all its drivers. Make sure it is working stably.
Configure your second hard drive as the swap drive.
4. Install Vista for a dual boot setup on the second hard drive. You can use
the first hard drive as the swap file for Vista.
5. Download and install Vistaboot Pro on the Windows installation. This will
allow you to configure your dual boot setup more easily than the tools in
Vista.
This way you can use your computer effectively in XP (Vista is unusable for
games with your expensive 8800 video card) for work and games. When you feel
the urge to stick pins in your eyeballs you can boot to Vista and try to get
it to work. If Microsoft ever issues Vista Service Pack 1, the inevitable
complete rewrite of Vista, you can switch over if you want to.
This is the best way to get the most out of the machine you have.

 

[Guest]

I don't know how it does it then, but my Core Duo system with the 975X
chipset with 4GB ram shows 4 GB ram being used by Vista. Actually just a
little less than the 4096 MB computed by diagnostic tools.

 

[Guest]

Why would say use ATI when Snowman bought an Nvidia chip set, and what makes
ATI better when I with the help of ATI tech people could not get the Radeon
all in wounder to work? ATI would not exchange the card as it was not faulty,
I just could not capture video from my VCR with home movies not retail a
video. I will never buy ATI again... just my opinion.