nvidia GeForce 2 440 MX not cooperating

[Ogg]

My ME box must have heard me talking about replacing it with Linux.. the
standard Nvidia GeForce2 440 MX display is (once AGAIN!) only booting to a
blank screen now. The only way I could initially fix that was to boot to
SafeMode, then force the setting to 16 colours there, then do a full
shutdown (not restart! but a full OFF). Then at next bootup, I could at
least get a non-blank display, albiet in 16 colours. (

I tried reinstalling the nvidia 440MX drivers from a saved set of files on
the hdd. The install reports "successful", but at next bootup - blank
screen! I had found a set numbered as version 81.98 for the 440MX card a
few years ago from the Nvidia site.

What to do? Trying to do anything on the net (even email) is absolutley
awful in 16 colours!

Could it be that the Nvidia reinstall doesn't overwrite some of the key
files that it should? How could I purge the system of all Nvidia 440 MX
driver files and try again?

I know this isn't a hardware fault because Linux (Ubuntu, PuppyLinux) boots
up into a very lovely display.

 

[Mike M]

One comment and one suggestion.
a) Graphics card fail
b) Try uninstalling all nVidia drivers, reboot and revert to plain old VGA
before reinstalling your graphics drivers.
--
Mike Maltby
mike.maltby@gmail.com


Ogg <no-spam-wanted@at.all> wrote:

> My ME box must have heard me talking about replacing it with Linux..
> the standard Nvidia GeForce2 440 MX display is (once AGAIN!) only
> booting to a blank screen now. The only way I could initially fix
> that was to boot to SafeMode, then force the setting to 16 colours
> there, then do a full shutdown (not restart! but a full OFF). Then
> at next bootup, I could at least get a non-blank display, albiet in
> 16 colours. (
> I tried reinstalling the nvidia 440MX drivers from a saved set of
> files on the hdd. The install reports "successful", but at next
> bootup - blank screen! I had found a set numbered as version 81.98
> for the 440MX card a few years ago from the Nvidia site.
>
> What to do? Trying to do anything on the net (even email) is
> absolutley awful in 16 colours!
>
> Could it be that the Nvidia reinstall doesn't overwrite some of the
> key files that it should? How could I purge the system of all Nvidia
> 440 MX driver files and try again?
>
> I know this isn't a hardware fault because Linux (Ubuntu, PuppyLinux)
> boots up into a very lovely display.

 

[Ogg]

It looks like I have partially succeeded. I manually uninstalled the NVIDIA
references in the Add/Remove programs, and inserted a completely different
card: geForce 6200 LE. However, that card doesn't seem to have a suitable
driver for WinME! (And I specifically bought it to "upgrade" my WinME
system) Anyway.. the pc is only booting up with Standard PCI VGA now. I
would assume that it's safe to re-insert the original geForce2 MX card and
start from scratch? It's an AGP card, btw.

If this process fails, I would assume that my next best approach would be
replace the mobo and use a completely different brand of video card? The
idea would be to grab a new lowcost barebones kit.


> One comment and one suggestion.
> a) Graphics card fail
> b) Try uninstalling all nVidia drivers, reboot and revert to plain old VGA
> before reinstalling your graphics drivers.

 

[Mike M]

Glad to read you've made some progress but I can't really help as I don't
think I've ever owned an nVidia graphics card although I do have mobos
with nVidia nforce chipsets.

> I would assume that
> it's safe to re-insert the original geForce2 MX card and start from
> scratch? It's an AGP card, btw.

I'd certainly try that and see if you now install a Win Me compatible
driver so as to get a decent resolution and colo(u)r depth.

> completely different card: geForce 6200 LE. However, that card
> doesn't seem to have a suitable driver for WinME!

What about the ForceWare Release 80 Version: 81.98 Release Date: December
21, 2005 driver set as this states that it is for 6 series graphics cards
and supports Win Me? This is the same driver set that nVidia say you
should be using for your geForce 2 MX card.

Best of luck,
--
Mike Maltby
mike.maltby@gmail.com


Ogg <no-spam-wanted@at.all> wrote:

> It looks like I have partially succeeded. I manually uninstalled the
> NVIDIA references in the Add/Remove programs, and inserted a
> completely different card: geForce 6200 LE. However, that card
> doesn't seem to have a suitable driver for WinME! (And I
> specifically bought it to "upgrade" my WinME system) Anyway.. the
> pc is only booting up with Standard PCI VGA now. I would assume that
> it's safe to re-insert the original geForce2 MX card and start from
> scratch? It's an AGP card, btw.
> If this process fails, I would assume that my next best approach
> would be replace the mobo and use a completely different brand of
> video card? The idea would be to grab a new lowcost barebones kit.

 

[Ogg]

>> completely different card: geForce 6200 LE. However, that card
>> doesn't seem to have a suitable driver for WinME!
>
> What about the ForceWare Release 80 Version: 81.98 Release Date: December
> 21, 2005 driver set as this states that it is for 6 series graphics cards
> and supports Win Me? This is the same driver set that nVidia say you
> should be using for your geForce 2 MX card.

81.98 is the driver set that I referred to in my very first message. That's
the driver set I used when I discovered it after 3 years of using an older
(original with the pc) driver set. At that time, the installation of 81.98
went flawlessly. That's the set that I kept re-installing now but ME
wouldn't recognize the card. It just kept listing Standard PCI VGA card.

Meanwhile, I also found the original nvidia installation CD. I'm going to
try that first.

 

[Ogg]

> Meanwhile, I also found the original nvidia installation CD. I'm going to
> try that first.

When I put the "original" GeForce2 MX 400 card back in, ME auto-detected it.
I had no choice to stop that. After that happend I figured I'd be back
to square one. Then I rebooted.. and low and behold, I was back to a BLANK
screen just like the first time.

Then I had no recourse except to re-boot to SafeMode and force the rez to 16
colours before I backed out. After that, ME booted normally, but only in 16
colours. That's when I proceed to try the original Nvidia CD that came
with this pc. But strange.. that CD didn't work! Well sort of. Infact it
seems to be for Win98 only. But then the installation message reported
"completed" and prompted me to reboot. But before I did that, I deleted a
common C:\NVIDIA directory and all its subdirs and contents. And another
*first* - it's the first time I had the choice to select 16bit colour mode
from the standard display control! I set it to 1024x768. There were 3 or
4 higher settings available, but 1024x768 is good enough for the time being.
then rebooted...

and... ME booted with a couple of Nvidia warning messages that a panel
control file is missing... but it continued to boot in full colour at
1024x768. WHEW!

What a horrible experience. What on earth could have caused the display to
fail in the first place?

I'm NOT going to use the 81.98 release of the driver at this point.
Another interesting thing.. when I open the Device Mangler and view the
video version, it reports device GeForce MX 6.23, and *not* GeForce MX 400.
Weird. But I guess if this works, I'll leave it alone.

 

[Mike M]

It appears to me that the GeForce2 MX 400 card is quite possibly defective
even if only intermittently.

> I'm NOT going to use the 81.98 release of the driver at this point.

Nor would I in the circumstances, or at least not with this card.

> it reports device GeForce MX 6.23, and *not* GeForce MX 400. Weird.

Not surprising given that (I think) you are using the default nVidia
drivers included with Win Me. Is the 6.23 perhaps the driver version?
--
Mike Maltby
mike.maltby@gmail.com


Ogg <no-spam-wanted@at.all> wrote:

> When I put the "original" GeForce2 MX 400 card back in, ME
> auto-detected it. I had no choice to stop that. After that
> happend I figured I'd be back to square one. Then I rebooted.. and
> low and behold, I was back to a BLANK screen just like the first time.
>
> Then I had no recourse except to re-boot to SafeMode and force the
> rez to 16 colours before I backed out. After that, ME booted
> normally, but only in 16 colours. That's when I proceed to try the
> original Nvidia CD that came with this pc. But strange.. that CD
> didn't work! Well sort of. Infact it seems to be for Win98 only. But
> then the installation message reported "completed" and prompted
> me to reboot. But before I did that, I deleted a common C:\NVIDIA
> directory and all its subdirs and contents. And another *first* -
> it's the first time I had the choice to select 16bit colour mode from
> the standard display control! I set it to 1024x768. There were 3
> or 4 higher settings available, but 1024x768 is good enough for the
> time being. then rebooted...
> and... ME booted with a couple of Nvidia warning messages that a panel
> control file is missing... but it continued to boot in full colour at
> 1024x768. WHEW!
>
> What a horrible experience. What on earth could have caused the
> display to fail in the first place?
>
> I'm NOT going to use the 81.98 release of the driver at this point.
> Another interesting thing.. when I open the Device Mangler and view
> the video version, it reports device GeForce MX 6.23, and *not*
> GeForce MX 400. Weird. But I guess if this works, I'll leave it
> alone.

 

[Ogg]

> It appears to me that the GeForce2 MX 400 card is quite possibly defective
> even if only intermittently.

There is a peculiar thing the card does the very first time the computer is
restarted after being OFF overnight or for several days: the bios message
and subsequent screens appear to have incomplete or jumbled letters. I
usually fix that with ctrl-alt-del right after it detects the harddrive.
Then when the computer recycles, the screen lettering is fine.

I can't be sure if the fault is the card's or the AGP's interface at the
mobo. That is why I was thinking it's time to move the WinME system to a
fresh set of hardward. I've been living with this behaviour of the card
for atleast a couple of years now. The ctrl-alt-del was no big deal since
it only needed to be done within a few seconds after turning on the pc.


>> it reports device GeForce MX 6.23, and *not* GeForce MX 400. Weird.
>
> Not surprising given that (I think) you are using the default nVidia
> drivers included with Win Me. Is the 6.23 perhaps the driver version?

A few years ago, I backed up all the driver sets (I used a utility to do
that - don't remember which one). Looking through the saved drivers
directories, I have one labelled Nvidia 6.23. I did this backup years ago
(circa 2001) before I installed any new drivers. So.. 6.23 makes sense to
be what was there when I first got the computer.

Now the key is to find a *new* barebone system just old enough to still
support WinME.