New G400MAX arriving within 48 hours

[benbentley]

Is there anything I should know before I install this baby? I have a C466, SY6VBA 133, SBLive, WINTV, 96Meg RAM. Has anyone had any problems with a similar setup?

[Mark F]

Have the latest SBLive drivers installed (3.0 Liveware), Good luck with the wINTV (some work, some...well...), also make sure to get FULLY get rid of any and all older vieo card drivers and entries in your registry.

Mark F.

------------------
OH NO, my retractable cup holder swallowed a CD

[paulcs]

Yes. You should update your VIA and Soundblaster drivers. I think VIA posted updated 4in1 drivers yesterday.

Make sure you have completely removed all of your old videocard's drivers (and, if you know how, registry entries) before installing the G400. Running the uninstall program often does not do the trick. Sometimes you have to get rid of them manually.

Install the 4in1 drivers before installing the Matrox drivers. I think doing both in Standard VGA mode will do the trick.

There were conflicts between the Soundblaster Live and the G400. They have been resolved since Liveware 2.1. If you are running something older, you should probably upgrade now.

The G400 likes its own IRQ. It should be on IRQ 9 or above. Increase your aperture size to at least 128 Mb. I know this defies conventional wisdom about AGP aperture and the amount of memory you have, but it's still a good idea.

Make sure the G400 is completely and properly aligned in the AGP slot. This can be very deceptive. Give it a good push.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[Fat Tone]

Welcome aboard Ben!

You need Win98 or 98SE for proper DualHead support, and make sure the G400 and the Live don't share IRQs.

I had problems with my WinTV PCI, which I fixed by first installing the WinTV (16bit) software. WinTV32 and Wintv2000 seemed to work after that!

Have Fun.

Tony.

PS Paul posted while I was typing. Thanks for the tip-off Paul on the VIA drivers. Heading there now...

[This message has been edited by Tony Andrews (edited 04 January 2000).]

[benbentley]

Thanks, I have liveware 3.0 and the latest drivers for the SBLive, I can't get the VIA 4in1 1.18 to download yet as it keeps timing out, Is it much of an improvement over 1.16? Also, does the driver uninstall apply to pci video cards as I have been running a 2mb Cirrus Logic 2d card since I ditched my TNT2Pro. I have WinTV2k but if it doesnt work I wont cry too much as I have a TV in my room anyway. Thanks again.

[paulcs]

In my experience, video driver uninstallers are just awful about removing drivers. They remove the display properties software associated with the board, but the drivers stay in your Windows/System directory and the registry remains unchanged.

The Matrox uninstaller is pretty good about this sort of thing. I haven't been able to find any trace of old drivers after using it, although it doesn't work the same way for everybody, every single time. 3dfx, if memory serves me correctly, also has a good uninstaller.

I haven't used a Cirrus Logic board in a very long time. I think to play it safe, you should try to get rid of the Cirrus Logic drivers.

I'm not a VIA user, but I've done some casual research on the chipset because of all the problems we've seen here and elsewhere. The set of drivers before this most recent release appeared to clear up the most serious issues between the G400 (and other AGP boards, I'm sure) and the VIA chipset.

You have a couple of days, and I'm sure many of the VIA users here will try them. You might want to wait and see how people react to them. It just seems like good policy to keep your VIA drivers up to date.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[dhopton]

RE: WinTV

I've just plonked in a G400MAX and it works WONDERFULLY with my WInTV Radio, and I could watch telly and listen to the radio n/p's... the only thing that doesnt work is the fan on the MAX, but thats got nothing to do with the WinTV

[The PIT]

Well the Fan needs fixing otherwise it's bye bye video card. On the subject of wintv I can't get the radio to work with the tv running.

[dhopton]

Well, the fan does work, but not when the machine is upright (eg, the fan is upside down)... If I take the fan and keep it upside down but not attached to the card it works OK, but if I put it on the card it gives up after about 15mins. I've just put some risers between the fan and the heat sink, to see if ~1cm gap helps. I'd send it back to matrox but it's the only GFX i have, and i need this machien to work on.

As for WinTV, what O/S & Drivers you using? It works fine here with NT4SP5 and the V3.0 drivers and also Win200 with the 'french' pal drivers.

[ALBPM]

I posted these awhile ago in a Thread concerning ABIT boards.



Here's what I think is happening with some cases/mother boards.


Try bending your bracket as shown to see if it helps with the fan.

Paul

[dhopton]

I will try that. But surely if this was the case it wouldnt effect the fan when it wasnt attached to the heat sink (it was still powered fom the card, but in mid air). I've solved it sort of with the height mounting... I'm just about to pound it with q3....

[benbentley]

Got my card at 9am this morning (it was sent overnight courier) and it installed without a problem. Now all I have to do is get the turboGL drivers to work with Q2. Any tips? I have run the turboGL setup and I am using powerdesk 5.41. I get into Q2 in software rendering but when I switch to defaultGL it just hangs.

[paulcs]

Are you using the 2nd version of TurboGL? It's a separate download and install. The first version isn't compatible with Celerons.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[benbentley]

Yes I have the seperate download, I think it may be an irq conflict so I am just off to change it to irq 9 on its own!

[Wombat]

Hey dhopton,
I bet if you e-mail Matrox, or post a message "Haig, my MAX's fan is defective", they'll get to shipping you a new fan rather quickly. Especially if you bought it from the Matrox online store.

Good luck