Matrox G200 Hardware Acceleration Problems

[MattRing]

My Millinium G200 AGP 8MB is running on a FIC PA-2013 Motherboard. I have the latest certified drivers from Matrox and DirectX 6.1 from microsoft. My problem concerns hardware acceleration. I have to disable it in DirectX and sometimes even go so far as to lower my hardware acceleration in my display adapter settings in Windows to get any response from many directx games. I would like to use the capabilities of my viedo card and not have to worry about reboots everytime it tries to access the hardware acceleration. When I run the dircetx test, the direct draw works great and Direct3d works ok for the spinning cube but reboots the computer during the hardware acceleration tests. Furthermore, if I turn hardware acceleration on in my games and it is turned on in windows and Directx, it will restar tthe computer. Please help, I would really prefer to get the most out of my video card then have games work but not run well.

Thank you for your help.

Matthew Ring

[cswan]

You're having AGP issues that are typical with VIA boards, and Socket7 AGP boards in general.

Get all the latest BIOS updates and GART stuff from FICs website.

[MattRing]

Maybe you could help me out further.. I got he new bios update for the FIC board and installed it about 6 weeks ago, I got the bios update for the G200 and installed it.. I don't know what this GART isue is, however. Any further help would be greatly appreciated.

[Wombat]

Go to VIA's website, they are now packaging what you (probably) need in their 4-in-1 driver download. Your problem sounds like you're missing this GART driver - it helps Windows work with the VIA chip on your motherboard, since Windows was only really ready for intel chips.

Good luck,
Wombat


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503+ rev 1.2a, 128MB PC100 RAM, K6-2/350@400,RH6 & Win98,G200 Millenium (SGRAM), no plans to buy a G400

[Phil MURC]

Hi there... I have heard of this exact problem hundreds of times.. as the people before mentioned

GET THE LATEST VIA DRIVERS

BUT, when you install the AGP driver, for VIA chipsets you are unlikely to be able to run in Turbo mode (AGP 2X) and should select Normal mode (AGP1x).

You should ensure that you have AGP 1X selected in your Bios, and - if using a 100MHz bus have the AGP/CLK divider set to 2/3 not 1/1 or you are overdriving the AGP bus.

Ensure that bus mastering is working (Matrox powerdesk diagnostics will tell you on boot normally) and that you have an IRQ associated with the video card that is not used by another device (bus mastering will usually not work if this is the case)

Any problems, mail me, or for the sake of others - post in here (and email me to get me to look)

Good luck!


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Phil (MURC's G200 : WWW.G200.COM

[Zwisch]

HI,

I Have the same Mobo as you and all my problem stoped after I installed the 4 in one patch directly from viatech

Ciao

Z

[Phil MURC]

And just out of interest.... are you getting AGP 2X?

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Phil (MURC's G200 : WWW.G200.COM

[MattRing]

Just wanted to say thank you. The four-in-one driver solved all the problems I was having.

Matt

[tony]

I have tried everything to achieve AGP 2x with my Marvel G200-TV and I have not been successful. My system settings are below. Has anyone reliably achieved AGP 2x with their VIA chipset and Marvel G200-TV?

I have tried manually tweaking the registry, but my system freezes intermitently when I force AGP 2x. I have just recently enabled the USB (someone told me that the USB controller had to be enabled to enable other
functionality of the VIA chipset), but that didn't seem to matter. I had my CPU clocked at 5 x 100 and I backed that off to see if that was the problem. It didn't seem to matter. I saw VIA's new 4.14 4-in-1 drivers. I haven't installed them, because they only update the IDE busmaster drivers which I do not use (they seem to cause problems with my CD writer). I'm sticking with 4.13 4-in-1 drivers for now. I also tried newer "unreleased" Marvel G200 drivers without any luck. I've chosen to stick with the 4.33 PowerDesk and 1.21 Video tools.

I would appreciate any advice that would allow me to achieve AGP 2x with this hardware combination.

Thank you.

Tony

---------------------------------------------
System Configuration:

Mainboard: PA-2013 Rev 2.0 E-O036 (BIOS Award Rev 1.15JI37) 2 MB Cache
128 MB PC100 non-ECC (8ns)
AMD K6-2 450 clocked normally at 4.5 x 100 with peltier cooler and fan
Additional case fan installed
Windows 95B (Version 4.03.1212) with USB Supplement
VIA IRQ Miniport 1.3a
VIA 4-in-1 4.13 drivers (without PCI IDE Busmaster Drivers installed)
Direct-X 6.1

Note: All device resources are set to "automatic" in Windows 95 with the
exception of the SMC Ethernet card which was not PnP

AGP Slot: Matrox Marvel G200-TV AGP (BIOS 2.6 TV, Powerdesk 4.33.045) (IRQ
9)
Matrox Marvel Settings: Use Bus Mastering, Use Device Bitmaps Caching, Use
Filtering When Scaling, Use Polygon Acceleration (32-bit Z-buffer not
enabled)

PCI Slot 1: Empty (shares IRQ with AGP)
PCI Slot 2: Promise Ultra-66 IDE Controller (BusMaster) (IRQ 10)
PCI Slot 3: Creative Labs SoundBlaster PCI 512 (BusMaster) (IRQ 11 and IRQ
5)
PCI Slot 4: Empty (PCI/ISA shared slot)
ISA Slot 1: 3COM 56K Fax Modem (IRQ 4)
ISA Slot 2: SMC Ultra16 10Base2 Ethernet (IRQ 7)
USB (IRQ 3)
Maxtor 10GB ATA66 7200RPM 2MB Cache HD (connected to Ultra66 IDE1, mode
UDMA 4)
Western Digital 18GB ATA66 7200RPM 2MB Cache HD (connected to Ultra66 IDE2,
set to mode UDMA 2)
Toshiba 40x CDROM (connected to PA-2013 IDE1) DMA not enabled
Mitsumi 6x2 CD-R (connected to PA-2013 IDE2) DMA not enabled
NEC Multisync XV17 Monitor

No shared IRQs
Device conflict note in Matrox Marvel Device list:
Memory Range E8000000 - E8FFFFFF used by:
PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge
Memory Range E4000000 - E4003FFF used by:
PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge

Virtual Memory Fixed at 256 MB on Drive C:
File System Performance set at Network Server

BIOS Settings:
Serial Port 1 Disabled
Serial Port 2 Disabled
Printer Port Disabled
AGP 2x Enabled
USB Enabled
AGP Aperture 64MB
Power Management Disabled
PnP OS Enabled
Resource Control: Manual with following settings:
IRQ4: Legacy ISA
IRQ5: Legacy ISA (saves IRQ5 for use with SoundBlaster PCI 512)
IRQ7: Legacy ISA
All other IRQs are PCI/ISA PnP
PCI IRQ Sequence: 10,...
Assign IRQ for VGA: Enabled
Spread Spectrum Enabled
All BIOS Caching Enabled
Video BIOS Shadowing Enabled
Memory: Turbo, CAS2
All other BIOS settings are System defaults

[odyn]

Hi, there
This isn't really AGP2x related (I have the same problem too) but... you could try to use DMAtool included in 4in1 drivers. It enables you to use UDMA on harddrive and normal mode (pio or sth.) on CDR. You will perhaps have to use harddrive on other channel than CDr though. (It works fine for me)

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With k6-2/300, G200 searchin for truth
Odyn

[tony]

Thanks for the advice on the 4-in-1 driver and the DMATool. My CD Writer works perfectly with the newest VIA Bus Master driver.

Also, I uninstalled all Matrox video drivers in preparation for a clean install of new drivers, and I noticed that the Matrox G200 is recognized as an AGP 2x card before I install the Matrox drivers (as reported by PCIlist). After installing the 5.30 drivers, my board reverts to AGP 1x.

[tony]

I have finally figured out why the FIC PA-2013 motherboard does not appear to support AGP 2x and I have corrected the problem on my motherboard. The manual is not clear about the AGP clock setting. The jumper settings specified in the manual for PC100 memory synchronize the AGP clock to the 100MHz FSB (1/1 ratio). To clock the AGP bus at 2/3 FSB (66 MHz for a 100MHz FSB), set the CLK4 jumper to 2-3 and the SDRAM1 jumper to 1-2. You may still need to force AGP2x in the registry, but it will run 2x very reliably.

[Wombat]

I don't mean to be disrespectful, but I really don't think that's it. Many, many people have been playing with these boards. If you're getting 2x, you are fortunate, but the exception. It's just shoddy design.

-Wombat


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K6-2/350@400, 503+ rev 1.2a, 128MB PC100 RAM, Millenium G200, RH6.1 w/ 2.2.12-20, Win98, and too many classes

[tony]

I stand corrected. I upgraded to Windows 98 SE with the FIC PA-2013 jumpers set for PC100 memory as per the manual (CLK4 1-2 and NBCLK1 2-3, SDRAM 2-3, NBCLK2 1-2). I am now running at AGP 2x (according to PCIlist) after tweaking the registry. I am running PowerDesk 4.33.045 with AGPFlags = -1 in the My_Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Matrox\Pow er_Desk\Current_Settings\

[odyn]

Tony: Powerdesk 4.33? I think that could be it. I read somewhere 4.33 would show you AGP2x (could be wrong though). Try latter drivers to see if it would still use AGP2x (even if it wouldn't, those drivers are still faster because they are better optimised).

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With k6-2/300, G200 searchin for truth
Odyn