From what I can tell from the information on the motherboard that I can find, it's a 16x (doesn't say whether it's PCIe 2.0 or not), so I don't think the motherboard is your problem. If it works in safe mode and doesn't in normal mode, I'd be willing to bet it's a driver issue or conflicting software.

As always DT good point.

If you were running Nhancer, Rivatuner, powerstrip, or made any registry edits to your original drivers involving overclocking or even somthing miniscule as forced AA, changing the AA from multi-super sample or vice versa. Its vital you set everything back to default before installing new drivers and a new card.

The 9600 Cards are PCI-E 2.0, and in my opinion that probably where the incompatibility problem lies, but one would think it wouldn't work in safe mode then either.

gotta agree...as the 2.0 stuff back clocks to X16 setups. i have a 8800GT 2.0 card in a X16 motherboard.

umm where did you hear this..as i have my BFG 8800GT OC box sitting in front of me and says NOTHING about a CPU requirement.

says 1gb of system memory. Vista or XP, PCI Express motherboard with X16 slot atleast and 425 watt PCI express compliant power supply. one 6 pin PCI express power connector or two 4 pin molex connectors

It's never on the box, it's not a requirment per say, this article explains it better then I can, but if your CPU dosen't meet the cycle times....just read this

http://www.digit-life.com/articles3/...2_scaling.html

I see your point, it may hinder performance but not cause the card not to run.

Out of curiosity what clock speed does your 8800 have. I almost bought the BFG OC, but decided on the Alpha overclock. I have mine currently OC'd to 840 MHZ

I have to agree here on it being a mb to card issue. The pci-e slot doesn't look to be pci-e 2.0 - so when you run in safe mode the port is emulating a standard vga bridge. This is why it works like that. Once you load "full", the OS is using the card as a true PCI-e 2.0 device - which the port its plugged into can't handle. Thats based purely off of what has been stated here and the pic. I don't think its a power issue, if it were I would expect the box to be bouncing or similiar.

For whatever it's worth, according to nVidia, that card is backwards compatible with PCIe 1.

I wonder
 

@Seaniam81

Did you uninstall the old drivers prior of putting in the new Card?
If you did, did you ensure you got rid of all files?

Sometimes files in System 32 stay in place as do strings in the Regedit which could cause problems.


Try Driver Sweeper or and Driver Cleaner Pro to make sure those files and strings get deleted but before you do that uninstall the Hardware in the Device Manager, reboot and startup in Safe Mode, then run the proggies one at a time.
(Driver Cleaner Pro is a slow process which takes forever... Might want to let it do it's thing over night).

After all the cleaning restart XP and do not let XP auto detect "New Hardware".
Install the latest drivers.

It could save you a trip to the store and if it doens't work you can alway do the trip.

:o I dont understand why you say that about Driver Cleaner...Works in less then a minute for me.....:o

the motherboard doesn't have to be 2.0 compliant. 2.0 cards will backclock to X16 speeds. my motherboard is only X16 and i have a 2.0 card in mine. i know others with similar systems like his with 2.0 cards.

you shouldn't EVER have to install drivers in safe mode. if so then there is more problems then just the drivers. you may have to wipe the hard drive completely. do a FULL FORMAT not that quick bull**** that doesn't do the job that full format does. and reinstall windows, install video drivers first, then motherboard drivers, then sound drivers, then proced to update windows. install SP1, then SP2, then SP3

uninstall old drivers, DON'T REBOOT, run drive cleaner pro, should only take a minute or so.

Reboot system, when it says found new hardware, you can then tell it to install drivers from specific location. i've done this with no problems. otherwise cancel that out.

install downloaded drivers from link i put up, reboot. adjust settings

if its still causing you problems then idk what to say. i've never had a single problem installing new video cards ever.

I didn't have to remove the old drivers it was a fresh format and install of XP... I wonder if SP3 would help...

but how many times have you tried to install drivers since then?

every time you install drivers you have to follow the steps i listed. otherwise it will cause major problems.

first make sure card is secure and locked in. power connectors are connected to card. if everything is ok.

then go into safe mode.

uninstall drivers, DO NOT REBOOT. run drive cleaner pro for nvidia. then reboot into normal mode.

if it goes to desktop let the hardware wizard find the new video card, cancel it out or install from specific location. your choice.

install new drivers. reboot. then adjust settings

you MUST follow said procedure every time. Nvidia, ATI, Creative, any of those drivers installed ALWAYS leaves crap behind. hence why drive cleaner pro is MUST HAVE for gamers.

Definitly. Did quite a bit of research on that while building my pc, and PCI-E 2.0 is (or should be) fully backwards compatible with PCI-E 1.1 / 1.0. Like Coolhand, I'm running a 2.0 card on a 1.1 slot (8800 on a p35 board). No issues, ever. (btw; PCI-E 2.0 boards use max 16 lanes per slot as well, it just doubles the data rate per lane. ;) )

However; "In some cases it is possible that a PCI-E 2.0 card will not work correctly on a PCI-E 1.0a slot. This is only limited to certain video cards."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express

My question to seaniam81 would be if he could confirm his boards version. If it's PCI-E 1.0a, that could explain the conflict. A solution could be flashing the BIOS to one that includes a fix.

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/...tibility-issue

Ment to clarify earlier but my connection crapped out. :roll: