Tried it and it did not work, thanks for trying to help.

Today I got some new different error messages, im not going to bother posting them as I am totally disillusioned with computers and games, each one of us has a very different spec and although I have had good advice I dont think anyone can solve the issues I am having. They are either a motherboard or graphics card problem, so hardware and not allot I can do about it.

hey folks...

havent read the whole thread because its meanwhile too huge, so maybe this solution was post before.

system: winxp pro sp1, athlon xp2200, msi ktvl kt400 via chipset, 300w power supply
bios before: agp 8x, aperture 128mb, fast write enabled

task: exchanged xfx nvidia ti4200 128mb with asus 9600xt 128mb

current working! system:
original ati drivers catalyst 3.9
bios setting: agp 8x, aperture 128mb, fast write disabled

heres the full story ( as far as i can remember):
1.) i deinstalled old nvidia drivers
2.) shut down computer
3.) installed new ati asus 9600xt card
4.) rebooted system and got some strange glitches which i would describe as "vertical deinterlacing" (this maybe because i didnt reboot with old card)
5.) deleted remainings of old drivers with one of the tools called detonator rip or detonator destroyer
6.) installed catalyst 4.10 driver - no errors during installation but....
7.) rebooted system - windows desktop freeze after 2-5 seconds
8.) another reboot brings up winxp only with 60hz and only 8bit color - and still freeze after 2-5 seconds
remark to 7.) and 8.) ati driver 4.10 is automatically testing system after first installation and should complete tests after hangs and reboot, which it does not. needless to mention that reinstallation of cat 4.10 did not help.
9.) set bios setting agp aperture to 64mb and fast write disabled.
10.) deinstalled cat 4.10 and tried original delivered drivers by asus - that worked! no hangs either on windows nor during gameply
11.) deinstalled this quite old drivers and tried cat 3.9 - working.
12.) set agp aperture again to 128mb - working.

did not try to enable fast write again. will try this at a later stage.

....

Ok I sure i've found the answer to the whole problem.

First the freezing crashing problem is not just an ATI graphics card problem it can happen with any card and if you do a search you will find many nvidia users with the same problems.
So after a lot of research I found that the problem is an IRQ conflect/sharing problem.

Even though windoze xp is designed to allow IRQ sharing and Microsoft say that there are no problems with it, sharing a IRQ with graphics card and with other devices, sound, modem will case the problems we all experiencing.

Heres a bit from AMD on the subject:
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResources/0,,30_1...55,00.html
and here are a couple of other that are related:
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winxp/t1005114699
http://www.computing.net/windows95/wwwboard/forum/152402.html
http://www.usbman.com/oldforum/forum7/messages/1417.html

Check your IRQs - Accessories < System Tools < System Information < Hardware Resources < Conflicts/Sharing

If your graphics card is sharing with other devices then theres your problem.

BTW here is mine -
IRQ 3 SiS 7001 PCI to USB Open Host Controller
IRQ 3 SiS 7001 PCI to USB Open Host Controller

I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 PCI bus
I/O Port 0x00000000-0x00000CF7 Direct memory access controller

I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF SiS Accelerated Graphics Port
I/O Port 0x000003C0-0x000003DF RADEON 9600 SERIES

IRQ 5 RADEON 9600 SERIES
IRQ 5 Softk56 Data Fax Voice Speakerphone CARP

Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF PCI bus
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF SiS Accelerated Graphics Port
Memory Address 0xA0000-0xBFFFF RADEON 9600 SERIES

I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB SiS Accelerated Graphics Port
I/O Port 0x000003B0-0x000003BB RADEON 9600 SERIES

which is NOT GOOD.

Now reasigning the IRQs so the graphic card is on its own IRQ, well thats another story.

I've read throught the forums but I still have no luck in getting my ATI 9600 PRO (Built by ATI) to work properly with my ASRock K7VT2 motherboard (AMI bios ver. 1.381) - VIA KT266A chipset. Has anyone had luck getting the 9600 PRO to run games properly on this motherboard? Yes, my system either hangs or goes into a sound loop.

Yes, I did all the suggestions in this Forum (clean install, tested in 98 and XP, upgrade bios, reformat and install, mess with bios, etc., removed PCI cards, etc ) and I still have problems with ATI even after exchanging and getting a replacement card since I initially thought that the first card I had was defective.

I have been having a terrible time getting the ATI 9600 Pro to work properly. The frustrating part is that before I upgraded to the ATI, I had a TNT2 then a MSI GeFrceFX 5600 VTR128 both of which worked flawlessly on my motherboard. The GeForce FX 5600 was a gift but I wanted a better card so I sold it after a month and bought an ATI 9600 PRO. (Big Mistake)

I am not an Nvidia fanboy but after my experience with ATI, I doubt that I will be so eager to buy an ATI based card again. My biggest gripe is that when I did my research, is that all the reviewers raved about the performance of the card and how trouble free it was. I couldn't find a negative review. I wish I had found this forum alot sooner.

Being on a tight budget, I wanted the most bang for the buck, instead I got a giant headache. IMO, ATI released a product that was not properly tested or designed to be compatible with a wide variety of motherboards. I think stability with a wide range of motherboards was not on top of their list when they designed the 9600 series. And if this is really a design flaw, ATI should admit it and make an apology.

If my GeForcxe 5600 worked why couldn't ATI make a card that would work also with my motherboard? I wonder if they were thinking, let the consumer buy our card and if it doesnt work with his system just tell him to upgrade his motherboard. I wish ATI had released a list of motherboards that worked with this card. If I had known that I would be having this much trouble with the ATI card, I would have just kept the 5600 and upgraded to a better and more thoroughly tested card. (sigh...hindsight)

So, if anyone has an ATI 9600 PRO card working with a K7VT2 motherboard please post.

Also, could you please post your motherboard type and settings if you have it working flawlessly with the ATI 9600 PRO since I may have to follow the CSR's advice and get a new compatible motherboard if all else fails. It cheaper than buying another expensive graphics card.

I think ive found my problem with the monitor going into power saving mode anyway...dont know if any1 else has the problem or wether it has been mentioned before but i downloaded the latest monitor drivers and all is good so far.... had the problem with the new far cry demo but now it runs like a dream......Jus look at the water !! YUMMY !

in regards to an earlier post.. i've uninstalled all of my old drivers, reinstalled them without control panel, it didn't quite fix my problem, though i thought it did, but now instead of your game of cstrike exiting and going back to windows to tell you "VPU ERROR" the screen just freezes for a second, flashes, then the game is back... but it still hasn't fixed this problem .. no irq sharing/conflicts on this card either ...

Bring it back. I did. I got a slightly less powerful video card, an MSI 5600 256mb card. Now my kid plays his favourite games, esp. NHL2004 with no freezes, no glitches.....just nice and smooth, in full detail at 1280x1024.
Trust me I tried everything! I'm a Network Administrator, I hate it when my kid can't play his games and says, "I thought you're the computer expert".The piece of crap never stopped freezing. I've got a 8500 radeon in my work machine, I tried the games in there, same mobo, same ram same everything, no freezes.
I did read somewhere, that there maybe a number of bad 9600 pros out there.
I certainly got one.

has anyone got aoe 2 conquerors to work?
I would really like someone to tell me if they have on this graphics card. The good news is that the problems i had with other games are no longer an issue...it's just aoe 2 conquerors .

ive just also tried using the DNA drivers.. the newest ones.. same crashing error (using cstrike)

i'm trying the OMEGA drivers now... lets see how they are... i bought this thing on the other end of the country... thing is i got it as a gift and don't want to return it.. i just wish the $250 piece of crap would work the way it's advertised to.

Guys, I have the Sapphire 9600 pro which is crashing when playing games. I also have an ATI-version 9600 pro which works fine in the same machine. However, since I'm using the ATI one in another box, I'm stuck with the Sapphire one at the moment (see my earlier posts for details). I too used to get common crashes in EverQuest and Return to Castle Wolfenstein. I've significantly relieved the problem by doing the following:

- Downgrade to the VIA 4-in-1 drivers to version 4.43.
- Use the latest Catalyst drivers for the video card, v4.1
- Use 4x AGP in BIOS.

Before making those changes, I had done virtually everything else that has been mentioned on the various forums. I even had changed the BIOS of the video card (which helped, but didn't solve the problem). I went back to the original video card BIOS and did the above and now I only rarely get crashes in EverQuest and RtCW. It's still not as stable as the ATI-version 9600, but at least it's usable.

So, if you're going to buy an ATI video card I recommend getting the ATI-brand card. It seems like they are more stable.

Steve

P.S.
- Using 4x AGP in the bios (though the 4.1 drivers seem to override this in smartgart)
- CAS of 2.5 (which was my default)
- MSI-km400-6734 motherboard.

ok, this is very strange.

when i was playing Unreal 2, it would normally freeze. however, yesterday, once i was playing, my monitor popped up with a "OUT OF FREQUENCY" message. distressed, i pressed Alt + F4, and i noticed that my computer wasn't frozen as the num-lock light could go on and off.

3 or so seconds later, the game fixes itself, and i could resume with no errors.

i'm using ATi's 4.1 drivers without the control panel.

lo people my first time here but here goes installed 9600 pro 4 weeks ago was all fine up until 6 days ago now guess what YEP bf1942 medieval total war, Horizons all lock up only way out is reset button ive read every post on this subjest and my frigging eyes are stinging. I been here 2 hours and realise we dont need to play games just insult money grabbing card manufacturers on forums like this. Long live pc issues as without them it would be an easy life
asus m/board
2 512 mem sticks
p4 ht processor

no point asking for a solution as im about as computer literate as a dead monkey

I've been having problems with this for a couple of weeks, and have just got the problem fixed. With my setup, if I used any catalyst drivers from 3.7 onwards I would get flashing screens/artifact problems with any d3d game (and on Windows desktop). Using the older drivers would be alright, but many newer titles such as Call of Duty and the Farcry demo need the newer drivers.

I am using a tyan 9600pro on a Elite L7VTA (via chipset).

I had tried every combination of catalyst/omega and 4in1 drivers possible and tried hundeds of combinations of bios and control panel settings (including setting agp to off, 4x and 8x in both bios and smartgart settings).

I eventually got everything working by setting the jumpers on the graphics card to 4x. There are a couple of small jumper switches on the bottom of the card next to the heat sink. The position of both these switches should be swapped to force 4x operations. These jumpers might not be on all versions of the 9600Pro, but it is definitely worth trying out.

Its a shame setting this in the driver software does not seem to work - would have saved me a lot of time. Does anyone know if extra 8x functionality was added in the later drivers or not? I hadn't any problems at all with my card on pre-v3.7 drivers

ATI has a history of having horrible drivers for anything except Apple. During the past year, ATI has tried to improve it's windows drivers with little success. Our advice is to ethier sell your card to somebody and get an NVIDIA card or just get an apple.

Trying to help,
Your Kansas friends at Badger, Inc.
Badger, Inc. uses only AMD processors.

catalyst 4.2 was released.

any word on how those new 4.2 drivers work? They seemed to have adressed the Wolf: ET issues so i guess i can dload them...but what about the card not working in AGP 8x?

what wolf et problem did they fix? the fps loss? Thats good news and its good to know that maybe my e-mail to the catalyst crew actually maybe worked. I e-mailed them regarding the fps loss in wolf ET and e-mailed me back saying ill let them know (catalyst crew).

FINALLY PROBLEM SORTED!!

As I assumed, it was my onboard sound. GOt myself a philips sound card and no problems at all. Runs like a dream now

All up2date VIA drivers AND CATs Good luck to anyone who still has problems, and if you have onboard sound...best get a sound card

again, the onboard sound as the source of the problems doesn't make sense to me other than the fact that ATI loads two sets of drivers for the AGP and PCI bus respectively as that may cause a IRQ problem...