Please Help! Trying to sort kid's pc

[justlearning]

Thanks Belatucadrus, Do you think my old card might work with a fan?

Is the one on the link quite simple to fit? :unsure:

[Scarecrow Man]

8X is slotted for 1.5V which means 2x and 4x cannot be used in an 8x board.. I am unsure about the reverse compatibility.

[Belatucadrus]

The one on the link was fairly easy to fit to my Voodoo card using the double sided adhesive thermal tape provided. On a newer card with the standard mounting holes, the plastic clips provided would have made it even easier. I've looked at your Intel card on the web and it looks as though it has a fairly complex frame holding the fan in place, but that it should come off fairly easily. The circuit board also appears to have appropriate mounting holes for the new fan, but as with the Voodoo no guarantee they will line up.

I would assume from your comments that the card works OK until loaded when it starts to overheat, so probably hasn't been damaged. This being the case the fan should be an appropriate fix.

If however I'm wrong about the compatability of the AGP 2X & 8X cards even a basic card like This could improve performance. It may be worth hanging on for one of the gamers, they are more into graphics cards than me and can probably give chapter and verse on compatability.

[justlearning]

I'll try and see whether I can take a look today and see what I find!!!!!!

Presumably if I take the case off I can get to the slots at the back somehow? :)

[Belatucadrus]

When you take the case off, all should become clear. The AGP slot will be obvious as it will be shorter than the PCI slots and coloured brown, all you will need to do to remove the card is take off the retaining screw on the face plate and lift the card out. Newer AGP cards also have a latch at the other end, but I don't think it will be there on your 2X card.

To avoid any chance of static damage to components, computer work is best done in carpet free areas where possible, with man made fibre carpets like nylon high on the list of things to avoid. Wherever you do it, remember to earth yourself on something like a radiator before touching anything in the case and don't use a magnetic screwdriver.

[justlearning]

This may sound really dim but how do I earth myself? Just by touching the radiator? Or some other way?

Thanks

[-pops-]

The computer case should be earthed so just touch a bare metal part of that. The important thing is for you to be at the same electrical potential as the components of the computer. Touching the case will ensure that.

Note: There is no such thing as a dim question. There might be dim answers but that's a completely different thing.

[justlearning]

Thanks :D

[Belatucadrus]

Tutorial on replacing graphics cards a little simplistic as it just covers installation to an empty slot, but not bad.

As -pops- said there are no dim questions, the dim thing is to plough on regardless when you're unsure how to do something. Trial and error can be an interesting way of learning what will work, it can also be a way of making something not work.

Just touching the radiator would be fine.

[r4may]

This may sound really dim but how do I earth myself? Just by touching the radiator? Or some other way?

Thanks

The best way is to obtain a wrist Eathing Strap; clips round your wrist and to the metal case. they are very useful and quite in expensive.

[justlearning]

Just to say that I have ordred a Spectrum Fan card and am waiting for it to arrive.

Will update when I have fitted it!!! :)

Thankyou again for all advice

[justlearning]

Well........I have fitted the Spectrum card and it is working well but it hasn't solved my problem with the kids game!

It is doing the same as before - starting to load and then going blank.

I ran Everest and it came up with a few things - On the CPU section the suggestion was 'install more system memory to improve applications performance'

On the Chipset it said ' AGP aperture size is more than half the system memory size. This may cause performance penalty'

On DirectX Video ' 2 problems no suggestions '32 bit rendering not supported - modern 3D games may require it' and 'Hardware Transform and Lighting is not supported. Modern 3D games may require it'

Any ideas? It doesn't mean much to me but I am wondering whether I need a new graphics card or another memory card or both?

Any ideas/suggestion would be gratefully received!!!!! :unsure:

We want to get a wireless router so that the kids can do some bits on the net - does anyone have any recommendations on a good one to buy?

Once again - many thanks for taking the time to read this! :)

[justlearning]

I guess that this is probably more of a hardware than a software question now!

Thankyou all for your help and advice. I now have a luminous fan working nicely and other functions on the pc seem to have improved a bit (or maybe my imagination!) :)

Should I post a question on the hardware forum?

Thanks :thumbup:

[Belatucadrus]

'install more system memory to improve applications performance'

Always a good idea, try Crucial to see what you can add.

32 bit rendering not supported - modern 3D games may require it' and 'Hardware Transform and Lighting is not supported. Modern 3D games may require it'

The games system requirements may exceed the technological capabilities of your graphics card, which would indicate that a new card would be in order. My concerns on the inter-compatibility of AGP 2,4 & 8 cards remains, I simply don't know enough about their physical differences. You could remove the existing card and assuming you have a free PCI card slot install one of these.

But this I think is where you start coming up against the law of diminishing returns. By the time you've added more memory and a new graphics card you will have invested quite a bit in what will still be a second rate gaming machine. Games being in my opinion the driving force behind much computer development, newer games seem to have exponentialy higher system requirements each year. With PC pricing at the moment, particularly on entry level models, being particularly cut-throat, it may be more cost effective to buy a new Computer use the new one for games etc. and the old one for less performance hungry applications like Office.

I haven't gone wireless yet, so can't offer any personal recommendations on routers, but ebuyer should be worth a look as they are usually priced well and they have buyers reviews that should offer an idea as to how popular they are with their owners.

You can post in the hardware forum if you want, but it's usually best policy to stick to one thread at a time, as people can lose track of multiple postings.

[justlearning]

Thanks Belatucadrus,

I am much happier sticking with this forum if I can - I just didn't want to keep asking questions if I wasn't in the right place anymore! :rolleyes:

I'll have a look into the memory upgrade at Crucial.

There is a free PCI slot - I'm not sure whether I need it for the wireless setup when we get it - so we could get a graphics card for PCI.

I would like to look into the compatability issue of the AGP cards - if anyone has any suggestions on where I could look I'd be grateful!

We have thought about a new pc for the girls but as they are only 4 years old would rather wait until they are a bit older, as it's not too much of a problem if they trash the old one!! :shocking: Ideally if we can get it going for as little as possible and it might last a couple more years until they know what they are doing then that would be good.

I've had a quick look on ebuyer and they seem to have alot of choice - when the terrible twins are at school I can sort something out :teehee:

[Belatucadrus]

Reading articles like This and this it looks as if new cards are backwards compatible, but new MOBO s with the later variant AGP slots will not accept old cards partly because of their different power requirements. To prevent this lugs were added to the ports to match slots added to the connection plate on the new cards. So a new slotted card will fit in a lug free old slot, but a non slotted old card will not physically fit in the new VGA socket.

Well that's how it looks to me anyway :blink: .

[justlearning]

Thanks for that! :thumbup:

I've read both of the articles and am trying to work out what key/voltage my card is - Looking at the pictures on the second article mine looks like a 3.3v keyed card - I read the comparison boxes to say that it was only OK with 1x and 2x speeds. Have I got that right do you think?

I noticed under the last PCI slot there was a long brown coloured slot that looked a bit like the AGP Pro slot on the picture could that be possible in a machine as old as this? (Not that I really understand the significance if it does!!!!!!! :blush: :wacko:

Was going to try and call ebuyer and ask them but no-one home until Monday - suppose they need weekends off too!!!!!!!

[justlearning]

:(

Well, I hadn't realised how long it's been since my last post but I have tried few things since.

I have installed a new graphics card - I saw one on ebuyer that one of the reviewers had used in a machine with Windows 98 and 2xAGP and was pleased with it. It is a Radeon 9250.

It has installed OK but hasn't solved the game problem!!!!!! It is still doing exactly the same as it did before. So......maybe wasn't the card or maybe my new card in a 2X slot doesn't make any difference. On Everest it still shows as a 2X card.

There were some suggestions on Everest about updating the BIOS or upgrading - I get lost here as I don't know what that/they are. There seemed to be 2 references to BIOS - are they the same thing? I think one was on the motherboard.

I have also installed a router and wireless card on the Win 98 pc which seems to be running well and means that I can download things straight on to that machine which is a bit easier.

Does anyone have any ideas of anything else I can update/look at or should I just throw the B***** game away!!!!!!? :angry:

Also, could I ask whether there is any value in upgrading Windows to SE as someone suggested that it might (not related to this problem)

Thankyou for reading this - any help much appreciated!

[Belatucadrus]

Well the new card should have made some difference, presumably Everest no longer shows the

On DirectX Video ' 2 problems no suggestions '32 bit rendering not supported - modern 3D games may require it' and 'Hardware Transform and Lighting is not supported. Modern 3D games may require it'

message ? As to the 2X, that is a hardware limitation of the motherboard so Everest should always say 2X.

BIOS upgrades are a bit of a pig as they tend to kill a PC fairly thoroughly if they don't go to plan. They should really only be attempted if you know the update will address a specific problem, such as fitting a faster processor. It's unlikely to help here.

As to updating the OS to 98SE, again not sure if that would fix it, but as it's got to this stage it could be worth trying. I don't like restore disks anyway and feel that reformatting and starting the whole thing from scratch is probably not a bad idea, time consuming and a pain in the posterior if you're short of any driver disks. But generally results in a much improved set-up.

One thing that may be worth a shot is SFC the built in System File Checker.

To be honest I'm running out of ideas, as to throwing the game away, well it's one answer to the problem :blush:

[justlearning]

Thanks for that!

How would I go about a reformat? I have used the restore disc which I think is when I probably made things worse!!!!!!

What would I be looking for with SFC?

The other thing that you mentioned earlier was adding to the memory - I looked on Crucial and could add another 128mb for about £25 - don't know whether it's worth spending much more on this machine but it's become a bit of a mission!!!!

[Belatucadrus]

How to reformat, have a read through these links Ultimate boot disk is a useful tool for reformatting.

Preparation is king in reformatting as it wipes the disk clean :-1) Make sure you have the driver disks for video sound and any peripheral devices like printers and scanners. 2) Back up all documents and mail you want to keep. 3) Make a note of your Internet settings.

With SFC, put the Windows disk in the drive, then type SFC in the run box and OK it, after that it'll scan for missing or damaged files and replace them from the disk.

As to the additional memory, always a nice idea but don't forget by adding an upgraded graphics card you've taken some load off the system and effectively boosted the memory already. I'd leave it for the moment and see how you feel after a month or so. I know the mission feeling all to well, and have invested ridiculous amounts of time and energy getting obsolete kit to work, when binning it and buying a replacement would have made more sense. It's a decision you need to make yourself as it's subjective, only you will know if it was worth it in the end.

You could also try running a registry cleaner Regseeker is free and pretty good.

[justlearning]

Thanks, I'll have a look at the links over the weekend and try and do something next week when the kids are out of the way! :rolleyes: :)