Help needed (before I pull my hair out :) )

[Talorin]

I've just bought a new personal machine - Intel Pentium Dual Core E8400, 4GB RAM, MSI P6NGM MB and a Nvidia GeForce GTX260.

 

Not the origional spec I was looking at - but good enough to do what I need it to do at home. Just a few little snags - the case is a micro form and the GTX 260 is a full size SLI card - After quite a bit of cussing I've got the card seated nicely in - but XP refuses to register the fact that the card is there. The MB is PCIEx16 - not SLi ready - but since I'm using only the one card I was informed that this would be fine.

 

I've taken the card out - checked it and reseated it - the fans are running so I know its getting power - I just can seem to find a way to get it detected. Its been a long day at work with a local power transformer going out of commission and one of our UPS failing - que server panic time - So any help or advice on how to get this card working would be appreciated.

 

Thanks:(

[Midget]

am I to assume you've got an onboard GPU? Can it been turned off in the BIOS? They can be a pain when you want to use a seperate grfx card.

 

take everything out of the case and start with the basics.

 

Put the mobo on your worktop and attach RAM, CPU,GrfxCard and PSU w/ powercord. Connect a VDU to the grfx card header and thats it. Turn it on and see if it displays the BIOS. Turn it off and connect the OS HDD and a kb/mouse and see if it will boot the OS and run through the PCIe grfx card.

[Talorin]

Tried your suggestion - The card is not showing up in POST - I've searched some more on the MSI forums and found a possible fix of resetting the CMOS - Still no luck.

[Marci]

Not enough power possibly... what rating is your PSU?

[Talorin]

Its a 350 Watt - Didnt think of that. I'll go grab a BIGGER one tomorrow and see what happens.

[michael2k6]

Get 500 plus. Make sure it's a decent make too, the value ones dont usually do a lot for me.

[Midget]

the PSU is your protection between power spikes and dead expensive equipment. Get an enermax.

[Brpilot99]

Hiyah just a silly thought ... have you plugged in the 2 extra power leads to the back of the card !!

Also 350 watts is not enough ... I had one and it failed very quickly when playing Crysis at ful res on my 260gtx ... Ive now got a 750 watt !!!

[Midget]

That IS a thought, quite a few new cards want MoarPowAr! so check that.

 

to disable onboard grfx:

to disable the onboard graphics in your motherboard you need to go into the set up(bios)

to do this restart the p.c and upon restart press delete to enter set up,and when in the set up screen press "intergrated peripherals" and then press "onboard device set up" and there you should see the onboard graphics device,simply change from enabled to disabled by using the page up/page down keys and then go back to the main set up page and press "save and exit set up",this will save any changes to the cmos and restart the p.c

 

 

Although I just read a review of your board that said that they WILL run side by side with an NVidia for dual screen without problem, but it just removes a point of failure, it can always be enabled later.

[Reaper]

Now is that dual monitor clone, or dual monitor split?

[IanT]

Some graphics card's will require extra power, normally a 6 pin power cable from the PSU, check that.

[Talorin]

Thanks for all your replies - been out today and got an Atrix 800W power supply and everything is working fine

 

Happy little bunny playing Deadspace and Fallout 3

[michael2k6]

Good show.

[Marci]

Just for those shouting "more wattage" (effectively)... wattage is more or less irrelevant. A good 350w PSU WILL do the job if it has enough ampage on it's 12v rail... most folks just go out and buy bigger wattage without looking into it deep enough, and discover they could've spent half as much on something that'd do the job.

 

Seasonic are about the best for solidity, quality, low noise, high output... without stepping up to ridiculously extreme levels of PCP&C etc (I swear by their 1.2kw model, but it's complete overkill unless you've got pumps hanging off it). Enermax have long since been a dead duck using lowend components (they were once good, but these days a bit on the cheap naff side).

 

Anyhoo... to find out what you ACTUALLY need... just bang all system specs into: eXtreme Power Supply Calculator Lite v2.5 and it'll tell you. (And if you knock off the original 38w, it'll also tell you the max heatload of that particular PC - handy for aircon purposes).