OK you 'puter Geeks, I need help

[DeaconDean]

On 8/24/07 I purchased a AMD AM2 MSI K9AGM2-L mobo, with an AMD Athalon64 3800x2 processor. Running 2 Gb ram, Aeneon pc 667, DDR2, 800 mhz (matched pair), Seagate 120 gb Ata HD. Windows XP w/Sp 2. 550 watt Atrix 120mm PS. It says its a Socket AMD2, AMD Chipset. (Actually, it is an AMD 960 chipset)

my wife bought me a GeForce 8500, Vertigo, 512 mb, PCIE 16x video card, and an Envision 19" widescreen LCD Flat panel monitor for Christmas.

Here is the deal, have installed the drivers. Now I have a whole new set of problems. Whenever Windows Xp comes back up after stand-by, I am now prompted to enter a password before it will let me back on. I never had a password since this is a home computer for only gaming and word processing. (I am a seminary student)

Command and Conquor Generals, and Command and conquor Generals Zero hour was playing just fine with the on board video card. not it just locks up the computer.

I cannot get Enigma: Rising Tide to play from the desk top icon.

Since installing this video card, it has run amok with Win-XP.

What am I doing wrong?

Now I was told:

"go to "control panel", "power options", "advanced" and uncheck mark "Prompt for password when computer resume from standby

go to screen saver page from display properties and and uncheck mark "On resume, password protect"

To wit, I replied:

I might not be the smartest person here, but I do something about computers and if if it was a minor problem of just:

"go to "control panel", "power options", "advanced" and uncheck mark "Prompt for password when computer resume from standby".
go to screen saver page from display properties and and uncheck mark "On resume, password protect"

I wouldn't have even bothered. But that didn't help.

Now it is to the point that whenever I finish doing whatever I have to do, I have to shut down the computer.

What could be the problem?

Thanks

God Bless

Till all are one.

 

[alexgb00]

DeaconDean,

I don't know a lot, but I'd like to be useful. Do you know how to go into the BIOS? I'm not sure if we're thinking of the same thing, but there is a password there that keeps the computer from being started by "strangers." You can see if it's that.

Also, in the BIOS it tells you what the CPU temperature is. On mine, when my computer is in a corner or under the desk, it will overheat (not enough circulating air) and shut down. If your CPU is getting very hot, try to make sure it's in an open place.

And I don't know if you're using the drivers which came in the package, but at the nvidia website (http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us) you can make sure you acquire the freshest ones. Maybe you did that already, but if not, see if that will help you.

Alex

 

[DeaconDean]

Thanks Alex.

The Geforce video card has its own fan.

As far as the case is concerned, I have two 60mm fans installed. One on the back just below the power supply, and one on the side of the case. So temperature isn't the prob.

I went to the MSI web-site and I have the latest version of BIOS installed.

but you still miss the point, i never had any password of any kind on the computer. It was only after installing the video card that this begain to happen.

And that was just 5 days ago.

God Bless

Till all are one.

 

[alexgb00]

I don't understand. If the computer asks for a password and you don't know what it is, how are you able to log on? And is it possible that someone in your family changed the settings?

Did you have just one user account on your computer? If so, make sure it's still that way. Go to the control panel, then "user accounts," then "change an account." There should be only the one you set up and a Guest Account.

As far as the game, it may be a hardware issue. Sometimes a person doesn't fully push the card into the motherboard. And also, if I understand your Geforce, it should have a Y-power cable that plugs into the card and the power supply. Do you know for sure that they're solidly connected?

Hopefully that is a little bit of help.

 

[DeaconDean]

I don't understand. If the computer asks for a password and you don't know what it is, how are you able to log on? And is it possible that someone in your family changed the settings?

When windows starts up after not being used for a while, then it is when it asks for a password to log back on. Not while initial start up.

Shutting the computer down, and restarting this seems to temporarily cure it until the compute enters "stand-by" mode again.

Did you have just one user account on your computer? If so, make sure it's still that way. Go to the control panel, then "user accounts," then "change an account." There should be only the one you set up and a Guest Account.

I am an Admin as far as Windows is concerned. my wife and son both occasionally use the computer, but they don't have Admin privledges, so i know this isn't an issue.

As far as the game, it may be a hardware issue. Sometimes a person doesn't fully push the card into the motherboard. And also, if I understand your Geforce, it should have a Y-power cable that plugs into the card and the power supply. Do you know for sure that they're solidly connected?

Nope, my Geforce 8500 GT Vertigo video card does not have a led to plug in for power to the video card fan. It is working because the fan is on and in the BIOS setting, the PNP set up is set to recognize the PCIE slot.

This is my video card:

Hopefully that is a little bit of help.

Puzzeling isn't this?

God Bless

Till all are one.

 

[SumTinWong]

DD I always go to this site when i need help on this sort of thing. http://www.majorgeeks.com Just ask in the forum there i am sure someone will know.

 

[alexgb00]

DeaconDean, I don't know why, but computers sometimes have a mind of their own. Maybe they are possessed or something.

Seriously, whenever I bring my computer from college to my parents' home, it does something. Sometimes it's minor, like the resolution of the screen changes or the game I had installed quit working. But on several occasions, I had to re-install Windows (I have two physical harddrives, my bigger one is where I store things that are important, and the smaller one is the one with XP installed which gets erased). The password issue that you have is probably a software thing. Can't you disable the stand-by mode if it causes you problems? The game not working sounds like a hardware thing. I don't know what it could be, to be completely honest.

 

[micro]

First off you never want to use the drivers that come on the disk with the video card. Nor do you want to use the mobo drivers that come with the mobo, or from msi or any other nvidia based mobo.(we wont worry about this now as im sure it isnt an issue atm)♦

First off (after you dl the new drivers) You want to uninstall your old video card drivers then reboot your pc. Make sure you uninstall your onboard video drivers if different from your video card drivers (if there ati instead of nvidia)

To get rid of the "pasword" you go to "start"control panel"user accounts"administrator". Then there are options in there to set a password manage log in screen etc.(as alexgb00 was saying but look under admin rather than guest)

Some older games have odd problems with the nvidia 8 series cards. I just installed star wars republic commando and ran ito a problem of the game exiting shortly after being opened. This is an nvidia problem rather than the games problem, but you may want to go to EA's website and look under tecnical problems to see if this is a problem with nvidia card/drivers.

If none of this works, i would reformat your hard drive and install the latest drivers and see if this will fix the problem. If not i would get the card exchanged from the store where it was purchased. If you buy online you should always go with a better name brand like evga or bfg etc as they have lifetime warrenty (cross shipping)and a good tech support. Pny and other name brands have a higher % of bad or problemed cards.

If you are running a 32 bit os (operating system) make sure to get the 32bit drivers. win xp is a 32bit os. win xp 64 is a 64 bit os.
Go to nvidia.com and dl up the new video card drivers.they will be version 169.21

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_169.21_whql.html

 

[peanutbutter12]

Make sure your screensaver doesn't have the password protection on. It's simple, but it might be the problem from the sound of it.

 

[alexgb00]

DeaconDean, inform us when you fix it. I'm curious what the cause of this issue is.

 

[micro]

Deacon, have you made any progress?