nVIDIA FAQ
May 27, 1999


Contents


Test Apps
These downloadable apps may help qualify a system's 3D capabilities:


AGP cards - No video, several beeps
For some systems, installing a RIVA 128/ZX AGP board properly requires extreme force when inserting into the AGP slot.


RIVA TNT2 - Silicon Graphics 1600SW flat panel compatibility
SGI has a really nice digital flat panel. Unfortunately it uses a proprietary LVDS scheme. The industry has moved to TMDS and looking forward from that DDWG. If you are looking for a TNT2 compatible flat panel, any thing that supports the 'standard' DFP (Digital Flat Panel) interface should work


RIVA TNT - incorrect BIOS checksum
Some early TNT boards have a video BIOS which produced an incorrect checksum when shadowed. Some system BIOS's don't like this. The only way to get the board to work may be to reflash the video BIOS (in a different machine). If possible, try other TNT cards in the same machine to see if any already have a better video BIOS that will boot. If you choose to try and reburn the video BIOS, contact the original manufacturer of your card for the latest information on how to do this.


RIVA TNT - sporadic system lockup on some systems with AMD CPUs
Some SIS and ALI PCI chipsets that are used on motherboards with AMD CPUs are having problems with RIVA TNT based boards. If you have such a motherboard look for a large (2") chip. You should see SIS, ALI or VIA on it. VIA chips do not have this problem.

For the latest information please contact the motherboard manufacturer. Other links that may have useful information include:


RIVA 128/ZX - true color 3D
For best 3D performance, RIVA 128/ZX is optimized for 16 bit (high color) rendering. The RIVA 128 architecture falls back to software 3D rendering for 24 bit true color displays. 2D acceleration in true color is not affected.


NT 4.00 - Microsoft Service Packs / VGA only
Either Service Pack 3 (most systems) or Service Pack 4 (some multi-processor systems) must be installed before drivers will properly engage. Systems exhibiting this symptom may dual-boot to W9X just fine. Microsoft NT service packs may be downloaded from their FTP site.


NT 4.00 AGP - dual-processors / VGA only
For some dual-CPU Pentium II systems, this can be worked around by changing a BIOS setting immediately after power on. If a BIOS setting doesn't correct the problem, contact the motherboard manufacturer and see if a more recent BIOS is available. Systems exhibiting this symptom may dual-boot to W9X just fine.

To change BIOS settings ...


NT 4.00 - drivers still won't install
Often under NT pre-installed drivers from other vendors can falsely be started and clobber the desired driver. Look through NT systems 32 and system 32/drivers directories for any suspicious pre-existing driver files. Often old drivers from Diamond Multimedia and STB can cause these issues for NVIDIA based cards.


NT 4.00 - determining what driver version is running


Windows 9X - Acceleration of Direct3D OK, but not for OpenGL
It seems at least Microsoft DirectX Version 5 needs to be installed for OpenGL to accelerate properly on some systems.


WIndows 9X RIVA 128/ZX - Acceleration of OpenGL OK, but not for Direct3D
  • Check that OpenGL acceleration is present using X29 or similar test app. With X29 use the Help, Who's Rendering Menu. If Microsoft is reported as the OpenGL renderer, no hardware acceleration is occuring and there may be a driver installation problem. For driver installation problems, see other areas of this FAQ.
  • Check that Direct3D acceleration is present using FlipCube, Tunnel, or similar app. With FlipCube the file menu will have a HAL option if hardware acceleration is present.
  • For DirectX 5 and later, locate DXTOOL.EXE . Run it and make sure that Use Direct3D Hardware Acceleration is checked. If it is not checked, Direct3D will not use hardware acceleration even though OpenGL will. For Direct3D versions before DirectX 5, lack of hardware acceleration may due to driver installation problems.

    Note: If hardware accelerated Direct3D is disabled via DXTOOL or similar method, re-installing DirectX may not re-enable acceleration. Explicitly enabling Direct X to allow hardware acceleration may be required.


    • Windows9X - determining what driver version is running
  • Open the System Control Panel
  • Device Manager tab
  • expand Display adaptors
  • select RIVA 128 and properties
    driver tab
    driver file details
  • for each file ...
    File Version: 4.10.01.2XX (XX is latest version)

    note, all essential W9X driver files are named NV3*.* . For W95 AGP only, VGARTD.VXD may also need to be installed.


    • Windows 9X Safe Mode Install
    Sometimes multiple pre-installed drivers can make it difficult to upgrade a systems' graphics card driver. A safe mode install can rectify this. Here's how I do it when upgrading a RIVA 128 graphics card driver ...
  • restart system
  • immediatly after system BIOS resets, hit F8
  • choose safe mode from boot menu
  • Open System control panel, Device Properties tab
  • remove every display adapter listed. Also check Monitor, Other, 3D Accelerator, and perhaps other miscelanious device classes for bogus graphics drivers and remove them. Close the control panel.
  • 'explore' the C:\Windows\Inf directory. Check the sub-directory C:\Windows\Inf\Other (present on Windows 95 OSR2 and later) for .INF files for anything graphics oriented and delete them. Leave non-graphics ones alone. For the C:\Windows\Inf check for any .INF files that may also be graphical. Culprits I have run into here are:
  • DMDISP.INF (Diamond MM)
  • NV*.INF (nVIDIA)
  • reboot and allow system to come up normally
  • normal plug and play should prompt for a driver file path for a 'unknown PCI' graphics card. Direct the system prompts to the graphics driver file path of your choice.


    • Windows 98, RIVA 128 ZX - incompatible boot screen
    Sometimes after installing a RIVA 128 ZX card in a Windows 98 system a ...
    "This version of the Resource Manager is incompatible with this NV product"
    ... black boot screen message is all that comes up.
  • restart system
  • immediatly after system BIOS resets, hit F8
  • choose safe mode from boot menu
  • Open System control panel, Device Properties tab
  • remove every display adapter listed. Also check Monitor, Other, 3D Accelerator, and perhaps other miscelanious device classes for bogus graphics drivers and remove them. Close the control panel.
  • 'explore' the C:\Windows\Inf\Other directory. Check for .INF files for anything graphics oriented and delete them. Leave non-graphics ones alone.
  • reboot and allow system to come up normally
  • for most version of Windows 98, normal plug and play should should locate a RIVA 128 driver in the standard CAB files that were used to install the OS. At some point it should ask if you want to restart ...
    NO!
  • after desktop appears, open control panel for Displays/Settings/Advanced/Adaptors/Change
  • choose to select list of Displays to choose from
  • Have Disk
  • scrub around file system to locate appropriate NV3DISP.INF
  • a prompt may ask you to confirm that you want to change from the current driver, say YES
  • Finish/Close/Close/.../Restart


    • Windows 95, AMD K6-2 - boot screen error
    Some systems with     Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) K6-2 processors may have boot problems starting Windows 95 OSR 2.X on processor clocked at speeds of 350MHz and above. Suspicous error messages include: The problem is very intermittent at 350MHz, but occurs more often at higher speeds. Contact AMD for measures to resolve this.


    Linux X Windows drivers
    RIVA 128/ZX/TNT drivers:     Linux Distributions:

    Are you a non-Windows driver developer? If so you may want to send your inquires to: os-info@nvidia.com