Black screen after windows loading after installing GPU driver

maxwelbr

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Oct 19, 2011
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Hi everyone

Like the title says, on my new build Im getting a black screen after installing the drivers for my nVidia 9800GX2 gpu's. Just got my new parts in today, everything has installed perfect this far until , here are my system specs

ASUS P8Z68-v pro (brand new) (using all drivers off DVD that came with it)
i5 2500K 3.3 (new)
8GB DDR3 Corsair Vengence (2x 4GB) (new)
Antec 850W quattro (3yr old)
2x nVidia 9800GX2 cards (3yr old)
default BIOS
Vista x64, SP2 installing right now, but only tried GPU with SP1
WD Raptor 150GB (3yr old)

I first tried with the very latest drivers that installed okay, then on trying to shutdown it just sat at a black screen. Manually powered off then on restart it would get to the windows loading screen, where the green bars go across then just sits at a black screen.

upon restarting it will get into desktop and then in device manager it tells me that windows stopped the device because it reported a problem, and revert to the standard VGA adaptor built into the card.

I have also tried using the stock drivers that came on the DVD with the cards. Have tried a combo of both cards connected, One card in the second slot only, one card in the first slot only. Always results in a black screen.

Seems obvious like a driver problem?? But none have worked this far. If my GPU slots on the mobo were shot it wouldnt even display anything? Similar problems to my old build where I used these cards

Thoughts or suggestions to find a solution would be really appreciated



 
Yeah, I really think you need a completely updated OS. It looks like you're trying the SP2 update, I would even ensure I have all available updates done completely before attempting more with the two cards.

Then I would wipe the old drivers using CC cleaner in safe mode, then reboot and install the latest Geforce drivers. I think that will do it.
 

maxwelbr

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Thanks Ill try that.

How exactly do i go about wiping any trace of the old drivers though? To me this doesn't sound like hardware failure so I really want to rule that out first off.

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that when I tried the latest drivers and it hung on shut-down I just did a manual shutdown holding the pwr button??

edit: SP2 update installed successfully, installing all 90 windows updates that could be found.

Should I update the BIOS? I have the second latest version and from what I can tell in the changelog there isnt much difference.
 

maxwelbr

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Sorry for the double reply, but I have just thought of something that may be causing an issue and need input on it...

Before trying to get my GPUs going, I installed drivers for my motherboard, including the Intel Graphics driver for the onboard graphics and am wondering if this may be the culprit??

In BIOS i have PCIE/PCI set as the main boot option (default).

Any thoughts on that?
 


That driver shouldn't be a problem. I wouldn't worry about it for the time being, I think its just CPU specific.

The reason for wiping the old drivers is that you have installed so many recently that we couldn't rule out a conflict as part of the problem.
With a driver cleaner like Ccleaner, you can install just the latest driver after wiping the HD of the old stuff. The drivers, even when uninstalled often leave crud behind like cab files that can also cause problems. Keep the latest Geforce drivers handy-
1) DL Ccleaner
2) Install the program but don't run it.
3) Uninstall all nVidia drivers through the remove programs menu.
4) reboot and enter safe mode, usually you can hit F8 or something like that in the POST.
5) Start Ccleaner program. Wipe all nVidia drivers. Then wipe all cab files.
6) reboot and enter windows. If it asks if it can install the device hit cancel. If it just does its own thing, let it.
7) Install the latest Geforce drivers and reboot.

That should do it. I found on my wife's PC that windows had installed 20 drivers and I had to remove all that crud. Its a hassle but you can eliminate driver issues this way.
 

maxwelbr

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Thanks for the link, thats what Ive done with all nivida software.

I have also uninstalled the Intel Graphics driver and am currently installing a relatively recent driver for my 9800GX2. Not the latest but fairly recent, and as far as I can remember the last one I had working on my old system with these cards.

There is no [PCI-E] option in BIOS, its [PCI-E/PCI], so it defaults to PCI-E first then if nothing is found resorts to PCI slot.

I get standard VGA display when my monitor is plugged into my GPU, hopefully this can rule out any hardware concerns?

edit:

installed the NVIDIA drivers and then after hitting "Restart Now" I'm suck at the Shutting Down... screen. It has been on for a while....

Second edit: And after having to manually turn the computer off I get the good ol' black screen before entering windows. Restarting now and will follow your steps buzznut, but am unsure how to use CCleaner to wipe drivers?
 


Its self explanatory, but I'll run ya through it. You start the program and it asks you to choose which type of drivers, you'll need video drivers and then choose nvidia or AMD drivers. you choose nvidia, follow any prompts and choose the drivers you want to delete. There may be a couple of them. Delete them, then check any cab files as well. Once it tells you its done cleaning, close the program and forget about it until the next time you need it.

The latest video drivers from both AMD and nVidia are optimized for the latest Operating System updates. That includes almost all drivers, so it is best to make sure your system is completely up to snuff with all updates before applying new drivers. You can avoid a lot of conflicts this way.

Just to verify, you are connecting to your monitor via VGA?

Why not DVI?
 

scout_03

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install your intel driver from cd then see if you got the pictue same as page 2.2 then go to bios under advanced if the pci x 16 slot are auto page 3.3 then page 3.5.2 aftergo to 5.2 for nvidia sli setting and drivers install also enabling the sli
 

maxwelbr

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Where am i looking exactly in CCleaner?? I cannot find anything that says Drivers or anything like that, using 3.12 I believe. Do you mean drive wiper?

I have it connected to the DVI port on my GPU, but must use an adapter from DVI-VGA because my monitor doesnt have DVI input.
 

maxwelbr

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Well dont know what else to do, searched everywhere I could too.

Have tried uninstalling drivers in windows and safe mode, installing in windows and safe mode too, used driver sweeper between uninstalls/reinstalls as well. Used latest drivers, earliest and a few in between and each result in a black hangup screen before getting into my desktop. Have tried with and without the Intel Graphics software and even tried removing my RealTek audio driver.

Tried different cards in different slots, no improvement.

Boots into safe mode fine. Can keep my monitor hooked up to the GPU and use its onboard vga to get into desktop okay.

Is my chipset or cpu somehow incompatable with my GPU's?? Seems software/driver related, cant seem to find anything in the BIOS that will address the problem either.

Does it sound like bad hardware? Motherboard is brand new, bad PCI-E slots perhaps? Or are both my cards somehow dead now?
 
Yeah see not likely they are both dead, plus you can boot into safe mode so it def sounds like something software related. Something is nagging me about the VGA output deal...
Can keep my monitor hooked up to the GPU and use its onboard vga to get into desktop okay.
This is confusing me. You can use the GPUs onboard VGA to get into the desktop...not sure what you mean.
 

maxwelbr

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I can hook my monitor up to my GPU and even though the GPU driver isnt working/isntalled I can still get display because of my GPU's built in standard VGA that doesnt require a driver. Basically this tells me that the slot in which my card is in must be working okay?

I've formatted my HDD and am reinsatlling windows currently. Do you suggest that I install all windows updates and then attempt my display driver followed by my chipset, intel graphics and audio drivers? Or install my graphics drivers right on the clean install of Vista x64?
 

maxwelbr

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Ill update with what I have done this far and have made a little bit of progress.

Clean installed Vista x64
Updated motherboard chipset drivers
Installed drivers from nVidia CD

Using one card, I was able to at least get to windows with the driver installed and can up my resolution to the proper setting.

Current problems:

- Device manager shows 1 of 2 GPUs in the card with a problem, code 43 had to be stopped
- Adding a second card, originally got a blue screen related to the driver, flipped the SLI bridge and it seemed stable.
- Now in device manager I see 3 9800GX2's and a standard PCI display, the top has the Code 43 still and Im not sure why Im not seeing the 4 9800GX2s that are there.


Ill update to a more recent driver and see where that gets me....

 

maxwelbr

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update again....

problems have gotten even worse as time goes on, computer crashed randomly while idling after installing the latest drivers and having all 4 GPUs show up in device manager. 3 of 4 were working proplerly while 1 was showing code 43 like always.

Now I cant seem to get it to boot with drivers installed... I can install drivers and it will boot to windows after restarting but it just says windows had to stop the device because it reported an error.

Very concerned as these problems were similar to what I had before I bought a whole new Motherboard, CPU and RAM. That really leaves just the GPUs, PSU and HDD that could be causing these problems.

beginning to think its not just software anymore as it should not be this hard trying to install simple GPU drivers, tried everything in terms of uninstalling/clean installing, drive sweepers, safe mode etc and no luck getting anything close to stable. When it does boot it says the device has reported problems and any other time it just doesnt boot at all.

If anybody has any ideas as to where to go from here Id greatly appreciate it.
 

jasonlaratta

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YES I AM HAVING A VERY SIMILAR PROBLEM ON MY LAPTOP AFTER INSTALLING AN UPDATE (JASONLARATTA)
 

maxwelbr

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No there should be 4 GPU's displayed under device manager. I have two physical 9800GX2 cards, each of those has 2 GPU units.

Thats the problem is that it doesnt matter what driver I use, even a fresh install of windows Im still getting Code 43 on 1 of 2 GPU's if I only have one card installed.

Currently have a useable and seemingly stable setup using one card, with 1 of 2 GPUs actually functioning properly. Surprisingly enough I tested of BF:BC2 and was getting 50-60FPS on medium settings at max res for my monitor, running only a single GPU on a single card