- May 15, 2010
- 46
- 0
- 18,530
Hello,
There's a lot here, but this is a troubling problem as there have been a few blue screens recently...
I'm using two video cards in my system, an Nvidia FX5800 and an older FX4500. I'm running 4 monitors - all Dell, one U3011 2560x1600 res and three U2311H, 1920x1080 res. I know the FX5800 is supposed to handle up to 4 monitors, but in the interest of not taxing the larger card ($$$$!) I've installed both cards and I'm running two of the smaller monitors off the FX4500.
This is the problem: roughly once a day all my displays freeze for two or three minutes and then restore themselves with the message that my video failed and automatically restored itself. This usually happens when I'm doing something display-intense (I'm running up to eight 3D programs at once - all for large construction and architecture projects - no gaming - I need a life!) which is generally the worst possible time.
I have Nvidia's latest driver for the FX5800 installed, but it's not clear how I can update the driver for the FX4500 (or if I need to - I only see the option for the FX5800 driver to be installed, but maybe I'm not seeing something.)
Could this be caused by my using the two mismatched cards? Should I plug all my monitors into the FX5800 and let it do its job? I have a pair of DVI splitters I can use - is this the proper way to connect 4 monitors to the FX5800? It has only two DVI ports.
OK - that was earlier. I had trouble logging onto the forum so I tried the single card with splitters. Here's a follow-up: I plugged all the monitors into the FX5800 using the two splitters. No dice, though there might be more I can try, but I couldn't even get it to boot up to the operating system. It just hung at the memory check and wouldn't move onto the IDE detection. I tried it first without removing the FX4500 and then I removed it - same result. I couldn't even call up the BIOS setup. Once I restored everything it went back to normal (such as it is...)
Another question: I'm starting to wonder if the problem really is the FX4500 driver (or lack of it - I don't think I installed the FX4500 driver, since it's been working for the most part, except for this minor problem...) - if I install the latest driver for the FX4500 now, is there a chance it could muck up the works of the FX5800 driver?
The system: self-built 16 months ago; MB: Gigabyte X58A-UD7; CPU: Intel 980X; Memory: 24GB Mushkin Ridgeback 6x4GB; OS: W7 Ultimate; 2 SSDs for OS and all programs; 7 HDDs totaling 9TB. Other than this, the system is solid as a brick.
Like I said, it was a lot. I appreciate the effort of anybody who's read this far.
So, any ideas? Thanks in advance!
There's a lot here, but this is a troubling problem as there have been a few blue screens recently...
I'm using two video cards in my system, an Nvidia FX5800 and an older FX4500. I'm running 4 monitors - all Dell, one U3011 2560x1600 res and three U2311H, 1920x1080 res. I know the FX5800 is supposed to handle up to 4 monitors, but in the interest of not taxing the larger card ($$$$!) I've installed both cards and I'm running two of the smaller monitors off the FX4500.
This is the problem: roughly once a day all my displays freeze for two or three minutes and then restore themselves with the message that my video failed and automatically restored itself. This usually happens when I'm doing something display-intense (I'm running up to eight 3D programs at once - all for large construction and architecture projects - no gaming - I need a life!) which is generally the worst possible time.
I have Nvidia's latest driver for the FX5800 installed, but it's not clear how I can update the driver for the FX4500 (or if I need to - I only see the option for the FX5800 driver to be installed, but maybe I'm not seeing something.)
Could this be caused by my using the two mismatched cards? Should I plug all my monitors into the FX5800 and let it do its job? I have a pair of DVI splitters I can use - is this the proper way to connect 4 monitors to the FX5800? It has only two DVI ports.
OK - that was earlier. I had trouble logging onto the forum so I tried the single card with splitters. Here's a follow-up: I plugged all the monitors into the FX5800 using the two splitters. No dice, though there might be more I can try, but I couldn't even get it to boot up to the operating system. It just hung at the memory check and wouldn't move onto the IDE detection. I tried it first without removing the FX4500 and then I removed it - same result. I couldn't even call up the BIOS setup. Once I restored everything it went back to normal (such as it is...)
Another question: I'm starting to wonder if the problem really is the FX4500 driver (or lack of it - I don't think I installed the FX4500 driver, since it's been working for the most part, except for this minor problem...) - if I install the latest driver for the FX4500 now, is there a chance it could muck up the works of the FX5800 driver?
The system: self-built 16 months ago; MB: Gigabyte X58A-UD7; CPU: Intel 980X; Memory: 24GB Mushkin Ridgeback 6x4GB; OS: W7 Ultimate; 2 SSDs for OS and all programs; 7 HDDs totaling 9TB. Other than this, the system is solid as a brick.
Like I said, it was a lot. I appreciate the effort of anybody who's read this far.
So, any ideas? Thanks in advance!
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