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General discussion

AGP cards only recognized as PCI

Feb 23, 2004 8:06PM PST

I have just gone from Windows 2000 to Windows XP Professional, full, clean install, and now my graphics card is being recognized only as a PCI card (under the cards properties it says that the location is PCI 1), also I know that it there is a problem because every time I load up Savage, it tells me that my card is in PCI mode and this will cause problems, which it does. I have tried uninstalling the card, reinstalling it, using an older card (that still came up as PCI), and had no joy with anything.

My PC Specs are as follows:

Windows XP Pro SP1
Abit AT7 Max2 Motherboard
AMD Athlon XP 2600+
Galaxy Geforce FX 5200 (the other card I tried was an ABIT GeForce Ti 4200)
1GB PC2700 RAM

NOTE: I have noticed a few people suggesting that you need to reformat reinstall to resolve this problem, however, seeing as that's what I have just done, I don't see how that would have any effect.

Any ideas or suggestions would be much appreciated.

Cheers

Ben

Discussion is locked

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Re:AGP cards only recognized as PCI
Feb 23, 2004 8:49PM PST

This is a cosmetic item with no real effect.

I would not fix this.

Bob

PS. You didn't note if the BIOS and motherboard drivers were current.

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Did you install the motherboard drivers.
Feb 23, 2004 9:29PM PST

For reference, another discussion about it:

"I fixed this on my computer. I have a Ti4600 on an Asus P4T-E
motherboard. Any time I went to the adapter settings screen I saw
that it said my card was AGP running in PCI mode. After a lot of
reading and searching, I read on Intel's site that you need to run an
Inf updater to get this motherboard (and 100 others) to communicate
properly with the AGP slot. I looked up the files for my chipset
(I850) and downloaded the Inf updater. I ran the updater (had to
unzip it and then run the 'setup' program) and rebooted my computer.
It found all kinds of new hardware for the bridges and installed it
automatically. "

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Re:Did you install the motherboard drivers.
Feb 25, 2004 11:47PM PST
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In closing, my best advice is to not fix this. Unless there is a "broken", don't "fix."
Feb 25, 2004 11:51PM PST

The item in question has been spotted by me a few times and some descend in another spiral of problems as they "fix" such things.

Proceed with care.

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Re:AGP cards only recognized as PCI
Feb 23, 2004 11:03PM PST

Install using XP specific drivers for your mtrbd. video. If needed, try the latest ones available from the mtrbd. support website. Under the bios, verify what AGP setting are at, try going to a lower level just to get it to work and if does, goto the next level or higher rate. If capable, allow the bios to "use optium setting" or "safe setting" to restart that area. If all fails, simply "clear" the bios and then reset values.

FYI, I found video to be an increasing difficult area to work in lately. In many cases going back to older drivers or recheck the newest driver is a perfect match for the video card installed. So, I don't find your problem a lone one, others I'm sure have similar problems.

good luck -----Willy

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Re:AGP cards only recognized as PCI
Feb 29, 2004 3:44PM PST

Found out some stuff for ya. Turns out, when you see the location of the Video Card as "PCI bus 1", that is OK. If you want to make sure, download the latest drivers for your video card from NVidia's website (www.nvidia.com), or use Gainward's own drivers from their website. Also, if you are able to edit your registry (regedit.exe), go to the following key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\NVIDIA Corporation\Global\NVTweak

Right-click the right side of the two "sides", then click on "New/DWORD Value". Name the value "CoolBits", then set it as "ffffffff". This will enable all the "secret" pages in the video properties page. Right-click on the desktop and then on "properties". Under the NVIDIA properties, go to where it (should) says "AGP Settings". On that tab, there is a slider that enables you to change from "PCI" to "AGP".

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Re:AGP cards only recognized as PCI
Feb 29, 2004 8:45PM PST

Did you change the option in the CMOS to show you are running an AGP card? I believe the default for this setting is PCI.