A computer question for the masses

[Monster Dave]

Hey guys,

I've got a really frustrating issue with my home computer and I hope that you can shed some light for me on this issue. I've got an LG 22in LCD monitor that has been hooked up to my computer that's been running an Nvidia chipset graphics card with an output resolution of 1920x1080 (which I love!). However, I just upgraded my graphics card because it was long over due to one with an ATI chipset and for the life of me I can't figure out why the max resoultion that I'm getting is 1400x1050 while the card states that it will clearly go MUCH higher than that. For the life of me I can't figure out why my 5 year old Nvidia card didn't have any problem auto detecting it, but this new card can't detect my 1920x1080 resolution at all.

My new card does have a connection for: VGA, DVI, and HDMI
My monitor however only offers VGA and DVI-D connections.

Does anyone know if I get an HDMI-DVI-D cable and not use the VGA (currently connected) if that will (concieveably) fix my problem?

I'd hate to fall back on a 128mb graphics card just to get the resolution that I like so much. Thanks!

[GAAN]

Did you download the ATI Catalyst Controller?

[Monster Dave]

3 times.

Even used Driver Detective to make sure that what I'm running is the most current version of the driver.

[GAAN]

can you use the controller to manually set the resolution?

[ZLTFUL]

2 things...first, what is the monitor being detected as? If it's "Default" instead of "Plug and Play" it may require a tiny driver to be installed.
Second, it could be a limitation with the ATI card and the VGA output. I am running both of my monitors off of DVI to HDMI cables and they work wonderfully.

[Monster Dave]

Thanks guys for the input. After exhausting 5hrs with this card, I finally just decided to return it because nothing worked correctly. I would bogg down, the resolution wasn't right, and the drivers are/were a mess.

I'll never buy another ATI card again. Looks like it's Nvidia all the way for me!

[derby]

Thanks guys for the input. After exhausting 5hrs with this card, I finally just decided to return it because nothing worked correctly. I would bogg down, the resolution wasn't right, and the drivers are/were a mess.

I'll never buy another ATI card again. Looks like it's Nvidia all the way for me!

did you remove all the nvidia drivers before installing the ati ones? there are a few "driver strippers" out there that'll do the job completly (files + registry entries, etc).

the issue you're having is either caused by the monitor not reporting it's proper resolution(s) to the card (unlikely) or the card not properly receiving the info.

given the performance issues you've described, i'm gonna lean to lingering nvidia drivers causing your ati issues.

[Monster Dave]

I did everything that I could think of - removing the old drivers was top of the list, I even downloaded a program called PowerStrip that one forum suggested trying for someone else having the same problems. Unfortunately, it didn't work any better for me that it did for that guy either.

Does anyone know at what point AMD and ATI became the same company? oh and another thing is that although it's a brand new card from HIS, AMD states on the driver page of their site that the do not support drivers of hotfixes for the card??!! WTF??!!

As soon as I put my Gainworld Geforce 6800 back in and reinstalled the drivers, everything was beautiful and back to normal at 1920x1080.

Now I don't know what to do. My mobo is a Asus AV8 Deluxe so it's a few years old but still runs great at 2.8ghz Win7 x64 and 2gb of memory.

Are there any 1GB AGP cards with Nvidia chipsets that anyone knows of? I've looked but haven't found any on Newegg or similar sites.

[mitt]

I am late to the thread, but I think win 7 only shows a few standard resolutions by default that it detects your monitor "likes".  If I remember right, there is a separate button to go to non-standard resolutions or something and then it lists everything possible even if it thinks your monitor will not like it.  I had to find it when hooking my win7 machine to my sony 26" tv.


mitt

[djrashonal]

Hey MD,
I've got an extra hdmi/dvi cable if you want it. Pm me and I can bring it by this afternoon

[Monster Dave]

I am late to the thread, but I think win 7 only shows a few standard resolutions by default that it detects your monitor "likes".  If I remember right, there is a separate button to go to non-standard resolutions or something and then it lists everything possible even if it thinks your monitor will not like it.  I had to find it when hooking my win7 machine to my sony 26" tv.


mitt

I checked for something like that but found nothing. That also doesn't really address why my old graphics card automatically detected the 1920x1080 resolution while the new one only detected 1400x1050.

[Monster Dave]

Hey DJ,

Thanks but like I said I decided to return it and took it promptly this morning to the post office to send back. The feeling was surprisingly one of "good riddens" when I left it.

I suppose that makes most of this conversation irrelevant now, but I still need a new graphics card thats AGP, offers more memory, and isn't an ATI chipset.

[djrashonal]

Well I suppose it pays to read the entire thread! If you feeling like cycling up to frys electronics I usually find good deals there... Good luck on the hunt!

[Monster Dave]

Well I suppose it pays to read the entire thread! If you feeling like cycling up to frys electronics I usually find good deals there... Good luck on the hunt!

How about I drive up there then ride there with my bike in the back. LOL - that would be a long ride from Tucson!!

[il d00d]

What was the make/model of the card you sent back?  I have an ancient ATI 9600 AIW running 1920x1080 on analog - I don't think it was your video card.   I had to install drivers for my monitor (not video card) to get this resolution.

As far as a good AGP cards, I think the consensus is that you could not do any better than a Radeon HD 3850 - Nvidia did not put out too many 1G AGP cards that were competitive with the ATIs of the same era.  There are some 1Gig cards, but they will probably be hard to find.

I am kind of in the same boat, hamstrung by AGP.  I want to install a card that has modern xwindows support, but I pretty much have to go to a board with PCIE to do so.  And I hate descending that slippery slope of hardware upgrades, where a $75 video card problem is solved with a $750 mobo-chip-videocard-RAM-harddrive solution.

This is a good site for research and comparing cards
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?

... but I would give ATI another shot.  They're pretty much the only AGP game in town.  Good luck