Windows 7 hangs at "Starting Windows" with Nvidia card

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zaxour

[H]ard|Gawd
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Jan 31, 2008
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Hey guys,

I recently bought a Rampage Formula motherboard and I'm having some issues with my 8800GT. I migrated all my hardware from an Abit IP35-pro where the card worked fine.

When I first install the card, the machine boots to windows in VGA mode. It then installs the driver and prompts me to reboot. When it tries to boot again, it hangs at "starting windows" with the pulsating windows logo frozen. No matter how long I leave it, it will not pass that point. I took out the card and put in an old X800 I had and it installed perfectly with me being able to use aero et al. I'm pretty sure this is an nvidia issue but I'm not sure why it would affect this particular motherboard. Any idea how I can get my card working again? I could easily buy a new ATI card but I really don't want to do that at the moment.
 
Details of all new hardware and software installation.

Did you do a fresh harddrive wipe and OS installation from scratch?
Installed the Intel chipset followed by nVidia drivers, from their websites, not from motherboard CD.

It sounds from your scenario, that on boot, it detects as generic VGA device, and then you let Windows install a driver. You need to cancel and abort window's attempt at driver installation and get the latest WHQL drivers from nVidia site. Actually, scratch that. There have been some issues. This is the latest known good driver that doesn't have weird fan issues.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/win7_winvista_64bit_196.21_whql.html
Assuming your using 7 64bit.

If you can no longer get your computer to boot into windows, use the F8 trick to go into safe mode. Check "Programs and Features" in control panel and uninstall any nVidia driver reference. Go into Device Manager and uninstall the driver it currently has.

Download http://www.guru3d.com/category/driversweeper/
Run it in *SAFE MODE*

You should now be able to boot with crappy VGA mode, and install the driver from above.
 
Config:

Asus Rampage Formula X48
8 GB PC6400 DDR2
Q6600

Yes, I did a completely fresh format/install. I also cancelled MS's driver install and attempted to use the newest nvidia stable AND beta. Same problem. I also used driver sweeper, in safe mode no less, since safe mode is all I can boot after the driver is installed. I think the issue may be that I may not be successful in cancelling the MS driver because, no matter what, dev manager will always show it as an 8800GT with the WDDM driver. If there was some way to disable auto driver installation, that may solve the problem.
 
It should show as a WDDM driver, nVidia drivers are WDDM, that is the driver model starting with Vista. Which caused all of it's headaches as manufacturers transitioned to the new driver model.

Other than that, nothing else coming to mind to help you out, weird.
 
Do those 8800's have the 4 pin power connector that you might not have plugged in?
 
He probably wouldn't have even gotten as far as he did if he didn't.

On the old 9700PRO's from ATI, you'd get a error screen before even bios loads telling you it didn't have power supplies via the connector. And that was when they used the old school floppy drive power connector.
 
Yeah I definitely plugged in the PCI-E connector. Other things indicated it may be the PSU, but that makes no sense whatsoever since it worked perfectly fine on my Abit board.
 
BUMP

So, i found that when I put the card in the 2nd PCI-E slot, the computer booted, I was able to install the nvidia drivers, and I got to the desktop. Problem is, I have an accelero S1 with a 120mm fan strapped to it, so I can't have it on the bottom slot unless I want to run it fanless (I don't).

I put the card back in the top slot and the computer "booted," but my monitors display a blank screen. I can hear the intro chime, and I can even enter my password and hear it enter windows, but no display. Any ideas why the top PCI-E slot wouldn't work after I install the driver? It works for the X800, but not this. I'm worried that any decent card I get will encounter this issue as well.
 
zaxour said:
BUMP

So, i found that when I put the card in the 2nd PCI-E slot, the computer booted, I was able to install the nvidia drivers, and I got to the desktop. Problem is, I have an accelero S1 with a 120mm fan strapped to it, so I can't have it on the bottom slot unless I want to run it fanless (I don't).

I put the card back in the top slot and the computer "booted," but my monitors display a blank screen. I can hear the intro chime, and I can even enter my password and hear it enter windows, but no display. Any ideas why the top PCI-E slot wouldn't work after I install the driver? It works for the X800, but not this. I'm worried that any decent card I get will encounter this issue as well.
Click to expand...

Could it be that the mobo has some defects in relation to that particular PCI-E slot? :confused: Time for an RMA, perhaps? :( :eek:
 
zaxour said:
I put the card back in the top slot and the computer "booted," but my monitors display a blank screen. I can hear the intro chime, and I can even enter my password and hear it enter windows, but no display. Any ideas why the top PCI-E slot wouldn't work after I install the driver? It works for the X800, but not this. I'm worried that any decent card I get will encounter this issue as well.
Click to expand...
Is this an SLI board? Kinda weird because the GPU is supposed to go in the top most slot.

Also, have you checked bios updates? You may have a bad board or bad GPU.
 
It's an x48 based board, so it can do crossfire, but not SLI. The video card worked without a hitch on my Abit IP35-pro board, so I'm pretty sure it's not the card. It's just incredibly odd.....
 
zaxour said:
BUMP

So, i found that when I put the card in the 2nd PCI-E slot, the computer booted, I was able to install the nvidia drivers, and I got to the desktop. Problem is, I have an accelero S1 with a 120mm fan strapped to it, so I can't have it on the bottom slot unless I want to run it fanless (I don't).

I put the card back in the top slot and the computer "booted," but my monitors display a blank screen. I can hear the intro chime, and I can even enter my password and hear it enter windows, but no display. Any ideas why the top PCI-E slot wouldn't work after I install the driver? It works for the X800, but not this. I'm worried that any decent card I get will encounter this issue as well.
Click to expand...

When in that stage, try doing a win + p?
 
I had similar happen to a 9600 which would do the same after drivers were installed. It turned out that the card was bad. . Try it in a different machine to confirm.
 
LOL, same thing happened to me. You CANNOT use the card in the top slot... only the bottom one.

A friend had a crossfire board, and if I used the top slot(with his Nvidia card) the machine would lock up.... if I put it in the bottom slot, it worked fine. It would ALSO lock up, if I put that "card" thingy that ASUS gives you to put in the other slot if you only have one card...
 
I decided to order a Gigabyte EP45-UD3P board instead of messing with it anymore (and also to experiment with Snow Leopard). I guess I'll try to sell this one to someone that has an ATI card or who can put up with keeping it in the 2nd slot. I'm running it in an Antec Solo so, like I said, I don't have enough space to keep my Accelero S1 on with a 120mm fan attached.
 
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