New card.

[Faris]

I recently bought a new graphic card and I'm having troubles installing it.

So far, I have the hardware installed, it's everything else that I'm having problems with. The instructions told me that I need to remove the old card, which is attached to the mother board. I don't know where it is, and I am not tearing it apart without knowing what it's supposed to look like. So what is it supposed to look like and what am I supposed to do to properly install the damn thing?

Note: It's a PCI graphic card and I am a twit =)

[Rostum]

Okay, well you don't need to un-install on-board graphics cards like you have. All you need to do is download the most recent drivers from the manufacturer's websites of the card you just bought. Install them, and you should be good to go.

[Faris]

I haven't un-installed anything.

There isn't anything available for my product on the website.

[Rostum]

I haven't un-installed anything.

There isn't anything available for my product on the website.

What is the brand name and model of your new card?

[Faris]

PowerColor 9250

"Powered by ATI Radeon"

[Rostum]

Drivers & Software

In the forms, you can select your operating sytem, then select Radeon, then scroll down and select Radeon 9250 series.

Hope that helps.

[crono_logical]

Yeah, you shouldn't need to "remove" the old card if it's an on-board one, most BIOSs are clever enough to use a PCI/AGP card as the primary one if it detects one, or at least can be told to if you go into the BIOS setup Even better, if you get a second monitor, you should be able to use both cards at the same time

[Yamaneko]

There should be an option in your BIOS to disable your onboard graphics. It's best that Windows not even detect it alongside your new card.

As far as multiple monitors are concerned, I'm pretty sure you can only mirror an image using an onboard graphics + dedicated graphics solution. To get dualview or spanning working (a driver level function) your graphics card would have to have two outputs or at least have a VGA splitter attached. I could be wrong though, I haven't had much experience with onboard graphics in the past five or so years.

[crono_logical]

We use multiple graphics cards (mix of onboard + multiport cards) at work to provide machines with 3 or 4 displays for our support centre staff since they like having the extra desktop space - one screen for remote controlling user machines, one screen for local work like email, and one for remote desktop for administrative functions

[Faris]

I'm going to have to manually install it because windows hasn't detected anything. =/ I can tell that it's plugged in properly. I can hear it's fan. When I plug the monitor into the port attached to the card, I just get a blank screen.

There should be an option in your BIOS to disable your onboard graphics. It's best that Windows not even detect it alongside your new card.

Could you tell me how to do that?

[o_O]

Windows probably wouldn't detect the card until after the drivers are installed, in case you haven't installed them yet.

You can enter your BIOS by pressing a key during your computer's boot sequence. It usually will display which key that needs to be on the screen. Usually it's delete or F2. In the BIOS you'll find heaps of settings - as a general rule of thumb, if you don't know what it does, leave it as it is. You just need to disable your onboard graphics in there.

[ValiantKnight]

If the card is powered on, and the fan is running, it just means its getting power.

It sounds like it still wants to pull off your on-board display for the video, and is ignoring the card. Also the card could be broken, but I doubt that.

They'd probably need to know your motherboard model number to tell you where to disable onboard graphics. The bios is a "dangerous" place to play around, and the wrong setting = new motherboard.

However if you feel like being risky, you basically would have to press F2, delete key, or maybe F10, depending on the motherboard manufactorer at the startup of your computer(very first screen when you restart/power on)

However from there, the place to disable the onboard video or set the video at bootup to be the agp or pci slot will vary by motherboard and bios version, but usually just vary by motherboard.