Matrox G550

Im trying to get a matrox g550 to work on me dads computer. The card is place firmly into the agp slot but when I boot both monitors stay black. The computer uses AOpen AX6BC mobo.

Appreciate any help.

 

This is from Maxtrox FAQ http://www.matrox.com/mga/support/faq/details.cfm?id=118 What can I do if I do not have any display while booting up or during POST? - There might be several reasons why the video card is not processing a display either on boot up, during POST or in a DOS mode. It is also possible that your motherboard will give sound signals as beep codes, referring to an error with the display adapter.

- You will need to be sure that the card is properly inserted in the PCI or AGP slot. It is also important to verify the cable connections to the card and to the monitor.

- Some motherboards have problems with newer cards and will need the AGP aperture size in the BIOS to be set at 256 in order for the card to function (mostly with Phoenix BIOS).

- If the card was working, and at one time you updated the BIOS, you can use the BIOS backup disk (which should have been created when you did the BIOS update) to restore your old BIOS version.

- If you have a G-Series graphics card you can use our Bios Recovery utility found in our utility section to recover our bios back to the factory default settings.

- If none of these help, you will need to contact us for a possible RMA.

 

There are no beep's on startup.

I changed the agp aperture size to 256 but didnt help.

Have not flashed\updated bios.

Cables are ok.

 

There are two connectors on the back of the G550. The standard VGA output connector is for the PRIMARY display and the DVI connector is for the secondary display.
Make sure your monitor is connected to the standard output connector or you will have a black screen on boot-up.
If in doubt, power down and change monitor to the other connector and try boot-up again.
Good luck

 

Thanks for your reply, I actually had both monitor connected when booting.

I've now tryed two video cards on the computer and none of them work on my dads computer but both work on my computer. So it seems like the agp slot is the problem. Is there anyway to disable it ? (switch on mobo or in bios perhaps) or is this a hardware failure and i need to replace my mobo.. ?

 

The G550 works in 2X or 4X AGP mode.
Your m/b can only do 1X or 2X AGP.
Try the AGP/FSB Clock Ratio jumper on your mb
(JP23) at AUTO (Pin 1+2). If that does not work, play around with it if you know what the FSB speed of the CPU is ( ie 66 or 100/133?)

I also suggest that you use a single monitor only - on primary connector - until you have a visable display, then add the second monitor.

And check the seating of the card again - specially the rear end of the card. I have found that my card stops working even if I just plug the IDE cable back into the mb. That little bit of movement causes the rear end of the card to dislodge ever so slightly , but it's enough to stop it from booting up!

Other things to consider are your computer PSU - is it up to the rating?

The G550 is a wonderfull card for productivity. I have 3 machines with G550's and cannot live without dual (or tripple, like my new P750) display anymore.

At some stage though, it will not be worthwhile to spend more time trouble shooting and replacing parts and it might be better to get a new mb that has AGP4X support.

 

Jaws3 : Thanks for your reply.

The G550 card supports agp 2x and 4x and my motherboard supports 2x agp so I guess that shouldnt be a problem, right ?

Will look into your other suggestion tonight.