GTX 295 RMA Arrived Today

[Dick Splash]

My RMA arrived today and I would have thought that [as it's an identical card] it was just a case of simply installing it and powering up the PC. Not so!

I had to manually change the display setting to their maximum. I then found that there was an error code in Device Manager/Display Adapters. Both GTX 295 drivers showed a (Code 43). My monitor driver has disappeared and more importantly, my Nvidia Control Panel has disappeared too. The latter doesn't appear when I right click desktop and it's not in the control panel either.

It took weeks of forum posts in here and elsewhere and it finally took EVGA's technical support to realise that the card had been faulty from day one. On the advice of tech. support I RMA'd it. All I did was remove it from the PC and now this. I'm still waiting for the report for the card this one replaced.

All help will be most welcome.

DS

[Rocky]

Uninstall drivers and clean install latest ones?

[Dick Splash]

Should I go into regedit too, just to make sure there's no Nvidia traces?

DS

[Rocky]

There's a tool for that, to clean out all nvidia files.

[JohnTC02]

I normally use Driver Cleaner, link below for the free version.

Download.

[GreyHaired]

Can you test the card in another/someone else's PC?

Question is if it's the PCI-E slot

[NoQuarter]

Should I go into regedit too, just to make sure there's no Nvidia traces?

Don't go overboard and delete/wipe all of the NVIDIA drivers/hooks...as I believe your X58 still utilizes nForce SLI.

[Dick Splash]

Don't go overboard and delete/wipe all of the NVIDIA drivers/hooks...as I believe your X58 still utilizes nForce SLI.

I've just had an email from EVGA's tech. support and they've just advised;

Please go into your control panel and then to the Add/Remove Programs option. In the add remove programs please uninstall the Nvidia Drivers and if asked please choose display driver only. Once this is removed please restart the computer and once restarted please download the latest 190.62 drivers from http://www.evga.com/support/drivers and when asked to restart please do so. If the problems continue please let us know and we will move forward from there to assist you. Thank You, EVGA Customer Support

I'm sure I did that when I plugged the new one in anyway and this all started.

I still don't understand why unplugging an identical card in would result in a driver issue and the disappearence of the Nvidia Control Panel!

DS

[ROCO*AFZ*]

Each piece of hardware has a unique identifier. Even though they take the same driver and are the same card, windows sees it as a new device and most of the time will load a generic driver. That is why windows activation relies on your hal from your pc to identify if Operating system has been moved to a brand new pc or not.

My recommendations are... remove the nvidia driver 1st using add/remove programs (if in xp) or programs and features (In vista and Windows 7). reboot. clean with driver sweeper. reboot again. then fresh load latest driver.

[Dick Splash]

I did that and checked in Registry Editor to make sure there was no trace of anything Nvidia. I then looked around my program folder and found both the original driver and the latest driver. I deleted those and made sure it was clean of Nvidia. I then downloaded the appropriate driver and then tried to install it, but an error message appeared during the install saying something like Nvidia's uninstaller was a 32bit installer and I'm using a 64bit OS. I'm using Vista 64bit.

Where I'm at now is that there are no display adapters in device manager, but the downloaded driver is in an Nvidia file in my C drive. I've emailed this to EVGA's tech. support too.

Everything looks fine, but the refresh rate is poor if I try to scroll or use my mouse. I'm nearly there and it all points to it being a driver issue.

DS

[ROCO*AFZ*]

You grabbed the wrong driver. Grab the vista (i think you had vista) 64 bit driver.

There is a seperate download for 32 and 64 bit.

[Dick Splash]

I did download the correct driver, twice. I can see there's a difference on EVGA's download page and it even shows Win 7 now.

After the Nvidia clean and the reboot, my PC auto-detected new hardware and tried to install some [generic?] driver. I cancelled that straight away. EVGA haven't replied yet.

DS

[ROCO*AFZ*]

Ignore EVGA's site.

Get it directly from nvidia.

www.nvidia.com

[Dick Splash]

That's exactly what EVGA's support email advised today. It was a big download and took about thirty minutes. When I ran it, it seemed to go ok until the same error code appeared and this time I wrote it down;

You are running a 32 bit version of Nvidia uninstaller on a 64 bit system

(Binary type I386).

Wrong version of uninstaller. Uninstaller exits now.

I opened up the Nvidia folder in my 'C' drive and manually tried to install each application. The PhysX and Nvidia's 3D Vision installed and they both appear in a new folder marked 'Nvidia' in All Programs. The Nvidia Control Panel wouldn't install, I assume because of the drivers, and the drivers failed to install and showed the above code.

Where I'm at now is that I have the two drivers in device manager showing the Error Code 43 and a poor refresh rate due to the fact I have no graphics drivers.

DS

[JohnTC02]

Don't know if this will be of any help to you but I just found link below in the nvidia forums, it's quite an old thread but there is a couple of fixes listed there for the problem you had which has helped some people, check out the last post.

nvidia uninstaller.

*Edit*

Just a thought, I wonder if you have a corrupted registry entry somewhere, I use the program below it cleans out all the unused/corrupted entries plus it will delete all the temp files on your hard disc, make sure you go into the settings option and save all the cookies you need before running it or you will lose all your saved passwords.

This may not help or you may have already tried it but it's saved me a lot of hassle in the past.

Download CCleaner.

Edited October 2, 2009 by JohnTC02

[Dick Splash]

Thanks for the research John. I've just replied to this email from EVGA's customer support;

Im sorry to see the issues you are having. If I could suggest a few things for you. I see you say your getting code 43 in device manager. That is a statement that the operating system has detected an error or problem.

On the rear panel of the card (where the dvi ports are located) what color light are you receiving on the card?

Also if you can please click on the small windows/start button and click on computer, then at the top click on system properties, can you please send me a screenshot of that page? Also can you scroll down and also screenshot the lower part of that page if not already visible in the first screenshot.

Then can you please click start again and type in “System information” and when opening that, then please go into “hardware resources”, then finally click on “conflicts and sharing” please also expand that to display as much as possible and take screenshots to show what you have that is in that section please scroll down and take as many screenshots as it takes to include all info.

One more thang, please open device manager and screenshot that for me.

All of this info will help me diagnose your situation further.

During the process I discovered Vista's Snipping Tool. Why has everyone kept this piece of magic from me?

BTW John, I never save passwords and on this new PC build, the only things on it are games and AV software. No documets, photos or MP3's.

DS

[Dick Splash]

After sending the information they wanted, EVGA sent me this very poor reply;

I did not attach any components, I asked if you could please download teh newest driver we just released on our site version 191.07 and see fi you still get teh 43 code.

Is he a teenager?

He didn't even acknowledge receipt of the info they wanted not whether it was any use or not!

DS

[twcrash]

I take a BIG ASS Hammer... Go and Whack the ###### outta something that needs whacking... I then calm down and try it again. If that doesnt work I go on a serial killing spree until I can calm down enough to attempt fixing it again

[Tinker]

^ Interesting option.

[Dick Splash]

According to EVGA, they can see no conflicts from the info/screenshots they requested and so the second card sent is faulty too. After several email exchanges they now want me to ship it back to them and they'll replace it with a brand new [not a referbished/tested RMA] GTX 295 Co-Op Edition. That's a nice gesture, but my gripe is that I purchased their top of the range card a few months ago, they replaced it with a 'used' card and now they're offering me a card that isn't their top of the range and is less expensive too. I've just emailed them my concerns.

DS

[GreyHaired]

I've asked earlier if you have the possibility to test the card in another PC.

It sounds strange when two cards are considered faulty so it's worthwhile to check if it's the mobo's PCI-E slot(s).

Is this a fresh install with new mobo etc or did you only swap the video card?

If the latter, can you do a system restore back to a date, before you installed the first "faulty" card?

Optimally then install an old video card to see if that one works.

I take it that hardware/software like PSU, bios etc are all conform to the card's requirements.

[Dick Splash]

I've asked earlier if you have the possibility to test the card in another PC.

They've asked me that, but I don't know anyone close by that can test it. I've tried the card in another slot and the result's the same. Even though the 3DMark score was low and Cod 4 chugged, I played GRAW no problem and it looked great and that's not even a Vista game. I played BiA HH and that played and looked great too. The whole PC is a completely new build. With the answers and information I've provided EVGA, they seem convinced it's the card. There are no conflicts. Even the board is an EVGA board.

DS

[NurFACE]

I know a lot of people have issue with 191.07 driver so try 190.62. I uninstall driver from control panel then reboot into safe mode to run drive sweeper 2.05 to remove nvidia display then rather than reboot I run the driver I want in safe mode so during reboot good old OS doesn't load a generic driver. You will get a windows installer error message during install while in safe mode but no worries. The goal is to have nvidia folder extracted to c:/nvidia then reboot normal windows and run driver install again from c:/nvidia.

One concern I have is you removed nvidia registry files which could be a problem which is why most suggest using drive sweeper or drive cleaner. Drive sweeper is my preference and it hasn't never removed a bad registry for me so I trust it.

Two cards failing on your system to bad you don't have a back card just to see if it's your motherboard since you don't have anyone close to test your gtx 295 card.

[Dick Splash]

Two cards failing on your system to bad you don't have a back card just to see if it's your motherboard since you don't have anyone close to test your gtx 295 card.

I've played GRAW and BiA-HH fine on the first card. CoD4 was the first game I installed and that's when I suspected issues. The RMA didn't just 'plug & play' and I've had driver issues since. They've just confirmed they'll now exchange this for a third card. This time it's an FTW Co-Op edition.

DS

[Dick Splash]

The GTX 295 FTW Co-Op Edition arrived two days ago. It's the full retail version, which surprised me. I'm now waiting on EVGA to get back with a step-by-step install to prevent any issues. If this third [even faster] card doesn't work then it's a trip to someone's house.

DS