Multimedia S618 - Cannot initialize built-in graphics adapter

Working on a Multimedia S618 with an S3 Trio64V+ PCI (765) video card.
It's stuck at 16 colors (no idea how, I'm fixing it for a friend), and
the adapter appears in Device Manager with an exclamation point on it,
and an error message. "Windows cannot initialize built-in graphics
adapter." Any help would be appreciated.

"peterjmilan" wrote in message
om...
Working on a Multimedia S618 with an S3 Trio64V+ PCI (765) video
card.
It's stuck at 16 colors (no idea how, I'm fixing it for a friend),
and
the adapter appears in Device Manager with an exclamation point on
it,
and an error message. "Windows cannot initialize built-in graphics
adapter." Any help would be appreciated.

Peter:
What is needed is more than likely a driver. Which can be found he
http://www.video-drivers.com/companies/906.htm

After you download and expand it to a folder on your system if you go
back to system properties you can then click the "Update Driver Tab"
then do a search at the folder you saved and extracted the files to,
it will then load them if they are needed or even update them if need
be. You may have to restart the computer for the settings to take
effect.

After that you should be able to raise the colors to 256, or 24 or
maybe even 32 True Color.

I hope that helped?

Elector

"Elector" wrote in message .. .
Working on a Multimedia S618 with an S3 Trio64V+ PCI (765) video card.
It's stuck at 16 colors (no idea how, I'm fixing it for a friend), and
the adapter appears in Device Manager with an exclamation point on it,
and an error message. "Windows cannot initialize built-in graphics
adapter." Any help would be appreciated.

What is needed is more than likely a driver. Which can be found he
http://www.video-drivers.com/companies/906.htm

After you download and expand it to a folder on your system if you go
back to system properties you can then click the "Update Driver Tab"
then do a search at the folder you saved and extracted the files to,
it will then load them if they are needed or even update them if need
be. You may have to restart the computer for the settings to take
effect.

After that you should be able to raise the colors to 256, or 24 or
maybe even 32 True Color.

I hope that helped?

I did all of that, downloaded the driver and transferred it to the new
machine, but no matter what, it still comes back with the exclamation
point. I even went so far as to reinstall the OS (there wasn't much on
this computer in the first place), and I still find no success. Where
do I go from here?

Pete

Depending on when, where and how you acquired the Trio64V+ driver, it either has
a self-installing executable or you have to jump thru hoops to install the
driver. My guess is that the driver is not properly installed, or, perhaps, it
is an incorrect driver for the chip. Especially with Windows 95/98, software
driver installs are/were very much a black art, because software writers hadn't
figured out yet or were not properly advised by Micro$oft how to write software
to install (and uninstall) drivers cleanly and easily.

So... go to Device Manager in Control Panel, click the + next to Display adapter
and tell us what the entry for the display adapter reads. We can take it from
there.

BTW, S3 is no more, having been bought up by Diamond Computer Systems, which
changed its name to SonicBlue and sold off the S3 intellectual property (chip
designs, drivers, etc) to VIA Technologies. But you can still find S3 drivers
on the web for all but the latest operating systems... Ben Myers

On 27 Jan 2004 10:13:08 -0800, (peterjmilan) wrote:

"Elector" wrote in message .. .
Working on a Multimedia S618 with an S3 Trio64V+ PCI (765) video card.
It's stuck at 16 colors (no idea how, I'm fixing it for a friend), and
the adapter appears in Device Manager with an exclamation point on it,
and an error message. "Windows cannot initialize built-in graphics
adapter." Any help would be appreciated.

What is needed is more than likely a driver. Which can be found he
http://www.video-drivers.com/companies/906.htm

After you download and expand it to a folder on your system if you go
back to system properties you can then click the "Update Driver Tab"
then do a search at the folder you saved and extracted the files to,
it will then load them if they are needed or even update them if need
be. You may have to restart the computer for the settings to take
effect.

After that you should be able to raise the colors to 256, or 24 or
maybe even 32 True Color.

I hope that helped?

I did all of that, downloaded the driver and transferred it to the new
machine, but no matter what, it still comes back with the exclamation
point. I even went so far as to reinstall the OS (there wasn't much on
this computer in the first place), and I still find no success. Where
do I go from here?

Pete

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message ...
Depending on when, where and how you acquired the Trio64V+ driver, it either has
a self-installing executable or you have to jump thru hoops to install the
driver. My guess is that the driver is not properly installed, or, perhaps, it
is an incorrect driver for the chip. Especially with Windows 95/98, software
driver installs are/were very much a black art, because software writers hadn't
figured out yet or were not properly advised by Micro$oft how to write software
to install (and uninstall) drivers cleanly and easily.

So... go to Device Manager in Control Panel, click the + next to Display adapter
and tell us what the entry for the display adapter reads. We can take it from
there.

Here's what it says:

"Windows cannot initialize the built-in graphics adapter. Shut down
your computer, remove all graphics adapters, and then restart your
computer. Shut down your computer again, reinsert all graphics
adapters, and then restart your computer."

Naturally, I have remove the graphics adapters in Device Manager
several times, to no avail. Does it want me to open up the box and
pull out the video card? (And if so, how do you do that? I've been
trying to open this thing for a couple of days and failing.)

TIA,
Pete

As is often the case, Windows provides misleading explanations and procedures to
follow to solve problems. You're right! How on earth can you remove all
graphics adapters from the computer. First, yours is an on-board chip. Second,
without a graphics adapter, the computer is pretty useless.

Ignore the message and do the following:

1. Obtain a copy of the Trio64V+ driver.
2. Boot up your system in safe mode.
3. Follow the procedure to install the driver.
4. Reboot the system. If the driver is installed properly, Windows
Plug-and-Pray will find the driver and the graphics chip, and install the
driver. You will probably have to reboot again.
5. Upon reboot, click the Display icon in the Control Panel, click the settings
tab, and select the number of colors and resolution from the choices available
to you.

.... Ben Myers

On 28 Jan 2004 08:34:32 -0800, (peterjmilan) wrote:

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message ...
Depending on when, where and how you acquired the Trio64V+ driver, it either has
a self-installing executable or you have to jump thru hoops to install the
driver. My guess is that the driver is not properly installed, or, perhaps, it
is an incorrect driver for the chip. Especially with Windows 95/98, software
driver installs are/were very much a black art, because software writers hadn't
figured out yet or were not properly advised by Micro$oft how to write software
to install (and uninstall) drivers cleanly and easily.

So... go to Device Manager in Control Panel, click the + next to Display adapter
and tell us what the entry for the display adapter reads. We can take it from
there.

Here's what it says:

"Windows cannot initialize the built-in graphics adapter. Shut down
your computer, remove all graphics adapters, and then restart your
computer. Shut down your computer again, reinsert all graphics
adapters, and then restart your computer."

Naturally, I have remove the graphics adapters in Device Manager
several times, to no avail. Does it want me to open up the box and
pull out the video card? (And if so, how do you do that? I've been
trying to open this thing for a couple of days and failing.)

TIA,
Pete

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message ...
1. Obtain a copy of the Trio64V+ driver.
2. Boot up your system in safe mode.
3. Follow the procedure to install the driver.
4. Reboot the system. If the driver is installed properly, Windows
Plug-and-Pray will find the driver and the graphics chip, and install the
driver. You will probably have to reboot again.
5. Upon reboot, click the Display icon in the Control Panel, click the settings
tab, and select the number of colors and resolution from the choices available
to you.

First of all, thanks for all your help so far. It's much appreciated.

Second, I need some more. So close...so very close. I managed to get
the driver installed, and now I have two monitors in the Display
Settings. Buuuuuut...when I try to enable the second monitor, I get
this.

"Your primary display must support 256 colors (or higher) to enable an
additional display. If your display adapter is capable of supporting
at least 256, you may not be using the optimal display driver."

Where do I go from here? I could go into Device Manager and disable
the Standard PCI Adapter...

Pete

Better still, highlight the Standard PCI Adapter in Device Manager and REMOVE
it. Click OK, reboot, and we'll all hope that everything will run as it is
supposed to... Ben Myers

On 29 Jan 2004 08:57:32 -0800, (peterjmilan) wrote:

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message ...
1. Obtain a copy of the Trio64V+ driver.
2. Boot up your system in safe mode.
3. Follow the procedure to install the driver.
4. Reboot the system. If the driver is installed properly, Windows
Plug-and-Pray will find the driver and the graphics chip, and install the
driver. You will probably have to reboot again.
5. Upon reboot, click the Display icon in the Control Panel, click the settings
tab, and select the number of colors and resolution from the choices available
to you.

First of all, thanks for all your help so far. It's much appreciated.

Second, I need some more. So close...so very close. I managed to get
the driver installed, and now I have two monitors in the Display
Settings. Buuuuuut...when I try to enable the second monitor, I get
this.

"Your primary display must support 256 colors (or higher) to enable an
additional display. If your display adapter is capable of supporting
at least 256, you may not be using the optimal display driver."

Where do I go from here? I could go into Device Manager and disable
the Standard PCI Adapter...

Pete

ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message ...
Better still, highlight the Standard PCI Adapter in Device Manager and REMOVE
it. Click OK, reboot, and we'll all hope that everything will run as it is
supposed to... Ben Myers

Device Manager will not allow me to disable the Standad PCI Adapter,
and every time I remove it, it just comes back the next time I reboot
the machine. This is driving me nuts. There is no question I'm using
the right driver; I used the utility at S3 which tells you what chip
you have and what driver is needed. I even removed all the Display
Adapters and started this process over from the beginning and now I'm
back where I started; 640X480 and 16 Colors. What's the next step? Is
there one?

TIA,
Pete

"peterjmilan" wrote in message
m...
ben_myers_spam_me_not @ charter.net (Ben Myers) wrote in message
...
Better still, highlight the Standard PCI Adapter in Device Manager and
REMOVE
it. Click OK, reboot, and we'll all hope that everything will run as it
is
supposed to... Ben Myers

Device Manager will not allow me to disable the Standad PCI Adapter,
and every time I remove it, it just comes back the next time I reboot
the machine. This is driving me nuts. There is no question I'm using
the right driver; I used the utility at S3 which tells you what chip
you have and what driver is needed. I even removed all the Display
Adapters and started this process over from the beginning and now I'm
back where I started; 640X480 and 16 Colors. What's the next step? Is
there one?

TIA,
Pete

You don't need to remove the device. You need to select the radio button
which states "Disable in all profiles or some other such words to that
affect"
On the adapter that is duplicated and not being used.

You do not however do this to the adapter which has the proper drivers
installed.

Elector