Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 06:33:

Hello! I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 p […]
Show full quote

Hello!
I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 pc and I got this image.
What does this mean?
Is the gpu DOA?

Specs of the Windows 98 pc
300 w psu
Slot 1 mobo
512mb of RAM
Pentium 3 500mhz

Try and finishi the installing your windows system and install the driver for the gpu, sometimes it get fixed, this kind of happend to me when I installed windows 98 in my project build with a fx5900xt, before installing drivers there were some visible weird lines passing thru the monitor (and I was using a vga to hdmi adapter because I dont carry a crt monitor currently or any one that takes vga input) after installing the video card driver it got fixed. If those artifacts keep appearing after installing your nvidia video drivers then unfortunately its a DOA, or something is not right with that gpu.

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-18, 07:13:

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 06:33:

Hello! I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 p […]
Show full quote

Hello!
I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 pc and I got this image.
What does this mean?
Is the gpu DOA?

Specs of the Windows 98 pc
300 w psu
Slot 1 mobo
512mb of RAM
Pentium 3 500mhz

Try and finishi the installing your windows system and install the driver for the gpu, sometimes it get fixed, this kind of happend to me when I installed windows 98 in my project build with a fx5900xt, before installing drivers there were some visible weird lines passing thru the monitor (and I was using a vga to hdmi adapter because I dont carry a crt monitor currently or any one that takes vga input) after installing the video card driver it got fixed. If those artifacts keep appearing after installing your nvidia video drivers then unfortunately its a DOA, or something is not right with that gpu.

Thanks for this, I am going to give this a try,
Also, one more question, if you have a mobo that is not showing video but everything else is working, does that mean that it’s DOA?

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 13:57:

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-18, 07:13:

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 06:33:

Hello! I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 p […]
Show full quote

Hello!
I purchased a GeForce 4 ti 4200 from a user off eBay and it arrived in great condition. I popped it into my Windows 98 pc and I got this image.
What does this mean?
Is the gpu DOA?

Specs of the Windows 98 pc
300 w psu
Slot 1 mobo
512mb of RAM
Pentium 3 500mhz

Try and finishi the installing your windows system and install the driver for the gpu, sometimes it get fixed, this kind of happend to me when I installed windows 98 in my project build with a fx5900xt, before installing drivers there were some visible weird lines passing thru the monitor (and I was using a vga to hdmi adapter because I dont carry a crt monitor currently or any one that takes vga input) after installing the video card driver it got fixed. If those artifacts keep appearing after installing your nvidia video drivers then unfortunately its a DOA, or something is not right with that gpu.

Thanks for this, I am going to give this a try,
Also, one more question, if you have a mobo that is not showing video but everything else is working, does that mean that it’s DOA?

Not necessarily, it all depends of the situation, For e.g. in my case, when I was building my Win98 pc I tought that my Asus P4i65g was DOA when i got it from ebay, because it did not wanted to turn on at all, I changed ram, changed cpu, changed psu, I also try to turn it on with and without the gpu but still nothing. Later I found out that because I did not fit it correctly inside the case one of the mobo stands were making contact with the mobo itself so it refused to turn on. After fixing that minor detail everything was running just fine.

Anyway if a mobo you have does not turn on does not mean its dead, just try to turn it on outside the case like in a free antistatic place and play around with it to see the problem, like switch cpu, switch the ram, the gpu, psu , even try that on a mobo you know its working to kind of see potential errors that are preventing your mobo to post. Just considered DOA after you did almost every troubleshoot it on it.

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-19, 02:51:

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 13:57:

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-18, 07:13:

Try and finishi the installing your windows system and install the driver for the gpu, sometimes it get fixed, this kind of happend to me when I installed windows 98 in my project build with a fx5900xt, before installing drivers there were some visible weird lines passing thru the monitor (and I was using a vga to hdmi adapter because I dont carry a crt monitor currently or any one that takes vga input) after installing the video card driver it got fixed. If those artifacts keep appearing after installing your nvidia video drivers then unfortunately its a DOA, or something is not right with that gpu.

Thanks for this, I am going to give this a try,
Also, one more question, if you have a mobo that is not showing video but everything else is working, does that mean that it’s DOA?

Not necessarily, it all depends of the situation, For e.g. in my case, when I was building my Win98 pc I tought that my Asus P4i65g was DOA when i got it from ebay, because it did not wanted to turn on at all, I changed ram, changed cpu, changed psu, I also try to turn it on with and without the gpu but still nothing. Later I found out that because I did not fit it correctly inside the case one of the mobo stands were making contact with the mobo itself so it refused to turn on. After fixing that minor detail everything was running just fine.

Anyway if a mobo you have does not turn on does not mean its dead, just try to turn it on outside the case like in a free antistatic place and play around with it to see the problem, like switch cpu, switch the ram, the gpu, psu , even try that on a mobo you know its working to kind of see potential errors that are preventing your mobo to post. Just considered DOA after you did almost every troubleshoot it on it.

Thanks for this. I tried it today pulling the mobo out of the case and plugged in all confirmed working parts like ram, gpu, cpu, and tried jumping the board and fans began spinning but no picture.

Also the GeForce 4 still gave me those scan lines even when I installed correct drivers. I also got some post beeps as well and sometimes it refused to boot to desktop, it would just crash to black screen with the scan lines

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:14:

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-19, 02:51:

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-18, 13:57:

Thanks for this, I am going to give this a try,
Also, one more question, if you have a mobo that is not showing video but everything else is working, does that mean that it’s DOA?

Not necessarily, it all depends of the situation, For e.g. in my case, when I was building my Win98 pc I tought that my Asus P4i65g was DOA when i got it from ebay, because it did not wanted to turn on at all, I changed ram, changed cpu, changed psu, I also try to turn it on with and without the gpu but still nothing. Later I found out that because I did not fit it correctly inside the case one of the mobo stands were making contact with the mobo itself so it refused to turn on. After fixing that minor detail everything was running just fine.

Anyway if a mobo you have does not turn on does not mean its dead, just try to turn it on outside the case like in a free antistatic place and play around with it to see the problem, like switch cpu, switch the ram, the gpu, psu , even try that on a mobo you know its working to kind of see potential errors that are preventing your mobo to post. Just considered DOA after you did almost every troubleshoot it on it.

Thanks for this. I tried it today pulling the mobo out of the case and plugged in all confirmed working parts like ram, gpu, cpu, and tried jumping the board and fans began spinning but no picture.

Also the GeForce 4 still gave me those scan lines even when I installed correct drivers. I also got some post beeps as well and sometimes it refused to boot to desktop, it would just crash to black screen with the scan lines

Edit:
Compaq Deskpro mobo is what I am plugging the GeForce 4 into, seller told me AGP slot isn’t comparable with GeForce 4 ti 4200, not sure if lying or?

https://theretroweb.com/motherboards/s/compaq … skpro-ep-3-dimm

Also the mobo that I also have that I believe is DOA is A-Bit BH-16

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?
Imho this card has memory or gpu issues, what you can do is try to push with your fingers the memory modules to see if the pattern changes.

About the motherboard you should try to use a debug card to see if it gives any code or if you hear any beep. Try two probably defective component is not a wise choice, you should try another video card on the abit board, maybe a pci one if you can.
Also the motherboard you are using is limited to agp 2x but it shouldn't be an issue since most of the Geforce 4 are agp 4x with an universal agp connector.

it is a memory issues. what type of memory it has? BGA ram installed?

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:45:

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If th […]
Show full quote

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?
Imho this card has memory or gpu issues, what you can do is try to push with your fingers the memory modules to see if the pattern changes.

About the motherboard you should try to use a debug card to see if it gives any code or if you hear any beep. Try two probably defective component is not a wise choice, you should try another video card on the abit board, maybe a pci one if you can.
Also the motherboard you are using is limited to agp 2x but it shouldn't be an issue since most of the Geforce 4 are agp 4x with an universal agp connector.

I’ll have to try the debug card idea.
On the A Bit mobo I tried a functional AGP card- GeForce fx 5500 and still no image. I don’t have any pci video cards to try and I agree with that driver explanation.
So if I press down on the board and the pattern does change, does that mean it’s a memory issue? The ram I currently have does function properly when I have a different gpu installed

And okay so the GeForce 4 should work on my current mobo, interesting

dm- wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:51:

it is a memory issues. what type of memory it has? BGA ram installed?

The memory installed is:

256MB PC133 SDRAM 168 PIN DIMM LOW DENSITY MEMORY 16x8

One of these.

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:00:

I’ll have to try the debug card idea. On the A Bit mobo I tried a functional AGP card- GeForce fx 5500 and still no image. I don […]
Show full quote

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:45:

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If th […]
Show full quote

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?
Imho this card has memory or gpu issues, what you can do is try to push with your fingers the memory modules to see if the pattern changes.

About the motherboard you should try to use a debug card to see if it gives any code or if you hear any beep. Try two probably defective component is not a wise choice, you should try another video card on the abit board, maybe a pci one if you can.
Also the motherboard you are using is limited to agp 2x but it shouldn't be an issue since most of the Geforce 4 are agp 4x with an universal agp connector.

I’ll have to try the debug card idea.
On the A Bit mobo I tried a functional AGP card- GeForce fx 5500 and still no image. I don’t have any pci video cards to try and I agree with that driver explanation.
So if I press down on the board and the pattern does change, does that mean it’s a memory issue? The ram I currently have does function properly when I have a different gpu installed

And okay so the GeForce 4 should work on my current mobo, interesting

You should try to push every module one by one, if you see a change it should mean the memory chip can be damaged or that the pad contact is loose. If nothing changes then the problem can be somewhere else.

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:02:

The memory installed is: […]
Show full quote

dm- wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:51:

it is a memory issues. what type of memory it has? BGA ram installed?

The memory installed is:

256MB PC133 SDRAM 168 PIN DIMM LOW DENSITY MEMORY 16x8

One of these.

Man we were talking about the video card memory modules not the system memory.

dm- wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:51:

it is a memory issues. what type of memory it has? BGA ram installed?

I have another similar stick as well and both are functional and detected by Win 98 when using previous GPU

Yeah, that definitely looks like a memory issue on the graphics card.

If it were me, I would inspect the VRAM chips on the card and see if I notice any broken solder joints (If your card doesn't use BGA (Ball Grid Array) VRAM chips) and re-flow the solder joints either way. If it's BGA I would heat the chips like I was going to remove them, then try it again. Sadly, this requires the right tools.

You can try what Nemo said and physically push down on the chips and see what happens. It could be as simple as a broken connection or a chip could be failing.

The simple thing would be to return it if you can, get your money back if at all possible and try again with a different card if you lack the tools or desire to attempt a troubleshooting and possible repair. Especially if you don't have a donor card to pull chips from should one be at fault.

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:03:

You should try to push every module one by one, if you see a change it should mean the memory chip can be damaged or that the pa […]
Show full quote

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:00:

I’ll have to try the debug card idea. On the A Bit mobo I tried a functional AGP card- GeForce fx 5500 and still no image. I don […]
Show full quote

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:45:

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If th […]
Show full quote

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?
Imho this card has memory or gpu issues, what you can do is try to push with your fingers the memory modules to see if the pattern changes.

About the motherboard you should try to use a debug card to see if it gives any code or if you hear any beep. Try two probably defective component is not a wise choice, you should try another video card on the abit board, maybe a pci one if you can.
Also the motherboard you are using is limited to agp 2x but it shouldn't be an issue since most of the Geforce 4 are agp 4x with an universal agp connector.

I’ll have to try the debug card idea.
On the A Bit mobo I tried a functional AGP card- GeForce fx 5500 and still no image. I don’t have any pci video cards to try and I agree with that driver explanation.
So if I press down on the board and the pattern does change, does that mean it’s a memory issue? The ram I currently have does function properly when I have a different gpu installed

And okay so the GeForce 4 should work on my current mobo, interesting

You should try to push every module one by one, if you see a change it should mean the memory chip can be damaged or that the pad contact is loose. If nothing changes then the problem can be somewhere else.

Jones817 wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:02:

The memory installed is: […]
Show full quote

dm- wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:51:

it is a memory issues. what type of memory it has? BGA ram installed?

The memory installed is:

256MB PC133 SDRAM 168 PIN DIMM LOW DENSITY MEMORY 16x8

One of these.

Man we were talking about the video card memory modules not the system memory.

Got it got it. Apologies.

StriderTR wrote on 2025-03-19, 07:05:

Yeah, that definitely looks like a memory issue on the graphics card. […]
Show full quote

Yeah, that definitely looks like a memory issue on the graphics card.

If it were me, I would inspect the VRAM chips on the card and see if I notice any broken solder joints (If your card doesn't use BGA (Ball Grid Array) VRAM chips) and re-flow the solder joints either way. If it's BGA I would heat the chips like I was going to remove them, then try it again. Sadly, this requires the right tools.

You can try what Nemo said and physically push down on the chips and see what happens. It could be as simple as a broken connection or a chip could be failing.

The simple thing would be to return it if you can, get your money back if at all possible and try again with a different card if you lack the tools or desire to attempt a troubleshooting and possible repair. Especially if you don't have a donor card to pull chips from should one be at fault.

Yeah I think I am going to return the card. I tried to push down on the chips but still no change. I think the problem is a bit too complex for me to solve. I appreciate yours and everyone’s input! Thanks all!

pushing bga chips will not help.

only reball/ reflow

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:45:

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?

Well It happend to me but it was because Im using a adapter hdmi to vga and I did see lines during post and they were even more noticeable after my windows was loaded installing my video drivers fixed my issue, of course his case is different and after all this its definately something wrong with his gpu. I just share my experience I had, but I guess I was wrong put in it as a possible solution. I did say before that most probably there was a issue with the card.

bosquetor0602 wrote on 2025-03-20, 06:56:

Nemo1985 wrote on 2025-03-19, 06:45:

It was dreaming to think that installing driver would have fixed an issue that was present even before windows was loaded. If there is screen corruption during post or dos how can the driver be involved?

Well It happend to me but it was because Im using a adapter hdmi to vga and I did see lines during post and they were even more noticeable after my windows was loaded installing my video drivers fixed my issue, of course his case is different and after all this its definately something wrong with his gpu. I just share my experience I had, but I guess I was wrong put in it as a possible solution. I did say before that most probably there was a issue with the card.

It was just unlikely, still in my experience if there are such issues during post it's not related to windows driver either way since windows it's not even loaded. If you had those issues after windows was loaded then you are right.

In this case, I would try removing the GPU, cleaning the contacts of the card edge with NONABRASIVE WHITE VINYL ERASER (no, not pink! Never use pink, it's abrasive! Never use anything abrasive!), followed by isopropanol ol a soft paper towel.

Let dry completely, then reinstall the card.