Issue with DirectX?

Hopefully this is the correct forum, since I'm relatively sure my issue lies with directx. I really don't understand what's going on with this stupid computer... Hopefully you can help me. =/

I've been trying to play the trial version of the Spore Creature Creator. I was getting an error saying "Could not create the Graphics Device. Direct X is unavailable. [1002]" every time I tried to start the game. Well... They told me to uninstall and reinstall the game, and uninstall and reinstall direct x. I did both several times and nothing helped! And now I'm getting this, and I think this is a whole new can of worms...

It began with the error "This application has failed to start because d3d9.dll was not found. Re-installing the application might fix this problem" sooo I downloaded d3d9.dll and put it in the system folder... And now I'm getting this error, which is where I'm stuck at now:

"The procedure entry point ddentry10 could not be located in the dynamic link library ddraw.dll."


After searching all over the internet, everything seems to say "just reinstall directx and it'll fix it." Well, that doesn't work. No matter where I download it from, it always says that there's an internal system error and to refer to dxerror.log and directx.log. DirectX WILL NOT update.


Microsoft Windows XP
Professional
Version 2002
Service Pack 3

Intel (R)
Celeron (R)
CPU 2.70GHz
2.69GHz, 760 MB of RAM

I've disabled the on-board graphics card that came with the computer and I've got an NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 installed, drivers up to date and everything. The monitor is plugged up to it and I can see, so obviously it's working, right? But something I've also noticed is that, whenever I restart my computer, the driver has a little exclamation point on it, like there's an error or something... so I disable it and enable it, and then it's fine. What the crap does that mean?

 

This sounds to me as though the video card is not supporting your directx.
Have you tried temporarily removing your Nvidia card and seeing if the onboard video gives you the same error?

 

Took me forever to get back here, but here I am. -_-

I've actually removed my nVidia card, and now it's just using the onboard card that came with the computer. Now there's only one problem: it's permanently erroring.

Unlike the nVidia, where I could disable it and enable it and it would be fine, doing so on the onboard card does not work. It simply says this under properties: "Windows cannot initialize the device driver for this hardware. (Code 37)"

 

You need to get the proper driver for your onboard video chip.

If you have no idea what your motherboard chipset consists of, download Everest and run it to get the information.
http://www.majorgeeks.com/EVEREST_Free_Edition_d4181.html

 

Lol... I had the proper driver installed, actually. I even checked and double checked, but the onboard video card would NOT work properly.

I attempted to play a game (IMVU) that had previously worked relatively well before (with the nVidia), and it ran SOOOO much slower. It was incredibly frustrating, considering IMVU is the ONLY game that works on my computer...

I thus reinstalled my nVidia card, since obviously it's doing something better than the onboard one, despite the errors. At least I can get the nVidia to act as if it's functioning properly.

You still haven't helped me with the DirectX issue. That's my main problem here.