Graphics Card Drivers SNAFU...Like Clockwork.

I've had the same system since I last posted. Well, not entirely true. I managed to scrape money together to get a good XFX GeForce FX5200. It's sweet. Lets me run C&C Generals and GC2. Only one big problem: every few weeks, more or less...I will boot up my computer, only to walk into my room with a fresh cup of tea only to find that the accursed box has no lights on. It has shut itself down. I restart, and it goes into safe mode. I play around a bit and try to fix it, reboot, and...

_ (blink blink blink)
Windows Protection Error. You need to restart your computer.
Press any key to continue...

Okay. Wow. Finally I uninstalled the drivers and reinstalled them (drivers for the card)... and it was better. Until about a week later. I did the process again. A week later.. Okay, it's getting annoying and it really ticks me off. How am I going to fix it? I have Win98SE.

If you need any other info let me know.
Thanks,
Jag

 

Are you by chance using the drivers off the cd that came with the card? Sometimes that is not the best thing. I would suggest using drivers from the Nvidia site as they are generally more stable than what the card manufacturer gives you. Companies sometimes attempt to change them for thier own purpose & not always with the best of results.

Before installing new drivers, make sure to remove the old ones completely or you could end up with more of the same annoying issues. Once you've removed the old drivers & rebooted, you can run Nasty File Remover to get rid of any leftovers.

Here is a decent tutorial on removing & reinstalling Video Cards.

 

Thanks Suesman. It'll take a while, but 9.9Mb downloads are better than restarting my computer 1503876 times.

 

Not a prob man.