Jack,
Friend of my husband gave him two graphic cards for me to try. I tried to
install them into the PCI slots but the cards did not work. There were post
beep codes and some yellow and green lights for diagnostic codes and the
monitor did not display anything. Unfortunately I had no instructions or
specs for the cards so I did not know if drivers were required (are they for
PCI cards). Is there a requirement for a certain RAM, the computer only has
128 MB RAM.

I still have no idea why Radeon PCI graphics card was installed and I could
not change bit depth to greater than 16. But Dell instructions show to plug
monitor cable into slot where the Radeon card was so it is as though Dell
did not want the Intel graphics card to be used. If we had originally
bought the computer from Dell I would call and ask questions but I don't
have the option since it was given to us.

Can you tell me anything about PCI graphic cards and requirements in
general? That is what you are indicating down in your link right. It needs
128 MB. I thought some of the diagnostic codes indicated to reseat the
DIMMs which would have meant the memory chips so there was probably not
enough RAM for the graphic cards I tried. Does this make sense?

Thanks again.
Susan




"Jack E Martinelli" wrote in message
...
Susan, I congratulate you and Mike on resolving this problem. It never
occurred to me that a second, PCI graphic card was installed!

You may wish to research the specs for the ATI card, or better yet,
purchase
a modern, faster video card. I am sure the Intel on-board graphics system
is quite primitive now. A modern card will have much better T & L support
for DirectX 8 or 9. If such is important to you, you will be amazed at
the
better graphics from such a card.
http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/index.html
http://www.anandtech.com/video/

Video Card PCI 128mb
http://www.pricewatch.com/

--
Jack E. Martinelli 2002-05 MS MVP for Shell/User / DTS
Help us help you: http://www.dts-L.org/goodpost.htm
In Memorium: Alex Nichol
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/e...ts/nichol.mspx
Your cooperation is very appreciated.
------
"Mike M" wrote in message
...
Susan,

There should I think be two settings in the bios, one that allows you to
disable the onboard graphics chip and another which allows you to choose
the primary display (on-board chip or PCI). Given that the on-board chip
is working just fine I think it would probably be easiest to simply
remove
the ATI Radeon card.

Best of luck,
--
Mike Maltby MS-MVP



Susan wrote:

Bless you Mike! I found in the Dell documentation how to disable it
in the bios. What I did was to change on the Video Configuration
Menu the Primary Video Adapter to Onboard from PCI. I was able to go
to the Display and change the bit depth to 256. I now have a yellow!
on the Standard PCI Graphica Adapter but that would be the Radeon ATI
card. I then plugged the monitor into the different spot that would
use the motherboard graphics card. I think my problem is solved! I
wonder why the Radeon ATI card was installed?

It looks like I have only one choice for video card from setting in
the bios -- either the Onboard or the PCI.