URGENT HELP !!!...FS2004/Radeon 9700 Probs......

Hi,

On behalf of a non internet friend.....

My friend has just had his PC returned from having a new hard drive fitted
(bigger). The shop simply transferred "everything" that was on his old drive
to the newer one.

And now he is experiencing various probs...

1. On boot up, his PC (he is using Windows XP), starts giving "file
inconsistency" warnings, and starts doing a "CheckDisk" program, which
amongst other things warns him about having "orphaned files" and attempts to
out them all right. This procedure takes for ever, and for the time being he
halts this process during the boot up by pressing any keyboard key.

How does he stop his PC attempting to go through the above lengthy process
each time on boot up ? Does he have to let it go through the complete
procedure at least once ? After that should he no longer get the warning ?

2, MORE IMPORTANTLY....

He is a keen fan of FS2004, and having now got his new upgraded PC, set to,
to install it for the first time, under my supervision. Having "succesfully
installed FS2004", he boots it up and finds ALL MANNER OF PROBS.....the main
one being that FS2004 refuses to acknowledge he has a all bells and whistles
graphics card (Radeon Pro9700), and "greys out" all the options to increase
hardrware settings, like, Bi-Linear Filtering, Water Textures, and many many
others. Also the graphics on launching FS2004 are pathetic, and it jerks all
over the place !!!

HAS ANYONE EXPERIENCED SIMILAR PROBS ? What needs to be done ? Is it
possible that during the hard drive file transfer process at the shop, they
have forgot to do something, and certain files havent transferred across ?
Would installing the latest Radeon drivers, help ? (I have my doubts)


I would really appreciate your help on this one URGENTLY, and could you
please email me DIRECTLY to if you can help ?

Many many thanks !

Derek

On Thu, 13 May 2004 20:48:03 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

I would really appreciate your help on this one URGENTLY, and could you
please email me DIRECTLY to if you can help ?

Take it back to the shop.

--
Alan White
Twenty-eight miles NW of Glasgow.
Overlooking Loch Goil and Loch Long in Argyll, Scotland.
http://tinyurl.com/55v3

Hi,

Are you suggesting that the shop HAS made a mistake when copying over the
files from his OLD hard drive, to the NEW one then ?

Have you had personal experience of the same prob ?

Cheers

Derek


"Alan White" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 13 May 2004 20:48:03 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

I would really appreciate your help on this one URGENTLY, and could you
please email me DIRECTLY to if you can help ?

Take it back to the shop.

--
Alan White
Twenty-eight miles NW of Glasgow.
Overlooking Loch Goil and Loch Long in Argyll, Scotland.
http://tinyurl.com/55v3

On Fri, 14 May 2004 00:56:59 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

Are you suggesting that the shop HAS made a mistake when copying over the
files from his OLD hard drive, to the NEW one then ?


Yes. It was OK before it went to the shop. It isn't OK now.

Have you had personal experience of the same prob ?

Yes, I'm still trying to fix it.

--
Alan White
Twenty-eight miles NW of Glasgow.
Overlooking Loch Goil and Loch Long in Argyll, Scotland.
http://tinyurl.com/55v3

Hi Again,

What were your symptoms ??

Cheers

Derek

"Alan White" wrote in message
...
On Fri, 14 May 2004 00:56:59 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

Are you suggesting that the shop HAS made a mistake when copying over the
files from his OLD hard drive, to the NEW one then ?


Yes. It was OK before it went to the shop. It isn't OK now.

Have you had personal experience of the same prob ?

Yes, I'm still trying to fix it.

--
Alan White
Twenty-eight miles NW of Glasgow.
Overlooking Loch Goil and Loch Long in Argyll, Scotland.
http://tinyurl.com/55v3

On Fri, 14 May 2004 12:46:09 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

What were your symptoms ??

The problem is only mildly related to yours.

For the past six months, the Windows XP Event Viewer has been
predicting the imminent demise of my C drive.

I purchased a replacement, installed it as a second drive and on to it
backed up my original drive. The backup drive then replaced the
original and became the new C drive. The backup isn't an analogue of
the original in terms of functionality, e.g. the desktop settings are
different and applications that worked on the original don't work on
the backup. I haven't carried out a rigourous examination. I'll
probably do that when the current C drive dies!

This just demonstrates that simply copying files from one drive to
another isn't simplistic.

BTW, FlightSim wasn't affected as it's on another drive.

My advice is still 'take it back to the shop'.

--
Alan White
Twenty-eight miles NW of Glasgow.
Overlooking Loch Goil and Loch Long in Argyll, Scotland.
http://tinyurl.com/55v3

On Fri, 14 May 2004 00:56:59 +0000, Derek wrote:

Hi,

Are you suggesting that the shop HAS made a mistake when copying over the
files from his OLD hard drive, to the NEW one then ?

Have you had personal experience of the same prob ?


Yes, it is possible that the shop messed something up. It's also, just as
possible, assuming FAT is being used, that someone simply failed to
shutdown the system properly, and this is the result.

A system should ALWAYS been cleanly shutdown after use. Do not power off
your computer until it says it's safe to do so. Powering off a computer
before it says it's safe to do so is begging for filesystem corruption and
possibly even file damage. Converting to NTFS is a positive, proactive
step, which will greatly help mitigate the risks. Just the same, even
after a conversion to NTFS, proper shudowns should always be performed.

Cheers!

On Thu, 13 May 2004 20:48:03 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

2, MORE IMPORTANTLY....

He is a keen fan of FS2004, and having now got his new upgraded PC, set to,
to install it for the first time, under my supervision. Having "succesfully
installed FS2004", he boots it up and finds ALL MANNER OF PROBS.....the main
one being that FS2004 refuses to acknowledge he has a all bells and whistles
graphics card (Radeon Pro9700), and "greys out" all the options to increase
hardrware settings, like, Bi-Linear Filtering, Water Textures, and many many
others. Also the graphics on launching FS2004 are pathetic, and it jerks all
over the place !!!

Find and delete 'FS9.CFG' (drive C, then load FS9 again. It'll
create a new fs9.cfg file, and 'should' fix the graphics problem.

All old graphics settings, and custom key-assingments (joystick too)
will be lost.

Might type-in 'dxdiag' from the 'Run' menu, and check the 'Display'
properties, make sure the video card is installed correctly.

Hi,

Thanks for that. I have told him what to do. Does this mean he will be able
to klick the sliders on ALL the graphics features in FS9 again ?

Cheers

Derek


" Ping Louh wrote in message
...
On Thu, 13 May 2004 20:48:03 +0000 (UTC), "Derek"
wrote:

2, MORE IMPORTANTLY....

He is a keen fan of FS2004, and having now got his new upgraded PC, set
to,
to install it for the first time, under my supervision. Having
"succesfully
installed FS2004", he boots it up and finds ALL MANNER OF PROBS.....the
main
one being that FS2004 refuses to acknowledge he has a all bells and
whistles
graphics card (Radeon Pro9700), and "greys out" all the options to
increase
hardrware settings, like, Bi-Linear Filtering, Water Textures, and many
many
others. Also the graphics on launching FS2004 are pathetic, and it jerks
all
over the place !!!

Find and delete 'FS9.CFG' (drive C, then load FS9 again. It'll
create a new fs9.cfg file, and 'should' fix the graphics problem.

All old graphics settings, and custom key-assingments (joystick too)
will be lost.

Might type-in 'dxdiag' from the 'Run' menu, and check the 'Display'
properties, make sure the video card is installed correctly.

On Thu, 13 May 2004 20:48:03 +0000, Derek wrote:


1. On boot up, his PC (he is using Windows XP), starts giving "file
..
..
..
How does he stop his PC attempting to go through the above lengthy process
each time on boot up ? Does he have to let it go through the complete
procedure at least once ? After that should he no longer get the warning
?


Yes. The drive is marked as "dirty" until it's able to complete this
diagnostic and correct step. It will be marked "clean" once it completes.
After which, assuming nothing else funky is going on here, it should boot
without requiring this step.

I should also point out that if he does have file system problems,
continued use of the filesystem while it damage can greatly extend the
damage to the filesystem. It's very possible to much, much worse off if
he continues to ignore this problem.

If the system is identifying cross-linked files, it's telling you that you
have some form of filesystem corruption. It's important that you let the
system fix what it can. It's also important to realize that some files
may be damaged beyond repair. The repair process only works to get the
filesystem repaired and properly layed out. Once the filesystem is in a
known good state, it's still possible to have files which remained
damaged. Worse, the process of repairing the filesystem can actually
damage some files. The details and extent of any possible damage and the
degree at which that damage can be repaired greatly depends on the nature
of the filesystem damage and the types of file activity that has been done
post-damage.

If possible, he REALLY needs to convert his filesystem to NTFS. NTFS is
much, much better than FAT. FAT is used by anyone that is begging to
suffer from filesystem corruption. FAT also suffers from very, very long
consistency checks. NTFS is a journaled filesystem, which means it always
attempts to keep the filesystem in good order without requiring a fsck to
be done on it. At worst, in bad situations, NTFS may still be checked but
the speed is mucho, mucho faster than the checks required for FAT. Best
of all, if the drive is very large and he converts to NTFS, he should gain
a fair amount of additional drive space back for actual file use. FAT is
horribly wasteful of allocated file space.

Hope this helps!

Cheers!


References:
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/p...convertfat.asp