code 41 - cannot find hardware device

[crabby117]

I've searched a bit on this topic and found the subject in reference to CD and DVD drives, but not video cards, which is where my problem lies.

In my Device Manager, I get an exclamation point next to my video card and the Properties state, "Windows successfully loaded the device driver for this hardware but cannot find the hardware device. (Code 41)"

The card seems to be functioning...to a degree. I can go to my Display control panel and change the properties of my screen to very high resolution settings that the card is capable of. However in the Advanced Settings of the Display Properties, there is no name listed for the adapter.

I uninstalled the original ATI drivers and all ATI software, and reinstalled the latest drivers. When I had Windows search for new hardware, it finds the card and proceeds to load the correct drivers, but at the very end of the process, it reports that the process was not successful and indeed the exclamation point returns to the Device Manager.

So I thought maybe the card was the problem and I bought a new one, completely different manufacturer and chipset (changed from ATI Radeon x550 to nvidia GeForce 7300GT). Same problem.

I've gone to my mobo mfg site (Asus P5LD2, if it matters) and gotten all the latest chipset drivers and flashed the BIOS to the latest edition. I've even done a Windows Repair with the boot CD. (XP Pro, SP2) No luck. (Of course if it's a registry problem, the repair option isn't going to fix that unless I reinstall Windows.) I've used a program called Fresh Diagnose to look at my hardware. It is reporting hardware specs my video card (memory, resolution options, color depth, even the BIOS version on the card), but not the make/model it. It did this with the old and the new video card. I'm now starting to think either the PCI-Express x16 port has gone bad or there's something wrong with the mobo otherwise. I don't really think there's anything wrong with either video card.

My windows display looks fine. Visually, it looks like there is no problem. But I can't play any of my games that do a check on my video card upon launching because, obviously, Windows is reporting that it can't find my video card.

Anyone have any ideas? Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[ski]

Make sure the card is firmly seated.
If that's ok and your MB has another PCI-E slot, then see if the card works there. If it does or there's only a x16 slot, then the x16 slot may be bad.

 

[kmcferrin]

Uninstall all video drivers and related software. Reboot and when it detects the video card, tell it to install the standard VGA driver. Once that has completed, reboot again. Make sure that everything is working with the VGA driver (screen resolution will be limited to 640x480, but that's VGA). Now reboot into safe mode, go into device manager, and look to see if there are multiple display adapters listed. If there are, delete all of them except for the VGA Adapter that you're using (all the rest will probably have exclamation points). Once that is finsihed, reboot.

Now when you log in, run the installation process for your video drivers. Usually it is install the drivers and reboot, or install the drivers, delete the video card in device manager, then reboot.

 

[crabby117]

Well, I attempted to follow your instructions, kmcferrin, but couldn't get very far. I could not load the standard VGA driver. When I selected the option not to search for drivers and let me choose my own, I selected Display Adapters and had no options to choose from. I had it "show all" hardware and still could not find a listing for standard VGA although I did see some other line items for standard CD-ROM, standard keyboard, standard USB and others.

I looked on the web for a place to obtain standard VGA drivers and came across an article saying to modify boot.ini with the /basevideo switch to force Windows to boot with Standard VGAdrivers (640x480). I did this, and it did boot w/ said resolution, but the video driver listed was still VGA Controller with the yellow exclamation point.

Do you know where I can find Standard VGA drivers for XP?

 

[BadBigBen]

Question: Is this a CLEAN install of XP? or did you just switch MoBo's?

if Clean install, have you installed the CHIPSET drivers first? Clean the GFX drivers that are on the system using DRIVERCLEANER (

http://www.drivercleaner.net/

), the trial will do... then install the chipset drivers and reboot, ignoring the Hardware Wizard that may pop up for the GFX card...

if you switched the MoBo, with out doing a clean install... then I would suggest doing a clean install on another drive or partition...


Ben

"If it works don't fix it! If it doesn't use a sledgehammer..."

 

[crabby117]

The setup was not a mobo switch. It was a clean installation probably a year ago, all new hardware, fresh install of XP w/ SP2. In my recent (this past week) attempts to fix this, I have d/l'd and installed the latest mobo drivers, including the chipset.

I may just end up doing a clean install of XP which is what I'll end up doing anyway if the mobo is bad.

Thanks for your suggestions, everyone.

 

[kmcferrin]

The standard VGA drivers are included as part of XP and previous operating systems as well. I don't recall if they are called "Standard VGA", or "Default VGA", or even just "VGA". Sorry if that wasn't particularly specific.

But you shouldn't be seeing CD-ROM and USB drivers listed when you're browsing for display drivers. That seems odd to me.