A12? I didn't find more recent than A10. It's just for the 4600, the 5100 is fine. Do you have a link to the 4600 A12?

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That should be just about any video card, as long as your monitor is calibrated correctly.

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Honestly, most rigs have sensible default CMOS settings and auto-detection support. And ten minutes is plenty of time to change a CMOS battery. I wouldn't worry too much about it.

You might find it helpful to have someone there to help tip the pc/motherboard over while you depress the release tab. Gravity is your friend in this instance, and it definitely beats trying to pry the darn thing out, especially if your case is a little cramped near the battery.

If you're still concerned about this, I'd also suggest having a quick walk through your CMOS, especially your power-save and advanced-peripheral settings, see if there's anything in there you don't immediately understand, and write those down. So long as you understand why things are set the way they are, you can easily recreate good operating conditions.

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"your going to regret that one. You are now a colonoscope...
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And actually, no, flashing a new BIOS won't help you any more than a "reset to default settings" would. With a drained CMOS capacitor, the net effect would be the same; except that flashing unnecessarily really does add a non-trivial element of risk to the operation.

The best advice I can give here is: if you don't have a backup BIOS, and you don't have a very specific reason for flashing it that outweighs the risks, then leave it alone.

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- Moose's one-line review.

"your going to regret that one. You are now a colonoscope...
- Chrissy, corrupting PraedSt's wish.

Dell USA: D4600A12.EXE
Dell België: D4600A12.EXE
Dell Nederland: D4600A12.EXE

All three files are of the same size, 537,306 bytes.

Your Dimension 4600's country of origin and language?

I would take Mr. Moose's advice on this. This is not necessary if you are just replacing the onboard CMOS battery or clearing the Real Time Clock RAM.

It is.

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Thanks for the links and thanks for the info. Strange that the list sites I found had only everything upto A10.

My 4600 is Belgian, I think. I can't remember where I ordered it .

But anyway, as you say I'd likely not need them.

With these proprietary BIOS'es and no config changes other than a sound card, the default settings should be the right ones. I'm not aware of energy saving function differences between the old and new PSU, so there shouldn't be a difference there.

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You are welcome, Nicolas.

From Dell's Dimension 4600 BIOS support page:

The Hipro H305P-00 VER: A02 may indeed have two 18A +12V rails. However, its maximum +12V DC output is 264W. This PSU should therefore deliver no more than 22A (264W/12V=22A). The Hipro unit has essentially the same +12V performance as the Cooler Master Real Power RS-450-ACLY, but the higher-wattage and more sophisticated Cooler Master can deliver more power on the +3.3/+5V rail.

Sorry...talking to myself again.

No need to apologize, I can only learn from this data since apparently you can google them better than I can.

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I just installed the 2600 pro. Wow!

Due to the catalyst control panel not working here (flashes on and off constantly) things weren't too clear, but I'm quite sure I've set the card to run everything at 8*AA 16*AF. I can change these settings in games too, but I don't see differences so I assume the card overrules everything with 8AA 16AF.

Anyway, I tried things like HL2: lost coast, and they run smoothly at 1280*1024*32/8AA/16AF! I don't know precise framerates, but it appeared quite smoothly so I assume at least in the 30+ region. Very nice! It shows that the 2600pro is indeed quite a bit faster than the old 9800pro.

I couldn't run 3dmark05 so I can't put a number on it. But I'm download Fraps somewhere in the near future, so I can check FPS in for example lost coast.

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The ATI Catalyst Control Center requires Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 for it to function. The display drivers themselves do not require .NET Framework.

Some links:

ATI Catalyst™ Control Center FAQ

ATI Catalyst Tweak Guide: [Page 3] Catalyst Installation

I'm a NVIDIA man, so I'm not too familiar with the ways of the Catalyst, but I have always let the application control the AA and AF.

Thanks!

It all works now, and I've been able to upgrade to catalyst 7.9.

I'm keeping things on card overrule 8AA 16AF now, and when I find an application that doesn't run well at these settings, I'll switch to application set AA AF.

edit: I've set things to be application dependent now; this offers more flexibility. I tend to play 4AA 8AF now, which runs a bit smoother. And still looks niiiiiice.

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If 3DMark05 is now working, great. If not, one possible cause is an out of date DirectX install. You can download the latest DirectX 9.0c update for Win XP from Microsoft with IE. You can also change the language of the update page.

If you are into video editing, your card is well suited for that type of work.

re video editing: due to the HD vision and sound support and the 512MB (which you generally don't need for games)? Anyway, I don't normally do video editing.

I've installed the newest Dx9. I'm trying 3Dmark again now. Tried it: doesn't work. What I do know now, is that the gpu reset function on the card works. Very well indeed.

Oh well, as long as the games work I can live with no 3dmark. Though I would have liked to see my score.

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3DMark0x can be tempermental. For example, Bad Mojo at the Futuremark / YouGamers Forums found that when he disconnected his Ultra 7-in-1 USB 2.0 Internal Media Drive, he was able to run 3DMark05/06. The 3DMark05 sub-forum section is here.

The fan is quiet, but sometimes it sounds as if it just barely scratches the enclosure. You know, normally it sounds like "bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz" but from time to time it sounds like "bzzzzzzzzzzz*tick*bzzzzzzzzzzz*tick*bzzzzzzzz "

Very lightly and it doesn't appear to slow down the fan, but the noise can be a bit annoying. Know any safe ways to solve this?

picture of the card:

http://www.baboohardware.com.br/abso...56-Topdown.jpg

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Another thing, I used to get an I/O interrupt error sometimes at boot. In the past, people solved this (for other cards and other dell models) with a bios update. This 5100 ran the very old A01, I've updated to A03, the most recent one I could find. I hope that solves this problem too.

I've not heard the fan ticking since I posted about it yesterday . I now think the sound was not related to the fan but the PC not being completely stable on the table.

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