Ati2dvag problem update
I decided to republish a very long but detailed comment from an Ati user, Casondra, on May 5, 2009, regarding the Ati2dvag problem that I used to face – which resulted in me trashing my previous computer completely.
I wrote to Casondra much earlier asking her if she would mind me republishing her comment in a separate post because the old post was getting a little lengthy in comments, and she agreed it was a good idea too.
“I figure the more information there is out there about this, the fewer people who will go insane looking for answers,” – Casondra
So here it is:
My husband just got a custom built system, all parts fully compatible (verified through several sources), but the video card seems to have issues. When running a streaming video fullscreen, or a video editing software (with inline preview), the system hangs for a bit, then you get an error: “VPU Recover has reset your graphics accelerator as it was no longer responding to graphics driver commands.”
So, I updated the drivers (not only for the card, but for the display as well). No change.
So, I lowered pretty much all of the settings in the Catalyst Control Center, and verified overclocking was turned off. Nothing.
I swapped the VGA to DVI (I knew this wasn’t the issue, but for the sake of things thought I would mention it).
I found that having a VIA chipset with an ATI card has issues with the AGP being default, so I switched it to PCI to PCI bridge. Still nothing. Except, this time when I tested a streaming video, I a blue screen saying that the file ‘ati2dvag’ caused a serious issue with windows, and windows had shut down. That my graphics drivers had been caught in an infinite loop, and the file ‘ati2dvag’ was to blame. What is that file even for? I have never heard of it until now. Am I only getting this blue screen now because I swapped the vga to dvi?
All this just makes me wonder if these ‘fixes’ just made things worse.
- ASROCK 4COREDUAL-SATA2 motherboard
- Powercolor ATI Radeon HD4350 video card
- Intel Pentium Dual Core E5200 cpu
- Crucial Rendition 2GB PC2-6400 DDR2-800 ram (1 stick)
- Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB SATA2 7200RPM 8.9MS 8MB hdd (storage drive)
- RetailPlus+ 465W Dual Fan psu
The main hdd is a Maxtor IDE drive, 120mb. Not sure of other specs on it, had the computer apart so much lately I don’t feel like opening it again to check.
It’s running Windows XP Home, though if I recall the disks we have are SP2, and it refuses to go to SP3 on his computer, though I switched over fine. Is it possible the solution, for us, is as simple as getting SP3 on his computer? Mine doesn’t have an external graphics card, so I can’t test that theory.
I did see most posts about these issues involve cards with fans, but this card doesn’t have one, and never seems to overheat. (You can touch it briefly and not get burned). So I can’t very well clean a fan I don’t have, not to mention as it is a new card (out of the box about a week), even if it had a fan, it couldn’t be dirty so fast.
I also notice some people have problems with not having a good enough psu to cover their demands. But surely 465W is enough?
I would yank the card altogether, but his motherboard doesn’t have built in video adapters, so it would make the computer useless.
Even though we only paid like 45 bucks for the card, I am not fond of having to RMA it, if it is even eligible (since the ATI/AMD site says system hangs and such aren’t covered by their warranty. I am hoping the retailer thinks otherwise on that). But it seems the only option left is to RMA and get an NVidia card. Or am I wrong?
Oh, the system also has in it a WinFast TV Tuner card, a soundblaster live! 5.1 audio card (which was hell trying to find drivers for, since the website says the card isn’t even there, til I realized I could manual force them from the list instead of searching), and a telephone/modem card (He says ‘Just in case’, though I doubt he will ever use it since we are on cable internet). I don’t think these cards are causing issues, but I guess you never know.
The one noticeable thing about this problem (in my experience) was that it seemed to go away for a while, only to reappear (again) after several months. Temperature spikes, slowdowns, and BSODs. And trust me, I tried just about everything that everyone has spoken about in the comments.
If you have any of your experiences, posting a new comment on this new page could be helpful to someone out there. Good luck.
I just ran into this problem for the first time today. My laptops a little on the older side, Im running Windows XP Pro (sp3) on a 1.7ghz pentium(r) with 512mb. I was playing runescape, a very simple and low end flash game. I closed my laptop (with the game still open) When i opened my laptop the game menu was there but everything was distorted, sat for a few seconds, then got the same BSOD described above. I find it weird ive never had this problem until now. I know there is still no solution for this problem, just though i would share my problems too. I will be keeping an eye on this though in hope someone finds an answer.
I am having this issue as well… I play EQ2, and WoW, and watch streaming video on my computer… World of warcraft, i’ve never had an issue. EQ2 freezes for about 10 seconds intermittently, and I’ve been seeing the BSOD saying something along the lines of Ati2dvag has an issue and must shut down. We have wiped the entire system, reinstalled, and are still getting the same issue, and as you have said it is intermittent.
I’m having the same issue as well. It happens maybe 5 times per hour when im playing Battlefield 2. It also happened after a patch on Lotro ( the lord of the rings online), but i just changed “engine speed” from high to medium in the game, and after that it works fine.
when i get the message“VPU Recover has reset your graphics accelerator as it was no longer responding to graphics driver commands.” i ussualy can keep playing the games. but i tried to turn on VPU recover once and then i got bluescreen instead D;
Sorry for my bad English!
I’ve had this problem for the last couple of months. I’ve had an ati radeon pci express 500mb card for about 3 years ran it on a previous custombuilt pc using W4K with no probs. Upgraded to XP about a year ago. I have a 600wt psu and fans everywhere. one side of the box is usually open so overheating isn’t a problem and I have a small antistatic hoover to get rid of dust.
I have tried the following;
Register cleaner, no good
latest drivers , no joy
Removing graphics software and reinstall from scratch, lasted about a week before blue screening.
Editted ati2dvag file in registry ( rename and force new file) and reinstall not bluescreened for 5 days now
If this doesn’t work then it’s a Nvidia card for me. Do I get my money back from ATI and what have they said about it? I haven’t seen any official comments from them
I had this problem happen to me yesterday. I was playing spider solitaire and using itunes when all of a sudden I got that blue screen. I didn’t notice the normal overheating because it was the hottest day on record ever in Seattle, Washington at 104 degrees, so that might be the reason for the crash. But it’s only 80 degrees out right now, and I still get the crash, I’m having to type this on safe mode. I removed the ati driver but it still crashes so that didn’t work. I noticed also, that after the crash, my norton protection turned off and it suggested this file to fix that: KB20080828105226EN.exe I don’t know if anyone else had that happen to them, but it would be nice if anyone knows about norton turning off
I have this happen to me too. I get the distorted screen with the lowest resolution and an error that my ati2dvga has an issue and must shut down. Please help by sending error report to Microsoft. This happens when I play Anarcy Online a graphics game. I have searched everywhere for a fix and have not found anything. I use a Compaq Persario 3200 80G HD 1G Ram..it runs Second Life fine..but not Anarchy Online. I fear it will conk out permanetly.
my problem with ati2dvag was a bit different, although some of the symptoms were/are the same. what i was getting was HDD access. a lot of it. usually, if i was just working on the laptop (a Lenovo T500, brand spanking new, running XP Pro, SP3, 3GB RAM), i wouldn’t notice much. some hanging on when clicking the drop-down when saving files. BUT when i was playing a movie, it was all start-stop-start….stop….start. And i would just watch my HDD access LED light up.
Anyway, what i found was that it is used for listening for hot-keys to be pressed. “what does that have to do with HDD access?” i thought. anyway, I went into the ATI Catalyst Control Center and disabled hot-keys. Problem solved, ati2dvag is no longer seen in Task Manager.
But alas, today, two weeks or so after applying that change, i got the BSOD, and found this site.
my screen had locked up, and when the BSOD appeared, it revealed the infinite loop problem. just rebooted, found this site. so far so good, I’ll see if it occurs again.
so if anyone is having this problem, and hasn’t tried it yet, I suggest the hot-key configuration. It’s easy to find, and is just unchecking a box.
John
hmmm… interesting.. I’ve recently reinstalled a dell 380 precision and replaced the nvidia card with an ati 4350. I did everything to the letter but after restarting the system it just came up with blank screen(s) on all ports. I downloaded the latest drivers off ati (new ones were put on this week) but then it said (in safe mode, and rather unhelpfully) ‘you must install directx 8′ – odd, because it had driectx 9c on it already).
because it was a fresh install, I reinstalled the whole operating system. I was wasting that much time trying to figure out of old nvidia drivers were causing an issue. no go. So I reinstalled the nvidia card, fiddled around a bit, then reinstalled the 4350 card again. This time it came up with a blue screen (immediately after initial boot) that refers to this ati2dvag.dll file, along with error codes 0×0..8e, 0xc..5, 0xbd04e59e, 0xb8166b1c, 0×0.. and it says something about stopping at address bd04e59e base at bd012000. I put those in incase this is meaningful to anyone over the whole issue. dell’s pretty good at system integration, which is why I tend to buy them and they have ati options for this computer aswell, I think. So maybe the 5 hrs of fiddling today might’ve revealed some fault codes worth noting…or maybe not!.. oh well, I’d better buy some other brand, then…
Not sure if it’s important, but in my case the problem first started to appear when I switched from my old CRT monitor to a HD LCD one.
Just encountered this hangup on my Dell desktop running XP SP2. This particular machine has had numerous problems with overheating & shutting off, which I have attributed to bad design and engineering. I’ve replaced fans, cleaned fans, etc., and still have problems with it running hot and often loud before shutting down. Now I’m wondering if any other victims of this Ati2dvag bug had chronic problems prior to the ATI problem that might provide insight to symptoms.
Thanks.
I did a barebones upgrade a few years ago. That’s when my problems started. I have done nothing but fight with this ATI PCI-E card since it’s inception. I have dumped and re-installed drivers. I have spent countless hours scouring the net looking for a fix. Nothing I have tried has even helped, muchless “fixed” it. I am going out today and buy an InVidia and call it good. I have atleast had good luck with those.
If you have problem with that ati2dvag just try to underclock your card as much as you can if necessary…..it fixed my ati. If that wont fixe your issue use google or try that thing with updating video drivers.
Keep smiling
I have a brand new Lenovo Thinkpad W500 and I get the ati2dvag error constantly. the most recent one (5 min ago) happened while I only had firefox open with a google maps page. Nothing else running. I don’t even have any software installed yet. I can’t believe anyone could sell me a computer with this kind of a issue.
Same as Jason S: Blue screen about once a day on a new Lenovo T400 with ATI mobility radeon HD 3470. It seems to happen often when zooming and shifting in Google Maps (Firefox) or when playing a 3D game (the free version Nadeo Trackmania Nations Forever).
I am in the exact same situation as Frank. I have a new Lenovo T400 with same graphics card. All went well for two months now – playing games, doing everyday stuff – but now when I even start Uplink (the most low-end game I own), it freezes, gives me a BSOD and chrashes. It says my ‘ati2dvag.dll file has run in an infinite loop and had to shut down to pervent errors’. I have tried everything from deleting drivers and reinstalling new ones for graphics card, BIOS, and some other stuff I thought would help. To no avail
. I am going to write a serious e-mail to ati about this, because this ‘little’ problem has cost me around 1.500 euros. If anyone finaly find a solution, please post it here, i’m watching this site for more updates.
Asrock has a new bios which fixes problems regarding the 4350.
Did work for me
I have been looping about every 2 minutes now, it seems to get worse with time. The computer is a friends and I think she bought it a couple of years ago, run XP with SP2. Found one site that claims going PCI to PCI will fix problem, but then I look at this site and that is not true here. Why won’t ATI publish or take responsibility for this obvious problem of there that they passed on to us?
Hi!
For all the desktop users, try the following:
1. Reseat the graphics card (temp variations, heavy cards and bumping into the casing … tend to undo the tiny lock … even slighlty)
2. When you are doing so, rub the contacts with an eraser or iso-propyl alcohol (mediacl swabs can be used)
3. Use DriverSweeper (guru3D) to uninstall all instances of graphics drivers
4. Use the show hidden devices feature by going to Advanced Settings from My Computer/Computer Properties->Environment Variables and add a new one->DEVMGR_SHOW_NONPRESENT_DEVICES with the value of 1. Then, goto device manager, select show hidden devices from the view menu and finally uninstall all previous instances of pci bridge and graphic card drivers
5. Verify that your motherboard is ‘compatible’ with the built-in audio device/or missing audio device on ATI cards (high idle cpu usage). If not, disable the High Definition Audio Device in device manager (do not uninstall, just disable)
Hi Ahmed,
Interesting tips.
Thank you all for your possible solutions to this “infinite loop” problem that I have had from time to time for over 18 months on what was a new Acer Travelmate 7720G with a an ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2400 XT. My technical computer skills are not adequate to try any of the various solutions… even the advice on updating the driver sounds problematic to me .. I cannot afford to lose the use of my laptop! Does anyone have the customer service email for ATI and we can start bombarding them with complaints and demands for a solution.
Just a thought.. would upgrading to Windows 7 help?
@ Gary,
I have heard a few cases – that this problem is still happening with Windows 7. But I’m not sure if it is true.
Just to increase the thread in case anyone at Microsoft or ATI are listening (some hope!!).
I have had a Thinkpad T30 for about 2 years now and it has run flawlessly until for some stupid reason I decided to upgrade all of the drivers before IBM removed them from their site (as Dell did for my wife’s old Inspiron).
Sure enough, after upgrading the ATI drivers to those listed on the IBM web site I get the ati2dvag.dll infinite loop about 80% of the time I boot the laptop.
I have tried all of the recommended fixes to no avail, tried using about 50 different versions of older ATI drivers, none of which addresses the problem as none are the custom type of driver needed for the Radeon Mobility 7500.
Of course, I could just backrev to the last working driver version on IBM’s web site….but oh no, in their infinite wisdom they remove all but the current version. Do IBM want to know about this, do they hell, if the laptop is not current they are not interested.
Way to go Microsoft, IBM and ATI, none of the big vendors these days gives a damn about thier customer base.
@ Tonks
I think if you made backups, you can likely still restore the old drivers and maybe this would remove your ati2dvag problem.
Well then it is time to make a web-site dealing with this problem.
Let’s gather and mass sue ATI. I believe we all have seen many examples of web-sites (even for mobile phones) that broughht awareness of the problem and made the companies responsible to face their mistakes.
As you may understand I have the same problem with a brand new ATI 4650 with this ati2dvag “Display Driver stopped responding” problem.
I am a webmaster and I would be happy to contribute in the effort.
I have ASUS RADEON EAX850 and having the same problems wth the ATI2DVAF-Infinity Loop Message, but only when I first boot up with new 4 x 1gb RAM. When the boot-up is successfulmm, the CPU runs HOT 75C even though the system is not overclocked! I noticed that the display card ran super hot as I happend to toch it while accessing RAM modules.
In my case I have no problems with 2 x 1 GB ram at boot up
but see that message with 4 x 1 GB ram; so I don’t know if it had to do with the BIOS setting or more ram casuing higher temperature or some type of BUG:( I still getting a 75C CPU warning ven though I’m running 2 sticks of RAM withouth overclocking. I haven’t tried re-installing the driveres yet and I’ll try that recommendation next.
I have a 5 yr old Vaio VGN S260. I had these problems and had them “fixed” when it was still under warranty but it only worked for a couple of weeks, a month at most, until it would mess up again. Every single time that I turn my computer on, it does this within a matter of minutes. Any suggestions, besides the obvious buy a new one?
I just rebuilt my desktop computer. It had been getting a little dated, so to make it last a little bit longer I decided to add two liquid cooling circuits into the system. Several months later, I finally got around to getting it back together, and now, what do I find I have to fix? The Ati2dvag bug. I have come across this bug before, and fixed it at least for myself.
In the past, it seems that with my experience, it is a conflict having to do with the device drivers for ATI graphics cards and Windows XP. The best way to get around it, for me, was to install Win XP, and before anything else, install ATI drivers. Everything else can come second. Something with the ATI code doesnt like it when it is installed on an XP system which is not pristine and virgin. That having been said, I find myself now that I dont want to install WinXP again now, even though I have set my system up so that the hard drive with XP is nearly empty of programs other than the operating system (and therefore makes reinstalling XP easier).
I had the idea that perhaps the ati2dvag file was something temporary or a type of dump file. So after about 20 bouts of blue screen madness, I deleted the file on a whim. Let me tell you, it is a fairly important file. It apparently has some say in fixing a display’s pixels, color bits, and is a major component of the display driver on a whole. By deleting the file, my color depth is down to 4-bits, and my pixel resolution shows up as 1×1, lol. I can attest to the fact that it seems to be influenced by high temperatures on the boards, but then again, it doesnt go away when the temperatures go down. I think it may be….. hahaha, just got it again. As I was saying, I think it is an error that is simply in a significant place in the code, which is easily exacerbated by high temperatures.
People might laugh, but high temps do cause problems for computer circuitry. As it stands now, my CPU is at 80.5 degrees Farenheit, my motherboard temp is at 123.5 degrees, my northbridge temp is at 118 degrees, and my southbridge temp is at 120 degrees. I can only get to windows desktop when I enter safemode, which makes the display drivers turn off. I don’t know what else to say except that I will comment once I have re-installed WinXP, because im getting to the end of my tether with this. Oh, and by the by, im a political science student… a facebook group or a petition on such a problem might be a novel way of dealing with this bug. Get some real attention on it.
Thanks Lugh, some good suggestions there.
Hi All,
I just got a HP Z800 workstation with XP 64bit that I use for work with no fancy graphic requirements. It has a ATI FIREPRO V5700 512MB PCIe graphic card. I have been having troubles recently. The computer started by crashing with this message:
“The ati2dvag display driver has stopped working normally. Save your work and reboot the system to restore full display functionality. The next time you reboot the machine a dialog will be displayed giving you a chance to report this failure to Microsoft.”
Sometimes you can’t even reboot it and you will have to mannually turn the power off and on to get any response from it.
I have removed all the ATI related programs and re-installed them. But the problem occured again. I have now removed them all together and just using the Standard VGA Graphics Adapter. So far I haven’t had the crashing problem any more. The only problem with using the Standard VGA Graphics Adapter
is that when moving a window across there is a waviness effect. I am not a computer expert so I am wondering if anyone has any simple suggestion to get rid of the waviness effect. Thanks, Zahra
I have been trouble with my workstation (HP Z800 with ATI FIREPRO V5700 512MB PCIe graphic card). I use it for work with no fancy graphic requirements. Recently the computer has been crashing with this error message:
“The ati2dvag display driver has stopped working normally. Save your work and reboot the system to restore full display functionality. The next time you reboot the machine a dialog will be displayed giving you a chance to report this failure to Microsoft.”
Sometimes rebooting after the carsh fails and you will have to manually turn it off and on to get any response from it.
I have removed all things ATI and reinstalled them but it didn’t solve the problem. I have un-installed everything and am currently using the Standard VGA Graphics Adapter. The screen looks a bit funny but so far have not have any crashes yet since I un-install the ATI driver. The other issue with this driver is that there is a waviness effect when you try to move an open window. Is there a simple solution to get rid of the waviness effect? Thanks. Zahra
I just ran into the Ati2dvag problem yesterday and have been online since then trying to find a solution.
I have a custom machine built for me by my brother which has lasted longer than any commercial machine that I have owned. It was starting to slow down and experience some problems so I just wiped the hd clean and reinstalled everything. I downloaded an ATI driver for the video card (Radeon 9800 series)and everything seemed ok except that I couldn’t get my favorite game to function quite the way it was before.
I had a couple of additional installs to do but both said I needed SP2 to install so I downloaded SP2. The next time I tried to open an email with a Media Player attachment, I got the blue screen and the “ati2dvag” infinite loop message and here I am.
Rather than get caught in another loop, i.e. trying to find fixes, does it work to just purchase and install a video card from a different manufacturer? I’ve read a couple of letters from people who stated they did this but they don’t say whether or not it works. Given ATI’s apparent refusal to deal with this problem, I’m done with them.
Steve
Hello everyone. My Atidvag issue is similar but only happens when I play a graphic intensive game. At completely random times while playing Warhammer Online the game will lock up and the screen goes black. I can still hear the in game sound lopping. At this point my options are to wait 5 minutes for the “The ati2dvag display driver has stopped working normally. Save your work and reboot the system to restore full display functionality. The next time you reboot the machine a dialog will be displayed giving you a chance to report this failure to Microsoft” error or just cold boot. I never get the error while at the desktop or playing any type of media. I have a Sapphire ATI3850HD AGP card. My previous card was a Nvidia geforce 6800 and it worked great. I’ve also tried the ATIx1600 with same problem. Never buying another ATI product again.
One thing I’ve noticed that may be a coincidence but seems to help. I dl’d Rivatuner and pushed the gpu to 750Mhz. I thought the constant switching from 500 to 750 that the card does normally might be causing the error. It still crashes but it seems to be less frequent now.
I estimate I’ve spent about 30 hours trying to figure this out.
@ Shawn
Hope it works out for you, and it doesn’t get worse.
I have a proble with the atisdvag and I cant help it!!! I formatted my pc and one day after BOOM!!!! It crashed again!!! And this is happening always, and mostly when i try to watch videos!!! What can I do???
PROBLEM CARD: HIS ATI HD 4350 GPU. [no fan] [HDMI:DVI:D-SUB] type.
Previous card ATI 9200 SE/series.
No problems what soever with the previous card.
System: XP pro 32- SP3
Asus P5VD1-X mainboard, 2GB DDR Ram in 2 slots, Intel 775 3.2ghz dual core processor. 350W powersupply. 2 harddrives, pushed Virtual memory to like the highest it can let me.
PC is always overheating, but it hardly crashes due to it unless outside is realllly hot. But that is with the previous card. With the 4350hd however… there is nothing i can do but play games… Plays perfectly with left 4 dead and flatout ultimate carnage. other open GL games that ate the previous card.. run flawlessly… but simple tasks like rightclicking on photo’s and zoomin on photos, watching AVI, MOV, etc movies, scrolling text Files… the machine freezes almost immediately, and always gets an unresponsive error from the 4350.
I have been diag. the problem. i Realised that it has something to do with layers and overlays and partial transpariencies. E.g. menu shadows, Faded menu animations. and menu’s appearing over photo’s and movies screens[rightclicks]. Therefore i tried to push the whole movie thing using a 3D rendered option in my movieplayer.. worked however 3 mins of video is all i got b4 it started again. So tested more. Winamp skins, dragging windows around and fullscreen- window stress testing…. Epic FAIL!! Its the layering and overlaying task handlin of the cards… things like Aero and such would fail quickly, i refuse to try it.
Someone told me it was my DDR Ram, because its DDR on my board and DDR2 on the card. its not keepin up WITH the card. BUT Y would it cause the card to hang IN my system and not IN games which push it harder?
My solution was to turn the card’s clockin down[underclock it]
Then go in troubleshooting in “display adapters” menu from the desktop and turn off the Direct draw… yes.. turn it off… and it even worked better with the direct 3d off also… but here is the F’d up part. no 3d gaming. and all movies worked without fail… isnt that retarded… Now to test photoshop and illustrator capabilities…
Works perfectly with adobe suite…. its just lame windows GUI errors. Who tests these products b4 they hit the market anyways huh??