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Kicking

I had to reinstall Win 2K after my IE6 stopped working and nothing would fix it. I used the Win 2K CD to do a "clean install" . First I thought everything on my PC would be deleted as HD was reformatted but most (all?)of my files are still there, all the old programs are in Program Files but some I can't run them. The old My Documents folder is in Documents and Settings/desktop1, the new My Documents is empty. This is weird.

The main problem I have now though is what seems to be a problem with the video card. The screen appears as when you use the machine in "safe mode" , pictures are not displayed properly(very fuzzy) and I can't see the NVDA manager on the task bar nor in control panel. I have an ATI CD but when I run it it says it "cannot find components, make sure you have the required hardware or software".
The only good thing is I can finally browse with IE.

But how do I get my graphic card to work ?
 
Kicking - if you still have your old files, then you didn't really do a clean install (i.e., one in which you really reformated your hard drive - for that, you need to use the W2K install CD and delete your current disk partition and then reformat and create a new disk partition). Just installing to the existing partition won't really do it - it might get installed to a different directory and thus have a different file tree, but you'll still have all the old (possibly infected) files lying around.

As far as your video goes - make sure you reset the video attributes after the install or it'll be at the default settings (usually low res). You may have to go to the vendor website and download the latest device drivers (if you're using nVidia you will almost certainly have to do that) and tools installation.
 
Actually you do not need to delete and recreate the partition, although it won't hurt. Just select the format option after you have selected which partition you want to install the new OS on. THIS WILL WIPE OUT ALL FILES ON THAT PARTITION, so be careful.

You must have missed that step in your previous install and that's why your files are still there. Even though all of the program files are still there, the OS cannot run them as they are not included in the new registry that was created when the reinstall happened.

For a totally clean install, put the OS CD in the drive (non-upgrade CD), ensure that the BIOS of your machine is set to allow boot from CD, and reboot the machine. It should boot from the CD (you may have to press the Y key during boot up when prompted to boot from CD).
 
I missed the delete partition part, just did it all over and now it appears OK. Still same graphics problem. The video card is an ASUS with Nvidia GeForce2 MX200, I am trying to download drivers from ASUS website , but I have no idea which one is good for the AGP 7100 Magic series I have.
 
Are you talking about an actual nVidia GeForce video card in your machine or an "on the motherboard" video option that uses the GeForce chipset?

If you don't find what you're looking for where you're currently looking, check the nVidia website (although note that nVidia chips are used in a whole bunch of different OEM implementations and some of them require vendor(OEM)-specific drivers).

Chances are that the W2K install CD would not contain the latest drivers for your video setup.
 
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