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Magenta Standby Gauge Fix

(Original thread started on 11-23-12 by Ron Rollo)

I have attempted to fix this problem myself but I think I have done more harm than good after about three hours of trouble shooting.

 

I first noticed the problem when Mike Badger and Greg were down about six weeks ago and I believe Mike updated the Nvidia Driver's to the latest and greatest ones available. The issue did not show up until the computer shut down and started back up the next morning.

 

I found my standby gauges turned hot pink, or Magenta!

Ron 14

 

 

That day I figured out that I could just reset my computer to an earlier date and that solved the issue. I got my gauges back!

 

That brings me to today...... Microsoft thought it would be a good idea to dump 12 updates on me at once. One or more of the automatic updates included new drivers for Nvidia which reinstalled one or more files that has once again turned my gauges pink. Has anyone else seen this yet?

(For the record, I am running Windows7 Professional.)

 

Of course I was able to turn the clock back on the computer to an earlier time to fix the gauges but every time I turn the computer off, it wants to reinstall the updates which brings back the Magenta gauges. Since then, I have figured out how to shut the computer off without installing the updates but this is just a temporary fix because I can't ignore the Windows updates forever.  Any thoughts or ideas on how to fix this?

 

My only two thoughts that might be causing the issue is that I noticed in your art work your using the same Magenta in certain areas. I wonder if some how the boarders have been removed or are no longer being detected causing the whole gauge to turn pink. Or is your template pink and your building everything on top of that?

 

My other thought is that all this new 3D technology might be having some sort of adverse effect on the gauges.

 

One thing I can say for sure is that the Jet45 windows and every other window that I can create does not have this effect with the new drivers.  Thanks for your help on this Dave and anyone else who might have a solution!

 

(Posted by Dave Ault on 11-24-12)

Well it looks like a Nvidia driver issue although I'm not sure why it is only affecting my gauges.

 

All I can suggest is that you look on http://www.nvidia.com at the latest driver for your card. If the latest one listed is the same as the version that you are running then see if there is a later Beta driver as they may have sorted this but not released the final version of the driver. I always run with updates turned off and only install the service packs, that way you know what you are getting. Never had any security issues doing it this way but I am running the free Comodo internet security suite.

 

If this doesn't fix it then I would install the older driver that worked OK and disable auto updates until the release of a newer driver.  Hope this helps.

 

(Posted by Rand Mathews on 11-25-12)

Did you happen to check for any system restore points? You might have a restore point created before you updated the drivers. As mentioned before by others, never do automatic update installs, I've seen too many bad things happen. In fact, some updates are not fully tested by Microsoft and drivers are a big one.

 

Personally I will manually get the updates and go through the ones I think I will need, then I go and research the updates on Google to see if there are any problems with other users. Any kind of new updates or service packs, I will always wait a few months and research first to see it there are any issues. Kind of falls back to that old adage, if it ain't broke........

 

I wonder if it has anything to do with DirectX? Anyway, I would do the same thing Dave suggested and either try a beta or install an earlier driver. Good luck and keep us posted.

 

(Posted by Ron Rollo on 11-26-12)

Thank you very much for the information guys. Everything that you are suggesting makes perfect sense, especially "If it ain't broke, don't fix it!"

Ron 15

 

UPDATE:

I got my gauges back!  I disabled the automatic updates on both computers and went to the Nvidia website and looked up one of the older drivers for my GT620 cards, (I have two of them in my client computer.) I found Driver 301.42 dated 05-22-12 and down loaded it. This driver was just a few months before the gauges were installed so I figured it would work, and it did!

 

In case your wondering, driver update 306.97 dated 10-10-12 is the booger that was giving me all the issues. I would be curious if anyone else experiences this issue, and if you do, now we know how to correct it.

 

By the way Rand, I did go back and did an earlier restore point a couple of times a few days ago until I eventually overwrote all the restore points that would go back far enough to work anymore. (All this while trying to figure things out!) So I currently have all the latest automatic updates plus an older Nvidia driver. Lots of lessons learned and I appreciate your help on this guys!

 

(Posted by Dave Ault on 11-28-12)

Great to see you got them sorted Ron! I will avoid 306.97

 

(Posted by Eric Williams on 12-19-12)

I feel your pain here- just got bit myself.  I thought I had all PC's auto updates turned off, but apparently my hardest to view and deal with PC was missed. I am rolling back now as I have had no luck finding an Nvidia driver for this old beast. It's my only old and unknown PC- but it has always worked like a champ for Dave's gauges and RMU's.

 

Windows wouldn't let me roll back either. I re installed video driver and all is well again. Thanks for sharing your info as I think it saved me a lot of time

Stupid auto updates....

 

(Posted by Alan Norris on 03-11-13)

Just updated to Nvidia driver 314.07 (released 2/9/13) and got the dreaded magenta gauges. There is a new one out 314.14 BETA but I'm not sure if that fixed it. I had to roll mine back to 306.23. Will test 314.14 over the next few days.

 

(Posted by Ron Rollo on 03-11-13)

Thanks Alan for posting this here. This is a perfect example of how an earlier post will help with current problems and help us to immediately identify what the issue is.

 

My issue started with update 306.97 and now we have information from Alan that the newest driver that will work is 306.23. So my question is, does anyone have a newer driver than 306.23 running Dave's gauges and working fine?

 

(Posted by Dave Ault on 03-13-13)

Not sure what is going on with these new Nvidia drivers but they don't seem to like my gauges. It will be due to some incompatibility with the driver and the Allegro graphics programming library that I use. Unfortunately the newer versions of Allegro are completely different so to recompile them with the latest Allegro would require a complete rewrite of the code which at the moment I don't have time to do.

 

So all I can suggest is that if you find a driver that works with it then stick with that and don't upgrade it. I have never found the Video driver updates to give any better performance anyway.

 

(Posted by Alan Norris on 04-30-13)

I just downloaded the latest driver from Nvidia — 9.18.13.2000 (shows up as 320.20 on their driver page) and the good news is that the Magenta Screen of Death has gone away.

 

(Posted by Alan Norris on 06-17-14)

Did the issue of the gauges turning solid magenta ever get resolved with later video card driver updates? I get requested all the time through Windows that a latest driver is available but am reticent to use it in case the issue has not gone away.

 

(Posted by Ron Rollo on 06-17-14)

As far as I know Dave has not made available an update to his gauges to resolve this issue.

I have turned off my updates so I do not even see the messages, I am in the same boat as you.

 

Dave stated on 03-13-13:

Not sure what is going on with these new Nvidia drivers but they don't seem to like my gauges. It will be due to some incompatibility with the driver and the Allegro graphics programming library that I use. Unfortunately the newer versions of Allegro are completely different so to recompile them with the latest Allegro would require a complete rewrite of the code which at the moment I don't have time to do.”

 

(Posted by Dave Ault on 07-30-17)

You may have already discovered this but though I'd pop on and share what I had noticed with the latest Nvidia drivers.

 

I'm in the process of upgrading my PC and have replaced my video card with a Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB It is running driver version 372.70 so was surprised to see that the standby gauges ran fine on it.

 

Maybe Nvidia has fixed the issue that caused them to turn Magenta or maybe I just got lucky with this combination of card and driver? If you are going to try a later driver then I would suggest that you make sure you can roll back to the earlier one just in case:

Dave 2