imac video drivers freezing 27 inch i7 (and probably i5 too)

hey,

So me and many others here have had issues in bootcamp with the ati driver freezing, usually locking up a spitting out purple artifact on the screen too.

Most people will say to update the driver using the new bootcamp 3.1 driver, but we will reply saying it cause banding (its NOT however 16 bit mode, it just looks similar).

Anyway I had the same problem. I will document all the steps here to show you how I managed to get ti working.

Bear in mind, given the fact we are dealing with computers, it may just be blind luck that it worked. Also ignore my typos, its just the way I roll.

ANyway.

installing windows 7 you get the balck screen on fiorst boot beacuse thier driver is screwed for usin with an imac. So you either get the huge donwload of exrta drivers form apple bfore you start or you follow the steps on the net to boot into recovery mode for winodws an ddelete one file manually to get around it. your choice.

anyway after that... theres MORE 😀

ATI driver (by Apple) version 8.661 is on the original snow leapoad install disk (this one cause the frezzes and purple artifiacts)
ATI DRIVER (by Apple) version8.681 is on the bootcamp 3.1 update and cause banding.

Now back int he good old days you woulf just downlaod a driver from the ATI site and install it, so that what I did. Version 10.2 and 10.3 as listed ont he site (the driver version are still in the 8.xxx range - newer than the apple drivers on disk)

ANyway, you run the install are it LOOKS liek it installs and things blink and it looks ok but in actual fact nothing changes. The only time this have happened is years ago when the wrong drivers were chosen for the wrong car don a pc I had. This made me think that apple was using a laptop variant of the 4850 that I knwo they usually do in imacs. so using the mobility modder tool (google it) i tried converting the desktop drivers I had downloaded ( the 10.2 and 10.3 version into versiont at would work on the laptio version of the card) This is basicaly what the mobility modder is supposed to do.

And the result? Black screens EXCATLY as if I was using the original Microsoft driver. Thie leads me to belive that while they are using a 4850 card in the imac, its modified a bit for apple. Enoguht thta desktop drivers dont work, and modded-for-laptop desktoo drivers dont work.

Now the upshot of using modified drivers is that it FORCES the catalyst control panel to be installed, meaing you get a few more options to mess around with the card.

Even so it still wasnt a soloution.

I couldnt use the original apple drive, it locks up, the newer one had banding, the newer radeon drivers direct form ati wouldnt work until they were modded and then they cause black screens.

SO the solution, as obsure as it was, was to donwlaod ACTUAL mobility radeon drivers - version 10.3 still, but made for laptops.

THESE drivers I was able to install - and here is where things changed.

THIS driver changed they way windows saw the video card in device manager. As I mentioned before, its NOT a desktop card, its a modified laptop card, but installing mac drivers makes windows THINK its a full desktop card, and running the orignal 8.681 driver crashed it. ONce I had installed the 10.3 LAPTOP driver it now appeared in device manager as a MOBILITY card.

BUt... this 10.3 driver (version 8.712 - the MOST recent), also caused banding, so form within device manager I went to update driver and select to choose my own and went BACK to 8.681 (the original apple driver that was cuasing frezzes and purpel artifiacts).

Rebooted, and bam. Not one. single. problem. Its runs fine, and device manager reports the card as a mobility radoen, but using the apple driver.

What this tells me is that the issue with the crashing driver is because its confilciting with what windows 7 thinks is IN the mac, vs the actual hardware.

I had an i5 27 inch mac and it did NOT have this problem, so it migh tbe realted to the i7 cpu combination who knows. Maybe its related to the device enumeration and its actual device number (or whatevers)

But to recap:

No drivers worked for me until I installed laptop drivers v10.3 (or the modded but failed desktop drivers v 10.2 and 10.3) One of these steps forced win 7 into recognising the card as a mobility radeon in device manager. If you can get it to come up as mobility radoen, then reinstall your orginal crashing apple driver and the problem will be gone.




If anyone here IS having problems with the purple artifacts, locking display etc, try FIRST doing the mobility 10.3(banding) drivers and going BACK to the original mac driver form the snow leaoprd disk and tell us if it works. Hopefully its a fix. If not, try modding desktip drivers, then removing the crashing driver by going into windows 7 setup via its install cd and deleting the ati driver manaully and reinstall apple driver aftre that and see if that works, otherwise try the steps above. (mod drivers, remove via windows recovery off setup disk, install laptio drivers, reinstall apple driver over it)


Good luck.