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How to check video card
If you are using windows OS XP operating software, there are a few ways how to check video card. Those methods are described supposing that you have installed video card drivers. If the drivers are not installed, please scroll down to the 4 method.
First method
1. First of all you have to see if your video card drivers are installed. To do that, simply click on your “My computer” icon, which has to be on your desktop. If not, then go to control panel and click on the “System” icon and it will show the same information.
2. On the System properties choose the “Hardware” button and click on the “Device manager”. A new window will open showing all of your computer components. If any of those contain any question or exclamation marks, this means there could be some problem with the driver presence or compatibility with a hardware component. The example is shown in a photo.
3. Click on the “Display adapters” (or similar with a +) and check you video card (name, producer, features and compatibility).
Second method
1. If you are on the desktop, right click with your mouse on your background.
2. Select “Properties”. The “Display properties” window will appear.
3. Click on the “Settings” choice which is usually the last button on the right.
4. Look under the “Display” note: it will tell what kind of video card model is on your computer. Check the photo example.
5. You can click on the “Advanced” tab if you are interested in the details of your graphics card. The “Adapter” tab shows your video adapter type: chip type, memory size, bios information. Clicking on the properties will take you to you video card driver’s window. You can run video card driver update, roll back or even uninstall your driver if you want. More info on driver update you may find by reading this post. Monitor tab displays the information about screen refresh rate.
Third method
1. Click on your start button, choose “Run” and type the command: “dxdiag” (without quotation marks).
2. Direct X diagnostic tool window will pop up with the default “system” tab information.
3. Select the “Display” tab and you will be able to see all the info on your video card.
4th way how to check your video card
If you don’t have your video card drivers installed in your system, and you don’t even know the name of your graphics card:
1. Shut down your desktop computer
2. Remove the casing.
3. Check the name of your video card. You can easily identify it by the monitor connection slot. If you cannot see, remove it, only be careful and try not to damage the motherboard. Also apply some antistatic means, before your touch the component.
4. Read the number of your card model and use it for a search in the manufacturer’s site.
If you don’t know laptop’s video card name, and do not see any drivers, it can be identified by the laptop model. Just type in the exact laptop computer name and try to google it. As laptop graphics components are pretty hard to remove or replace, they usually can be identified by the laptop model motherboard chipset name.
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