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I just build a new HTPC-ish desktop computer and everything works fine until I install the ATI drivers for the videocard which is a Asus HD 5450 Silent 512MB DDR3 card.

The main issue is that I get a black screen with a mouse pointer after rebooting after installing the ATI drivers (I tried both from disk and from the ATI site). Only after reverting through windows safe mode does the computer show the desktop (seemingly running on integrated graphics, but through the VGA port of the GPU(?!))

These are my hardware components:

I can think of two possible issues myself but I would like some feedback from the experts.

First thought was an insufficient power supply seeing as ATI recommends 400W+ for the HD 5450, however a bit of googling reveals that 300W should be sufficient and that it is even possible to run it with as little as 250W. I am a little iffy about this option. On one hand this card only consumes as low as 20W and all the PSU calculators I tried show that 229W is enough for my system. On the other hand, the spec does state 400W+

The other thought I had is that the video-card doesnt exactly fit. By that I mean that the bracket that interfaces with the backpanel is slightly to tight. As a result some of the copper-tinted pins on the HD 5450 card are not entirely locked into the PCIE16 socket...the edge is however minimal and I am running this computer via the GPU's VGA interface right now so once again I am iffy on wether the connection is an issue or not.

I would appreciate any solutions that anyone can come up with. I did google before so I may encounter some solutions that I already tried (including changing the resolution).

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  • Have you tried removing the faceplate to get a better fit?
    – imtheman
    Jul 20, 2012 at 21:16
  • Honestly though, it really sounds like your PSU doesn't have enough power.
    – imtheman
    Jul 20, 2012 at 21:19
  • Not resolved but my hd 5450 seemed to be dead-on-arrival. For others having the same problem, a more powerful psu might resolve the issue but I am happy with the nvidia gts610 I bought instead... Jul 27, 2012 at 2:42

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