Mobility HD 3470 not working - I've tried everything!

krysjez · Feb 26, 2011, 11:01 AM

Hi everyone,

I've spent a full day on this and am quite close to literally tearing my hair out because of the problem! I work in art so good graphics are an absolute must. Let me explain what's going on:

Last week I spilled water on my laptop (Sony VGN-SR28/B) and brought it to a repair shop, which changed my motherboard to the kind used by the VGN-SR55. When I booted it up at the shop the laptop was working except for some display driver problem - the resolution was 1024x768 and unable to be changed. I left it with them for another night and they said they installed the drivers for SR55 from Sony's website. I don't know what exactly they did, but anyway at this point my resolution was back to 1280x800 (although Catalyst Control Manager wasn't working).

Well, today I was trying to run a game (which had always worked before) and it told me "graphics device not detected". DXDIAG told me my graphics card was ATI Radeon Mobility HD 3470, driver version around 2008 or something. After reading around on forums I decided it was because of the graphics card drivers and so I went to ATI's website to download drivers for Vista 32-bit, Radeon Mobility HD 3470. The file I got was "11-2_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc.exe".

Uninstalled all ATI-related products and then installed that driver, rebooted, but my game still wasn't working (resolution was still 1280x800, graphics card still showing in Device Manager).

Then I went to Device Manager, double-clicked on the graphics card, and clicked the "Update Driver" under the drivers tab. I chose to do the automatic one where Windows searches for drivers online. Anyway, that completed, and I was prompted to reboot.

After rebooting the horror began! My resolution is now 1024x786 and the only change I can make is to set it to 800x600 via Control Panel. I went back to Device Manager to check - now under Display Adapters it shows "Standard VGA Graphics Adapter" with an error symbol. When I double-click on it, it tells me the device could not start (error code 0).

Since then I've tried downloading different sets of drivers from ATI's website, downloading from Sony website (but they only work for Windows 7, so I can't install them!) etc. Must have done at least 15 reboots so far. Then I found HH's Mobility Modder tool and followed the instructions, but still no luck after I modded, installed and rebooted!

I tried to install the modded driver manually via Device Manager, pointing it to "C:\ATI\Support\11-2_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc", but it says "Windows has confirmed that your drivers for the following device are updated: Standard VGA Graphics Adapter".

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

PS: I am translating all system messages from Chinese so bear with the funny phrasing.

LQDForce · Feb 27, 2011, 01:58 AM

fall back to 9.12 drivers, see if it's a system issue (driver conflict).
Use this driver pack
ftp://file8.mydrivers.com/display/amd_Mobility_9.12.zip

If this works, you may try upgrading to the newer drivers, though I don't recommend it for Vista.

Maybe you can try Omega drivers instead.
OmegaDrivers.net | ATI/NVIDIA Omega Driver's Home, PC Gaming Drivers & News!

krysjez · Feb 27, 2011, 06:19 AM

Thanks for your reply. I managed to get it working again with the help of a friend who got me to install the 11.2 drivers off this site via Device Manager. Not clear why the ATI ones didn't work and these (which are supposedly direct from ATI as well) did, but I'm just glad the problem was resolved!

Feb 26, 2011, 11:01 AM	#1
krysjez HardwareHeaven Newbie Join Date: Feb 2011 Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0	Mobility HD 3470 not working - I've tried everything! Hi everyone, I've spent a full day on this and am quite close to literally tearing my hair out because of the problem! I work in art so good graphics are an absolute must. Let me explain what's going on: Last week I spilled water on my laptop (Sony VGN-SR28/B) and brought it to a repair shop, which changed my motherboard to the kind used by the VGN-SR55. When I booted it up at the shop the laptop was working except for some display driver problem - the resolution was 1024x768 and unable to be changed. I left it with them for another night and they said they installed the drivers for SR55 from Sony's website. I don't know what exactly they did, but anyway at this point my resolution was back to 1280x800 (although Catalyst Control Manager wasn't working). Well, today I was trying to run a game (which had always worked before) and it told me "graphics device not detected". DXDIAG told me my graphics card was ATI Radeon Mobility HD 3470, driver version around 2008 or something. After reading around on forums I decided it was because of the graphics card drivers and so I went to ATI's website to download drivers for Vista 32-bit, Radeon Mobility HD 3470. The file I got was "11-2_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc.exe". Uninstalled all ATI-related products and then installed that driver, rebooted, but my game still wasn't working (resolution was still 1280x800, graphics card still showing in Device Manager). Then I went to Device Manager, double-clicked on the graphics card, and clicked the "Update Driver" under the drivers tab. I chose to do the automatic one where Windows searches for drivers online. Anyway, that completed, and I was prompted to reboot. After rebooting the horror began! My resolution is now 1024x786 and the only change I can make is to set it to 800x600 via Control Panel. I went back to Device Manager to check - now under Display Adapters it shows "Standard VGA Graphics Adapter" with an error symbol. When I double-click on it, it tells me the device could not start (error code 0). Since then I've tried downloading different sets of drivers from ATI's website, downloading from Sony website (but they only work for Windows 7, so I can't install them!) etc. Must have done at least 15 reboots so far. Then I found HH's Mobility Modder tool and followed the instructions, but still no luck after I modded, installed and rebooted! I tried to install the modded driver manually via Device Manager, pointing it to "C:\ATI\Support\11-2_mobility_vista_win7_32-64_ccc", but it says "Windows has confirmed that your drivers for the following device are updated: Standard VGA Graphics Adapter". Any help would be greatly appreciated! PS: I am translating all system messages from Chinese so bear with the funny phrasing. Last edited by krysjez; Feb 26, 2011 at 11:08 AM.

Feb 27, 2011, 01:58 AM	#2
LQDForce HardwareHeaven Junior Member Join Date: Oct 2010 Posts: 77 Rep Power: 0	Re: Mobility HD 3470 not working - I've tried everything! fall back to 9.12 drivers, see if it's a system issue (driver conflict). Use this driver pack ftp://file8.mydrivers.com/display/amd_Mobility_9.12.zip If this works, you may try upgrading to the newer drivers, though I don't recommend it for Vista. Maybe you can try Omega drivers instead. OmegaDrivers.net \| ATI/NVIDIA Omega Driver's Home, PC Gaming Drivers & News!

Feb 27, 2011, 06:19 AM	Thread Starter #3
krysjez HardwareHeaven Newbie Join Date: Feb 2011 Posts: 2 Rep Power: 0	Re: Mobility HD 3470 not working - I've tried everything! Thanks for your reply. I managed to get it working again with the help of a friend who got me to install the 11.2 drivers off this site via Device Manager. Not clear why the ATI ones didn't work and these (which are supposedly direct from ATI as well) did, but I'm just glad the problem was resolved!