Ati Radeon 9800 pro problems please help

blackhawk08 · 05-29-2009, 08:30 PM

Hello, I have been having an issue with my computer just recently. When ever i start up my pc everything looks fine but within seconds the screen turns into a dancing pixel rainbow. I think these might be called artifacts but i am not sure. It is so bad that i cannot see anything behind the mess. I searched on google using another comp and i found that i may need to take out the graphics card and clean it. So i took it out, cleaned it, put it back and booted up my pc. It worked great for about an hour but then it went to hell yet again. When the system starts up it sounds normal. Its just the video part that is screwed up. I got a couple of error messages, one was an ati error message that said the VPU was failing (what does this mean?) another message i got was on a blue screen that said there was a problem with the ati2dvag file. I then booted into safe mode where i unistalled all ati drivers, when i restarted it made no difference, the screen went into a frenzy of patterned pixel crazyness.

is my video card on the way out? Btw i have a 5 year old dell dimension 4600
I am running windows xp
Pentium 4 2.8ghz processor
1 gb ram
Ati Radeon 9800 pro 128 mb
Also should I be leaning toward a new computer?

**koala** · 06-03-2009, 06:21 PM

Hi, welcome to TSF

If you've already tried reinstalling the graphics driver, it sounds like the card is damaged, possibly through overheating or a weak power supply.

What are the temperatures and voltages in BIOS?

Do the artifacts appear when you first switch the computer on (white text on black screen), or only when Windows is running? If it's only in Windows, do they also appear in safe mode?

What make/model and total watts is your PSU? Is it the original one from 5 years ago?

05-29-2009, 08:30 PM	#1 (permalink)
blackhawk08 Registered User Join Date: May 2009 Posts: 3 OS: xp	Ati Radeon 9800 pro problems please help Hello, I have been having an issue with my computer just recently. When ever i start up my pc everything looks fine but within seconds the screen turns into a dancing pixel rainbow. I think these might be called artifacts but i am not sure. It is so bad that i cannot see anything behind the mess. I searched on google using another comp and i found that i may need to take out the graphics card and clean it. So i took it out, cleaned it, put it back and booted up my pc. It worked great for about an hour but then it went to hell yet again. When the system starts up it sounds normal. Its just the video part that is screwed up. I got a couple of error messages, one was an ati error message that said the VPU was failing (what does this mean?) another message i got was on a blue screen that said there was a problem with the ati2dvag file. I then booted into safe mode where i unistalled all ati drivers, when i restarted it made no difference, the screen went into a frenzy of patterned pixel crazyness. is my video card on the way out? Btw i have a 5 year old dell dimension 4600 I am running windows xp Pentium 4 2.8ghz processor 1 gb ram Ati Radeon 9800 pro 128 mb Also should I be leaning toward a new computer?

06-03-2009, 06:21 PM	#2 (permalink)
koala Moderator Hardware Team Join Date: Mar 2005 Location: UK Posts: 12,457 OS: XP/7/Ubuntu My System	Re: Ati Radeon 9800 pro problems please help Hi, welcome to TSF If you've already tried reinstalling the graphics driver, it sounds like the card is damaged, possibly through overheating or a weak power supply. What are the temperatures and voltages in BIOS? Do the artifacts appear when you first switch the computer on (white text on black screen), or only when Windows is running? If it's only in Windows, do they also appear in safe mode? What make/model and total watts is your PSU? Is it the original one from 5 years ago? __________________ New members: Subscribe to your thread (Thread Tools) to receive an instant email notification when you get a reply. TSF Folding@Home Team 85015 - details here