Snouty

hi

I recently bought a new nvidia 9800gt graphics card which works very well when running things like msoffice and some games like World of Warcraft. The problem occurs running Age of Reckoning, Counterstrike and some other games. After anywhere between a few seconds and a few minutes, but never longer, the graphics crash so the screen still shows the game but distorted and covered in dots a few pixels square. The sound goes scratchy but usually persists until the pc is switch off, while the pc often auto-reboots although that option is turned off.

System:

O/S: Windows Vista Home Premium (6.0, Build 6001)
BIOS: Phoenix - AwardBIOS v6.00PG
Processor: Intel 2160@1.80GHz (2CPUs)
Memory: 2046 MB RAM
DirectX 10
Gfx: Nvidia GeForce 9800 GT 1GB
PSU: Jeantech Absolute 1000W


Things I've tried:

Drivers, updating, reinstalling etc
Checked temperatures which seem to be in the right range
Checked clock and fan speeds, which also seem to be in the right range. (I'm not overclocking anything)
Replaced the psu
changed to "single display performance mode"

and probably more besides

If anybody has any suggestions at all about this, or would like more information please, please let me know.

Many thanks in advance :)

koala

Hi, welcome to TSF

Make a note of the temperatures and PSU voltages listed in BIOS, then reboot and play a fullscreen game with SpeedFan (or any other system monitor) running in the background until the artifacts appear. Alt-tab back to SpeedFan and take a screenshot.

Post back with both sets of readings so we can see how your system copes under stress.

Although the temperatures might be ok, if the +12V output is outside the +/-5% range it can cause problems for the graphics card, leading to the kind of artifacts you're seeing.

What make/model/watts was your old PSU? If it was too weak or faulty, it could have damaged the graphics card.

Have you tested the card in another computer with a suitable PSU?

Have you run the DirectX tests in dxdiag, and the graphics card stress test in ATITools?

Snouty

Hi, thanks for your response :)

I can't post screenshots as the pc crashes when this problem occurs, but the temperature under load is about 70 degrees, and the voltage is 12.1 - 12.3.

The old PSU was Jeantech 350W, upgraded to 500W then 1000W. Unfortunately I don't have another machine available with a big enough psu - all the ones I have access to are around 450.

DXDiag and ATITools report that everything is fine :s

A friend suggested that this card might need 26A and that I should bridge the 12v rails on the psu to achieve this, but honestly, I have no idea what that really means or how to do it. Any advice gratefully received :)

koala

All PCIE cards need a minimum of 26A/+12V (the more the better, 26A is the bare minimum). You could use a 550W or 650W for a 9800GT as long as it has enough amps, so unless your 1000W Jeantech is faulty, it's easily strong enough. As it's providing 12.1 - 12.3V under stress, it's working properly and you don't need to do anything to it.

If the 70C reading is for the graphics card under stress, that's ok. It can go much higher than that without causing any damage (85-90C is common). We could do with seeing the rest of the temperatures and voltages from BIOS to see if any other components are overheating or not receiving enough power.

Considering all the things you've already tried (drivers, tests, readings, etc) I would test the card in another computer, or take it to a PC store to have it looked at if you don't have access to another computer.

Snouty

I'll do that - thanks for your help :)