Is my video card dying?

PaulMigaj

I have an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro card and today while enjoying a game of civilization 4, the screen suddenly turned black with the most amazing assortment of various graphical artefacts.

So I Alt-Tabbed out of the game and my desktop had a series of columns of lines along with a general snowiness. The computer was not frozen however, it all worked, just hard to see anything you're doing.

I tried a restart, and during boot up I immediately saw that the screen had a nice series of green boxes almost in a checkerboard pattern. this persisted through the boot up process and when windows came up the system went back to the columns and snow described above.

So I powered down the system properly (full off , remove power cord). When I restarted after about a minute it was fine until about 2 minutes in. Then the graphical problems came back.

Another full power down and restart and the graphical issues were there. Waited 15 minutes with computer off and still the graphical problems are present. But it works otherwise.

I then opened the case and checked to make sure all the fans are working, nad indeed they are all working, including case fans as well as the video card fan.

I (did my best) to look at the CPU and Video Card temps through the snow and columns, and they both seemed fine.

So is my video card dying or is this a sign of something else going wrong?

The case is aluminum and fairly well-ventilated (2 front, 2 back, 1 side + 2 PSU fans). Ive never had the computer overheat, and I do keep the temp alarms on.

I didn't overclock the CPU or the video card.

Thanks for your feedback.

If the video card is dying, what is a cheap replacement you'd recommend of approximately the same or better performance as the radeon 9800?

Sledgehammer70

Sounds like a Card gone bad to me... I have a few of those in a pile somewhere that just when hay wire on me... Not much I can tell you to check, as you done a pretty good job of ttrying to test it. unless you can try it in another computer? that would be the only for sure way to tell.

Mt_Goat

Here is one of the cheaper alternatives that is waaayyy better than your old 9800.

XFX PVT42KVDE3 Geforce 6800XT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 AGP 4X/8X Video Card - Retail

airbornflght

Definately, I have the 6800GT, and it is pretty nice, though I would suggest getting one of the 7xxx cards or X1xxx cards if you can, they have the newest support such as Smart Shader 3, HDR, and others.

Mt_Goat

airbornflght wrote:

Definately, I have the 6800GT, and it is pretty nice, though I would suggest getting one of the 7xxx cards or X1xxx cards if you can, they have the newest support such as Smart Shader 3, HDR, and others.

But he wants cheap AGP and since AGP is going the way of the dodo and will not likely be able to be interated into his next system I picked the best bang for the buck instead of newer chip.

madmat

I've got a 6800nu that'll unlock 100% for sale cheaper than a new XT and it'll spank it handily.

PaulMigaj

Thanks for the replies everyone,

I ordered the 6800xt because its fairly inexpensive and actually a good step up. The reason I wanted cheap is because this system is quite old (AMD 1.7 !!) and I've already upgraded it a few times over the years (memory, graphics, sound card, new PSU). To make it take the new video cards (Pciexpress) id need to get a new mobo and processor too.

Id rather wait to build a new system, in a few months Vista and the new Amd platform should be established, and perhaps the current crop of "top-end" video cards will discount a little (or a lot).

Mt_Goat

PaulMigaj wrote:

Thanks for the replies everyone,

I ordered the 6800xt because its fairly inexpensive and actually a good step up. The reason I wanted cheap is because this system is quite old (AMD 1.7 !!) and I've already upgraded it a few times over the years (memory, graphics, sound card, new PSU). To make it take the new video cards (Pciexpress) id need to get a new mobo and processor too.

Id rather wait to build a new system, in a few months Vista and the new Amd platform should be established, and perhaps the current crop of "top-end" video cards will discount a little (or a lot).

Let us know how the new card does in your current system. We will all be curious to know how it stacks up against your old 9800Pro.

A-T

Curiously, my 9800 PRO suffered a similar fate recently, although the symptoms were different. I was about to start shopping for a new card when I found this. I think you might have saved me looking, thanks :smiles: