Radeon 9700 Pro - Possibly Heat Damaged? (Have Screenshots)

[travelyan]

In December 2002 I bought a Gigabyte Radeon 9700 Pro. It worked fine for about a year thereafter, but suddenly while scrolling a web page a few months ago my screen became distorted. Yellow and blue blocks that kinda "stair step" up the screen, and when I scroll, they smudge together.

Loading a game, such as Max Payne 2, would produce HORRIBLE distorted textures and blue shimmering "Matrix" style lines running vertically down the screen. But after about a week of this happening at random, it stopped.

Two weeks ago it started happening again, only now it is ten times worse and will not go away.

I have tried just about everything short of reformatting (which I seriously doubt would help at all). DirectX updates, driver updates, reseating the card in the slot and dusting the interior out, underclocking the core and memory... anything I could feasibly think of to solve the problem, but nothing. Rebooting does nothing - the Windows XP boot screen will have slight corruption, and then it loads my desktop and the blue and yellow neon-colored crap is everywhere.

If I shut down for a couple hours, then boot, it's fine for a little while. But then after it's been going for about an hour or so the weird colors reappear. NOTHING makes it go away.

Here's a shot of my desktop when scrolling a page.

http://files.radioitg.com/crazyshit.jpg

(Please pardon the filename).

And here's a screenshot from Max Payne 2...

http://bellsouthpwp.net/t/r/trav/my_radeon_owns.jpg

And here's Counter-Strike.

http://bellsouthpwp.net/t/r/trav/corruption.jpg

I guess I'm just trying to confirm that the problem is my GRAPHICS CARD, and not something like the AGP slot. Specs are ASUS P4PE Mobo, P4 2.57ghz CPU, 1024mb Corsair DDR333 ram, 430W Enermax PSU, Giga-Byte Radeon 9700 Pro 128mb at default clock speeds.

Given the evidence, I *think* it's heat damaged. What do you think? I wanna be sure before I go drop money on a 9800 Pro...

 

[paparazi]

travelyan
Unfortunately I think you are right but to be sure couldn't you see if a friend will try your card in their system for a day.
I presume that you have already checked the fan is spinning properly? and that the extra (floppy drive power cable) is properly fitted and shows no signs of burning or poor contact.
It is also worth cleaning the contacts on the card with an erasor rubber.
Martin

Start by questioning and soon you will be anwering.
So please take but remember to return and give when you can.

 

[travelyan]

The fan's spinning and there's more than adequate ventilation and airflow in the case. I haven't tried swapping the card out to check if it's the slot or not, but I'm going to try a 9800 Pro first. If the problem is my motherboard I'll find out after the new card's in, or I'll have up to one year to get my money back for the 9800 and buy whatever I need to to fix the problem. I should HOPE it's not the freakin mobo.

But then again it very well could be.

I just wanted to know what y'all think it is. Heat? I wouldn't want the same thing to happen to the new card.

 

[Wiggy911]

I have got exactly the same problems with my Gigabyte 9800 pro. It definately seems like its a heat problem. I have tried underclocking using vtuner which made it slightly more tolerable but I am still typing this through a jumble of digital artifacts. It is 66 degrees F in my living room at the moment and I have more than enough fans pointing at the card. I use a Thermaltake case and an Enermax PSU.

It is worth mentioning that this is the 2nd card I have got, the 1st one died after just 1 month with similar issues which prompted me to get the new case and PSU. This card has been OK since I got it last Autumn.

I think its the memory that has got too hot, not the GPU as it has not crashed (yet!). The frame rates in UT2004 are the same, its just the polygons are all over the place, like in your screenshots. I think, gigabyte have not put enough cooling power in for the memory.

I am a little dissapointed with this card because I have never overclocked it - after all, it was more than fast enough to handle any game I threw at it. This is the 1st bit of hot weather it has encountered and it gave up the ghost.

I just hope that I can find the receipt and that I am still in warranty. I wont be buying Gigabyte again, thats for sure.

Wiggy.