Hello to all Gurus! I’m quite new in this forum as you may see, i have trolled the forums in search for similar problems to mine and even though i found a few, they gave no solution, this may mean that simply, no one knows WTF is wrong with these lame (Yet expensive) Graphic cards... The problem is as follows: I use an NVIDIA 7950 GX2 card, with an ASUS M2N32 SLI Deluxe motherboard, 2Gigs of memory and a 2.4 AMD processor. OS: Windows Vista / XP Things were fine until some months ago when my video card started to crap out and Vista constantly threw at me the "nvlddmkm display driver has stopped working" error, which only annoyed me since it apparently reset and continued to work, i tried to update drivers etc, looking for a fix and nothing worked. suddenly the damned PC crashed one day and nothing i did made it restart up again, the display was all f*cked up, implying a video card problem, so i did a clean install of windows XP and it started to work again... after installing the updated drivers of the card and motherboard, i attempted to launch World of Warcraft and the PC crashed, just like before and now I’m left with a "dead" pc hoping against hope the video card did not die completely on me so, bottom line, I have no new ideas to try, I think I may have to buy a new one, but maybe you guys can come up with something interesting. Any ideas on how to fix this would be much appreciated!! PS: sorry for this uber long post :O
i just did a system restore, to before i reinstalled the 175.16 driver for this card on win XP, (In safe mode) PC booted fine, the restore worked, and i was back on with my pc, i install the driver, not 6 minutes passed when the screen simply shut off, nothing else happened. so, reading your above comment, i opened the case and even though the fans on the card were working, it seemed a bit too hot for normal usage, im thinking you hit the problem on the head, now, if this is the case, what can i do about it ? ps: mm i suppose im an idiot but, by artifacts you mean the screen has weird shapes or discrepancies all over it and its not a solid image ? if so, yea, i got a lot of those while trying out different things before the total meltdown of the system.
could u: 1. open up ur computer case and see if the FAN of the VGa is running 2. install RIVATUNER and monitor your GPU temps? 3. YOur computer will working fine and stable if you dont install any drivers? thanks
1. open up ur computer case and see if the FAN of the VGa is running yes, i can open it and it seems to be running, both of them, but i feel the air flow is pretty low, the rest of my system fans work just fine, so maybe install new fans on the card ? if thats even posible 2. install RIVATUNER and monitor your GPU temps? i havent tried this, will give it a go and see what happens. 3. YOur computer will working fine and stable if you dont install any drivers? i could monitor the ocndition of no display drivers installed for a while, to see if nothing crashes, so far, i have been able to install w/e drivers i want, until i reach the nvidia 175.16 at this point i have about 5-10 minutes until it dies on me. get back to you on points 2 & 3 in a short while, any other ideas are SO welcomed lol
ok, so a total of 15 minutes have passed since i restored the PC and deleted the 175.16 driver, no problems what so ever so i guess its running fine, i simply dont have anything to work with on the system lol, its completely free of any drivers, i suppose this means that as long as the NVIDIA drivers arent installed, the card wont over heat ? maybe, i dont really know. on the other point, i installed Rivatuner, with no problems, its been up for the past 10 minutes or so, but i must confess i have no clue as to what im supposed to do with it :/ do you have perhaps a link to a quick guide as to how i can monitor the system temp? anyway, having answered those 2 points im back at wondering wtf to do lol, thx in advanced for the help !
I could never monitor my temps with Rivatuner on my GX2. Maybe you should download GPU-Z also and check the temps with that? I also think that this is a heat issue because the GX2 is always borderline hot 60C at idle and probably high 70's into the 80's full load. And that is with pretty good air cooling. I would recommend checking the fan and making sure that there isn't tons of dust clogging it up. Then you need to go into Rivatuner and set your fan speed to 100% in 3d Mode... or at all times if you like (that is what I do). EDIT: If after installing the drivers for your card and it then crashes and won't work... I would assume there might be some physical damage to your card? And temperatures in GPU-Z:
i will DL and install the GPU - Z to see at what temp im running at. the damned card has had no contact with nothing outside the case, everytime i have pulled it out it goes striaght on my bed to avoid any dmg of any kind so no i doubt its a physical dmg problem. the fans arent clogged with dust, just put a blower in them and nothing came out of em so thats not the problem either, my pc is pretty clean since i try to maintain it every 2-3 weeks with a heavy dutty blower. ill try the temp readings and if they are above 60c ill see what i can rig to install drivers and set the rivatuner to up the fan speed lol, hoping im fast enough to avoid a system crash... sigh thx and i`ll keep updating in a few more ideas FTW
ok, so i used the PC for about 2 hours, with no problems, having installed all drivers EXCEPT the nvidia 175.19. nothing was wrong i simply was not using the video card so nothing happened... i cant run GPU Z or RivaTuner if the damned driver isnt installed since it wont recognize my video card, nothing apears when i open riva and try to select the video card icon (since its not there) i cranked up the AC in my room and set up a fan in front of the video card, its keeping it pretty cool atm, but again, i cant monitor the temp in any way since neither program recognizes that i have a video card running. im begining to think its not an overheating issue since it was not hot by the time i installed the last driver. as soon as it installed and i was promped to restart the computer, selecting OK and the PC never starts up again, the monitor claims a "No Signal" in the middle of the display but the pc seems to start just fine, at least thats what i think, i just get no image. OMG HELP ! EDIT: no, fans are not clogged, no dust at all
Try to manually install the 175.19 driver in Device Manager (in the control panel) if you are using Vista. If you are using XP try the 93.81 driver...
If 175.19 or any newer driver for that matter is giving you so much trouble just roll back to an older driver that works for you. The latest drivers were made with new cards in mind anyway.
tried on vista, didnt work, tried on xp and it gives me an error msg stating that this driver has'nt been aproved by windows XP... (93.81) then i click continue anyway and suddenly i lose the signal to the monitor, no idea why. if i could get a link to older driver versions, it would be a big help i cant find any via google... thx guys EDIT: wich is the version before 93.81 or 175.19 ? i have no clue :/
Try here man http://tweakforce.com browse around their download section they have official and modified drivers there. Hope you find a good driver for your card :nerd:
Thx Rylen i'll give it another try, but honestly i get the feeling the card is fried, because i just finished trying the install of the 170.73 from the drivers section of GURU3D, using driver sweep and i had the same problem, thing isntals OK then, on reboot it simply stops sending video to the monitor, and the fans seem to be working at full when XP is about to start... ill give it a try with older versions but i may just have to buy a new card :bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang::bang:
No prob man. Try drivers 169.xx or lower maybe those will work, if you still have no luck don't worry prices right now are dropping(thanks to ATI) and you have plenty to choose from. I think ATI is offering better video cards than Nvidia right now and I think you'll be better off with ATI's 4850 or 4870 I'm actually thinking of changing sides myself :nerd: but not right now coz my 8800GT is still serving me well :thumbup:
Hi, kyo1877: I can see you are logged from Venezuela. I'm from Basque Country, so it would be easier for me to speak in spanish than english, but maybe others members don't understand us, so I'll try my best :angel: -------- I've a second PC with an Asus A8N32 SLI Deluxe motherboard, a XFX 7950GX2 graphic card, 2gb DDR400 GSkill & a Opteron 180 proccesor. As you can see very similar to yours In that PC, I've had the exact same problem than you. If I disable SLI, all goes well, but if I enable it, then the problem is back. ------- Notes to check: - My card is an overclocked factory version, but when I checked it with NiBitor v4.3 I found that one of the BIOS was right (overclocked version card), but the other one was working at normal 7950GX2 frequency (***), so I 've to flash that BIOS with the propper one. EDIT: (***) Error: The second BIOS was running at superclockecked frequency (XFX 7950GX2 XXX model if I remember well), so I'm pretty sure that the second chip/pcb is burned... and maybe that is the cause why I've got problems running the card in SLI mode... Anyway, I'll try to RMA it. - Temp problems: Even if you use any tools to force to spin the fans at max rpm (eVGA precision, Rivaturner, nTune, etc.), seems like forceware drivers takes the control over it soon or later. Forceware drivers 169.x and older seem to work better in this matter. --------- At the end, I couldn't resolve the problem so I've buit a new PC (see firm), and left the old one as HTPC, working without SLI support... --------- Good luck & apologize for my poor english
Hey ASAP, well no worries on the English haha, i understood perfectly, even though i wish i hadn't lol, I'm pretty much resigned right now, gonna try a last driver fix with the 169.xx versions, two or three to see whats what, and I'm about to buy (i hope) the 9800gtx this afternoon, even though this means i will be away from online games for about a week ! OH NOES ... aaaaaaanyway, thx for all the help guys, it taught me a lot 'bout my PC and some interesting things i could be doing to optimize its use via Riva, etc. let u know if it worked and/or if i bought the new card haha
If I were you I would go for ATI's 4870 coz in all reviews I've read it beats 9800gtx in most of the benchmarks. But if that's the card you want then go for it man :thumbup:
