Video card going bad?!?!

Discussion in 'Videocards - NVIDIA GeForce Drivers Section' started by mattymaxima, Dec 21, 2008.

  1. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Hello everyone. My system has been rock solid for months now until the other day. I was playing Fallout for hours and then randomly it crashed. 2nd time its done it in the last month...no biggie I thought. I then downloaded CoD WaW and installed and ever since my pc is laggin bad. I mean 150 points less in Vantage, 5-6 fps less in Far Cry2 all the time now. I uninstalled CoD - no success. I did system restore to the day before - no success. Ran dskchk - no errors so I then Uninstalled all nvidia drivers :nforce, geforce, physx, performance, and monitor and reinstalled, same thing. I didnt change a thing and now I cant figure out what is causing this problem.

    I defrag every time I uninstall/install new driver and I am currently using the 181.00's which have been the best for me. I have been getting 37-38 avg fps in Far Cry 2 bench and now I'm only getting 30-31 and noticeable stuttering. Even tried going back to 180.60's I had before and still horrible performance.

    Do you guys think this is a video card issue?

    I wouldn't think so but I just am getting so mad now. I always leave GPU fans on 100% and I have Antec 900 so heat shouldn't be a problem for any component.

    Is it possible that when Fallout 3 crashed my system got corrupted somehow and I need to reformat? or maybe a video card, or memory issue.

    I dont know where to start with determining a hardware problem really and I dont feel like giving up just yet to do format - no backup. Like I said everything was great until crash which I didn't run any games right away afterward like I should have and then I installed CoD : (


    Vista 64 sp1
    XFX 780i w/latest bios
    eVGA 9800gtx+ sli
    2X2GB pc8500 OCZ @ 1066 5-5-5-15-2t 4-26-5-10-7.8us
    WD 500GB 16 MB
    181.00
    Nov 2008 directx
    nforce 15.23
    AVG/A Squared Free, Adware sweeps have been done

    Thanks
     
    Last edited: Dec 21, 2008
  2. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    Well check things out one by one. You can try downloading memtest86 and testing your ram to see if you don't have any bad sticks. You can also try checking your voltages to see if your PSU isnt going bad and causing your video card to be underpowered. Check temperatures on both the CPU and Chipsets. When playing a game try to monitor your temperatures while playing a game/running a benchmark.

    For CPUs try to check that it doesnt go around 60+C
    For Northbridge (Chipset) try to check that it doesnt go over 50+C (varies)
    For GPUs try to check that it doesnt go over 70-80+C

    High temperatures can cause slowdown as well as harm to the components.
     
  3. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    My temps never get to that point at all. My processor can get up to about 60 when running a Prime95 torture test though.

    I have ran memtest and I DO get errors on both dimms during test 7. I didnt get any errors when running the MHZ at 800 though BUT I have got these errors on memtest ever since I had my pc, unfortunately I didnt kow about memtest unitl after it was too late to RMA and I already sent in the UPC for rebates a while ago.

    I thought that it could be the memory but would memory just all of a sudden crap out like that but not completely. Been going strong since July and like I said its cool in my house temp wise and my case has good cooling. System temps around low 30's

    And how would I go about checking my PSU? I have was gonna get the Corsair 1000hx but hadnt planned on this soon.
     
  4. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    hmm memtest problems does show signs that the ram is dying and such... i had ram that was running strong for 6 months then one day i started getting BSODs (doesn't error when the ram isnt being used) so whenever I used over a gig (2gigs total) my browser would start locking up and thats when I found out one of my sticks was dying

    as for checking voltages download PC Wizard 2008 http://www.cpuid.com/pcwizard.php

    If you can try testing out the rig with one stick and swap and test it with the other stick on memtest
     

  5. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Bios shows 1.40625 and CUPZ shows 1.392 which is pretty darn good I believe for these 780i boards. I actually did the vdroop mod a few months ago and its alot closer now than it was before.

    Somethings not right though. I notice now that my hard drive light on my case is almost constantly solid and I dont remember it being that way. I mean what acticity is there too do when Im typing a post?? I dont even have virus or adware protection on ATM and hardly have any services or startup programs on like its ALWAYS been.

    Uh there goes that light being solid again and I rebooted a few mins ago and when I went into nvidia control panel this time it is only showing ONE program being installed!! when a few mins ago it showed Crysis, Vantage, BIA, Far Cry2, etc?? WTF
     
  6. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    ctrl + alt + del -> taskmanager

    and see if there is anything running out of the ordinary, a program running at 100% or a weird looking .exe program, you might have a virus/malware or something but not too sure, better to check it softwarewise before going hardware
     
  7. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Nothing detected again in scans so far. Anything look out of the ordinary to you??

    [​IMG]
     
  8. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Usually when Im running scans or playing a game, etc the HDD light just flashes very quickly, now it seems to just blink once and again but mostly is just solid
     
  9. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    Everything looks fine cept firefox eating up 127mb of your memory lol

    You said chkdsk went by fine so it probably wont be the HD.

    I would try memtest86+ on each stick (one at a time) and booting to test them.

    And do you happen to get the same errors on stock mode?
     
  10. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    What do you mean stock mode, memtest showed errors on both dimms. Is that not necessarily accurate and better to try them out myself? and BTW is PC Wizard accurate cuz...

    Voltage Info.

    Voltage CPU - 1.39v
    +3.3V Voltage - 3.20V
    +5V Voltage - 4.56V
    +12V Voltage - 11.14V

    That doesnt look good huh. Maybe I should run Far Cry 2 in windowed mode with the voltage page on and see what it does?

    I still dont understand even if the PSU happened to be going out why the light would always be on for HDD activity.

    Looking like time for some Gskill 1100 ddr2 and corsair 1000w?
     
    Last edited: Dec 21, 2008

  11. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    Yeah the +12V is pretty low, the HDD activity might have something to do with the voltage but im leaning more toward the ram. But trying to see whats the main cause of the problem, and unless you were already thinking of buying ram and another PSU then we should diagnose first to see what the main prob is heh. Don't want you to go out buying those and ending up not the cause of the problem. But those are the two main things that are of concern right now. As for stock settings I meant putting your BIOS on default w/ your CPU running at 2.4 and ram running on stock clocks etc...
     
  12. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Ya I did that and it got errors when at 1066 @5-5-5-15-2t even when I put the latency's higher it still failed. Only would pass @ 800 and it would pass there @ 2.1v with tight latency's of 5-4-4-12-2T 3-20-4-9-7.8uS
     
  13. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    I have been getting alot of Not responding messages kinda lately too and def alot more yesterday and today.

    Im gonna check Voltage in bios really quick.

    Ill tell you what though, If both my ram and my psu are duds, NO MORE OCZ for me...2 strikes is enough
     
  14. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    hmm sounds like a ram degrade so yeah the ram asking for more voltage is a sign, usually with an oc'ed ram running on high voltage for a long time will cause wearing (degeneration) and eventually it will cause the ram to require more voltage to achieve the same clocks... the ram should be lifetime warranty so you can RMA them or buy a new set, as for the PSU im not too sure about, the +12 rail is pretty low but ive had this PSU for 2-3 yrs and its been running strong so I would get the Ram issue worked out first then go for the PSU, but having a faulty PSU can damage the rest of your system if left unchecked
     
  15. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Ya and definitely not temp issue. Ran furmark and core temps were 51 52 48 48 and gpu temps were 56 and 52
     

  16. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    haha i think its all that florida weather, all that humidity is messing with our systems... yeah I would definitely go for the gskill as they are going fairly cheap, the CL4s seem to OC better than the CL5s but they're both good esp for the price... as for the PSU the corsair 1k is pretty good as well as antec, fsp, tagen, silverstone, zalman etc...
     
  17. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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    Bios shows the 12v @ 12.19 and the 5v @ 4.86. Ive been considering getting new mem ever since I saw errors on it at 1066 no matter what voltage 2.1v-2.2v so I think ill grab some of the Gskill 1100's this time around since they run at like 1.8-1.9 volts anyways. Seem like better dimms IMO.

    Thanks for your help. I will update this thread when I find out more.
     
  18. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    oh so the PSU is stable now? thats good

    Yeah NP. hope everything works out. Cheers mate! :thumbup:
     
  19. mattymaxima

    mattymaxima Member Guru

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  20. UZ7

    UZ7 Ancient Guru

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    Personally I would go for these:

    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231166

    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231145

    But thats if you want them at a high clock already and dont have to worry about OCing them. If you like OCing and want the new gskills that run much cooler, can OC 1000+ and uses less voltage then I would go with these:

    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231209

    heh, but thats up to ya man

    The Dominator and Gskill looks nice, not too sure on the OCZ since I dont have much experiences with them. My bro has dominators and we install gskills in most peoples computers so we know that those are reliable especially their Corsair's RMA.

    I have a dominator airflow (fan) blowing on the ram and it keeps them nice and cool and will help with oc'ed/high clock ram. (lots of people overlook ram temperatures).
     

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