Monitor not displaying on my AMD R9 290

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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Alright guys, bare with me on this one. This is something I've been trying to fix for the past 3 days and simply CANNOT figure out how to fix it. And I've also created a new problem while doing it. I'll start from the beginning.

I recently got a Radeon R9 290 4gb 512-bit from a friend(it's practically brand new) and for a couple of days, everything was perfect. I had absolutely no problems with it. Then one day, my friend came back over and we where going to add thermal paste(Arctic Silver 5) to the GPU's liquid cooling pump (NZXT x31). Once we had the card out and had seperate the pump from it, we seen that the card had PLENTY of thermal paste already on it, almost too much, so we just put it back together and put it back into the PCIe. After we did this we plugged up a new monitor I had just gotten so that I could use 2 monitors for gaming. . . After setting everything up, I jumped on a game to test it out.


I got in game and about a minute later both monitors lose signal and also my sound cuts out, which makes me believe my PC was also crashing. I proceeded to do the normal, I checked to make sure nothing was over heating. All appeared to be fine. . Updated my BIOs, Reinstalled AMD Drivers, unplugged the new monitor, took the GPU out again and re-docked it back into the PCIe, made sure all connections where secured. Still happened. . . Tried pulling the battery out of my MOBO for awhile, still happening. . . Then I ran a different game that was less demanding than the others that where crashing me and it ran fine, I played for about 2 hours. No error. . . Decided to try the games that where crashing instantly hoping something had fixed somehow. . This time it ran for 30mins-1hours with not problem, then all the sudden it crashed. . . . At this point it seemed even more demanding games would sometimes run for a few hours and then crash, and sometimes crash 4 minutes after being in-game . . . . So I started digging around on the internet for fixes. One of the first things I came across that seemed to help a lot of people was a video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4waDEC8kPAY) the videos was saying to turn down the MHz used by your card using MSIafterburner. . I set a system restore and gave it a try. . After doing this I got on a game called Ark: Survival Evolved, probably the most demanding game I own and one that was previously crashing almost instantly. I thought the video fixed the problem! I played for 3 hours, no problem AT ALL. Then all the sudden, crash. . . I went to sleep for the night and woke up and tried to get back at working on this issue. Turned on my PC and now my monitor won't display AT ALL. Can't see any of the boot screen, nothing. . . . I can hear sound though when I actually got it to boot to my desktop blindly. . . And that is where I'm at now. I've put my old Radeon R7 260x back in my PC and everything is fine. . Also, I tried to use the system restore I set before changing stuff in MSIafterburner, and the monitors still receive no signal.

TL;DR outline

1.) Card was fine
2.) Took card out of PC and put it back in
3.) Plugged in a new monitor so I could use 2 displays
4.) After doing these, when I would get in-game my monitor woud "lose signal" and I'd have to cut power to the PC to turn it off.
5.) Noticed it happened faster with more demanding games.
6.) Randomly started to let me play for hours before it would happen
7.) Tried a fix I seen on youtube(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4waDEC8kPAY) (Turning MHZ down on GPU w/ MSI Afterburner)
8.) Made it so I could play the most demanding game for 3 hours without crashing
9.) After I crashed though, not my monitor will not get ANY signal when using the R9 290 GPU, but works fine on others. Tried system restoring the changes from MSI Afterburner.
10.) Can't get the displays to pick up signal from GPU
11.) Sound does work, so it doesn't appear it's crashing my PC like it was when happing from gaming
12.) Orignally, the ingame crashing would happen when I was still at very low tempatures.
13.) WTF
 

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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PC info and specs..

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit)

MOBO: ASUS M5A97 LE R2.0

CPU: AMD FX Eight-Core (~3.1GHz)
--CPU PUMP: NZXT 31x

RAM: 12gb DDR3 G.Skill (3x4gb)

GPU: Radeon R9 290 (The card that is having the issue)
--GPU Pump: NZXT 31x

PSU: Kentek 850w

Resolution: 1680x1050
-2nd Monitor(Display2): 1280x960

--Tempatures(Incoming)--

CPU: 33.C

MOBO: 30.C

GPU:
-Idle: 33-40.C
-Ingame: 70-96.C
 

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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Overview of solutions that have been tried that didn't work.(Not all in-order)

**Checking tempatures(All seem to be fine to me)

**Removing GPU and putting back in and checking for dust/dirt and making sure all connections are in firmly and secure.


**Checking power consumption.(I could be wrong here, so if anyone would like to double check this that'd be great) As far as I can tell, I should have plenty of power to run everything.(850w)

**Uninstall GPU drivers and Re-install.(Also used different driver sweepers to make sure it was FULLY uninstalled). Done this 3 times.

**Update MOBO Bios

**Unplug the new monitor

**Removed MOBO battery circle for ~10 minutes.

**Followed a video that helped others fix the solution (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4waDEC8kPAY) which helped for a little, but after it crashed once. Now the monitor won't pick up ANY signal when using the Radeon R9 290.
 

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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So first of, does anyone know how to undo the changes I did in MSI afterburner on my R9 290, when I can't get a display when using it. Having to use my R7 260x . . I had set a system restore before making the changes, but it hasn't seemed to help. . . . So I need my R9 290 back to 947mhz instead of 805mhz, but can't just open MSI afterburn and turn it back down because I have to use a different card for my montior to work.

 

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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@huvik

There was so much that was still pretty new, I just left it and put it back together. Was one of the first things I thought about being the problem. But with out it overheating, I don't see how that could be the problem.
 

Lolsteel

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Feb 8, 2016
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I agree, it does need new thermal paste on it. It's never good to not put on new paste after taking it apart. In which I will do, I just seriously doubt that it's the issue here, I'll give it a shot though. . . . .Either way, it's not even booting right now. And not even slightly hot. And from everything I've read on the R9 290, it's normal for it to run around 90.c when in-game. . And I meant that was a max, it typically stayed round 77ish-86ish. . . .
I should also of probably mention when it was crashing ingame to begin with it was still very cool. . . Probably around 50-60ish.C