Well if the fan is stuttering, then it cud be that the fan is on its way out. Also if your not getting any video, i dont know about ATi cards, but my old 6800 ultra needed its own power cable to be connected to it, if yours needs that then make sure its plugged in correctly.
All i can suggest for now.
I tried another popular forum (which will remain unnamed) and they were absolutely no help. So I hope you peoples can offer me some advice. I have the above mentioned card. It's a rather "stock" Dell Dimension 8300..
When I power on my rig.....you can hear the fan on the card spin up, but then "sputter" spin up, "sputter" and it just maintains that routine......In the back of the card, there's this little light that comes on and right above it is the term "t_fault" I have NO IDEA what that means and I've Goolged for hours with no luck. BTW Absolutely no video what so ever when I power my rig on.....
Any help you guys could offer would be great! Ps....P/N is 102A5206250
Can't find anything on Google about that part number either....It says Ati on the card. It has the lady with the sword on the air vent. Argh Technology! It stinks sometimes!!!!
I know a guy who had the exact same problem you are having. It was with his dell and his new X850XT PE card. It ended up being an insuffecient powersupply.
on my 1900xt when i dont plug in the pcie 6-pin power connertor in it gives me an onscreen warning (even before i get to BIOS or anything) that it is not plugged in correctly. if it is an issue that has to do with insufficient power it should give a similar warning if i'm not mistaken. furthermore it shouldnt eat so much juice when idleing.
also when i power on my pc the fan on the card is on 100% until i get to a certain stage in the POST checks. then it returns to its default speed for the respective GPU temp. (~20% i think for cold).
IMO i think it is your power supply.
Either the power supply you are using has insuffecient power to make the video work, or you forgot to plug in the PCiE power connector.
"T_FAULT" LED on = dead card. Just ask my poor deceased X1800XL and XT. One overheated, the other had liquid spill onto the VRAM. It's that simple, unfortunately.
I'm going to go with "insufficient power supply" Dell doesnt usually equip their computers with power supplies that are more than just enough. The fact that you have 4 hard drives running in that rig is decently impressive. I don't know if they still do it, but Dell used to use non-standard power supplies so that you can't easily replace it with an aftermarket one without also replacing the motherboard. I'd try to test the card in another system with ample power before deciding that the card itself is dead (which is still entirely likely from the sound of things). Hopefully the LED being on is just a side-effect from having too little power and/or unstable voltages coming from the wimpy PSU.
Good Luck!
buddy, if you're unlucky you have a dell properietary power supply, which means you cant put any standard atx. If not, i recommend you buy a 500w power supply as no way that power supply can power up an x1900xt and 4 hard drives. invest in thermaltake or enermax. For my x850 pro i had to buy a 430w thermaltake power supply and its been great, as my dell was standard, but you have to find out or not. It would be helpful if you posted the picture of your atx connector on your motherboard, anda picture of the power supply.
It's a Dell D 8400 It came with the 6 pin PCI-E Power clip standard.......I unplugged all but one HD and plugged the card in. Booted the bad boy up. The fan spun up to a constant speed, BUT NO VIDEO! BLACK BLACK BLACK
I peeked inside and the "t_fault" light was still on.......
Called the ATI Tech Support and said that the power supply must be a MINIMUM of 450 Watts.
SO, I picked up an ULTRA XFinity FlexForce SLI READY 500 Watt Power Supply. This one's go the nifty cable system where you plug in only what you need ...Going to toss that into the rig and see if that solves the power problem.....
(This one was 60 bucks with a 50 dollar rebate (Fry's))
Thanks again Everyone for your help, I really appreciate the advice/help. I'll update you when I get this plugged in.
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