i need some help

[miked1156]

hey guys. i just bought XFX GeForce 8800 GT Alpha Dog and i just installed it. i have a dell dimension 8400pentium 4 with 3.20ghz with a acer lcd model AL1914. but alot of times out of nowhere my screen will just turn black, blue, pink, purple, whatever. do i need a new lcd? how do i fix it? if anyone can help me out that be great. thanks

 

[badge]

how do i fix it? if anyone can help me out that be great. thanks

What VC did you use in the system before? The 8800GT may require more power than your power supply can offer. How much 12v power does your PSU provide? Could be any number of things including bad VC, driver, Graphics RAM overheating. Does the fan spin up on the video card? If you put the old card back in does the system do the same thing?

 

[miked1156]

lol how do i find all that stuff out?

 

[miked1156]

well i know nothings wrong with the card. and the old one never did this so

 

[badge]

Well, find the product page for your power supply. The specifications will be listed there. or, look at the side of the unit inside your case and see if the 12v power output is listed there. I'm not familiar with your DELL system. Can you put up a link to the product page? I don't knw specifically how much powewr an XFX 8800GT AD requires, but I'm sure the 12v volt rail(s) would need something in the area of 25-28 amps there. A good 450-550 wat PSU would provide enough amperage to power the card. Is the fan spinning? The card could be overheating.

 

[badge]

How did you plug in the 6 pin 12v power connector, was there a 6 pin supplied form the PSU? Or did you use the 4 pin to 6pin adapter supplied with the 8800GT? If you used the adapter, try running it off a different PSU 12v lead. Never know, might shift the load or something miraculous.

 

[badge]

What driver are you using? Did you load up the CD that came with the card. Also what Operating system are you using, Vista or XP?

 

[miked1156]

yea i just opened it and the fans deffinatly spinning, im trying to find out the power output. and im using xp

 

[badge]

I had an underpowered SLI setup that acted like what you are describing. I thought one of my video cards was going out. So I instaalled each one as a single. They worked fine. Then I noticed when I put the PSU under the stress of two video cards, the power supply would get relly hot and the system would do it's thing acting up like that. So, I put in a unit with more 12v power and my SLI system ran perfect. Anyway, if your PSU is not providing enough 12v power to the video card, that alone can cause your system to act up like you describe. You did install the driver from the CD that came with the card?

 

[miked1156]

its a 6 pin from the psu.

 

[badge]

Also, is your system old? Maybe the PSU has seen it's better days. When you put the new 8800GT in there, the PSU unit just fell on it's face.

 

[miked1156]

yea i think your right, but whats a sli system. im sorry im a bit new at this

 

[roadrunner197069]

How many threads you gonna make?????????????????

 

[vertigo_2000]

Just one 6 pin?

 

[badge]

Here is the latest driver for the 8800GT using Windows XP. You can download and instal it and see if the problem persists. I would suspect the PSU is the cause, but I don't know that for sure. Yeah, find out how much 12v amperage your power supply is producing. I believe your card is 65nm which requires a little less power than other 8800's, but even then 22 amps would be minimum. And you are not even stressing the system for more pwer. So yeah, research your PSU specs.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_178.13_whql.html

 

[badge]

How many threads you gonna make?????????????????

@RR. Funny, next time I will require a Curriculium Vitae before answering these threads. :lol:

 

[miked1156]

Just one 6 pin?

yea just one 6 pin

 

[miked1156]

hey bage should i run it or save the download

 

[badge]

OP, SLI is multiple nvidia video cards configured to render system video as a unit. A lot of 12v power is required to run multiple video cards. As far as your system is concerned, you have only the one 8800GT, but it may have overwhelmed the capability of your power supply to provide adequate power to it. Anyway, there are other psooibilities as to what is creating your problem. You might want to stick the old card back in until you can get a new PSU to test with.

 

[badge]

hey bage should i run it or save the download

I usually save the dwnload, then run it from the hard drive. Hey, hope it solves the problem. Did you install the driver from the CD?

 

[miked1156]

yea i installed it from the cd.

 

[miked1156]

also whats a really good psu to buy

 

[badge]

Well, that driver oin the CD is tested and should work fine, so that's not the proble. I would look in to that power supply you system has. You want a 450-550 watt unit with a minimum of say 26A or so. If you have a unit in there with any less than that, this is you likely proble. You siad you know he card is good, so there you go. The PSU powers the good card.

 

[miked1156]

and i was actually thinking of getting another 8800 so im probably going to need alot of power

 

[badge]

also whats a really good psu to buy

Take a look on Newegg. Maybe 550w will work well with your system. Antec, PC Power and Cooling even Thermaltake and OCZ make decent PSU's. Antec has some good prices if you search around. If you walk into a local store they'll hit you up for upwards of ninety to hundreds bucks for a good 550 watt Antec. I have many I bought in the $49-$59 range. I trust them too.