4850x2 Issues

[zacharus]

Ok, first I know I need to do a bit more troubleshooting here but hoping someone may be able to direct me where I need to focus on.

First my setup:

MB: Gigabyte x48-DQ6
CPU: Intel e8500
OS: Windows Vista 64bit
Ram: 8GB ddr2
PSU: Toughpower 700

I recently upgraded my 8800gts to the sapphire 4850x2 card. The old card was starting to just stop displaying anything to the monitor, though sound and such was still working, whenever I was gaming.

When I installed the new card I removed the nvidia software and booted up in safe mode and ran drive sweeper to complete the removal of all files. I then booted up with the 4850x2 card in and installed the drivers that I downloaded from Sapphire (the 8.12 version) and was up and running.

I played several games for a while and didn't seem to have any problems. However when I am in World of Warcraft for about an hour or so, it suddenly will just lose complete power and my ssytem is rebooting. I even rolled back to the 8.11 drivers but seems to keep doing this. The card does not appear to be overheating.

What I'm starting to think is its the pcie 6 pin cord from my power supply is failing. On the 8800gts, it fails out and the card just stops responding but on the 4850x2 the failout causes a critical error and the whole system reboots.

Anyone have any ideas if my assumption is correct or if I need to look in some other direction?

 

[cliffro]

you actually had 8.12's working with more than 4gb? That alone is surprising.

And for kicks and giggles, try uninstalling the 8.11's, run driver sweeper, and then install 8.10s, then upgrade to 8.11(I had major issues with 8.12s and 8gb of ram on my friends build)

Any way 8.12 really does have issues with more than 4gb of ram. When i uninstalled ran driver sweeper and then installed 8.11 it still had issues. Till I did it as mentioned above.

I cannot guarantee this is YOUR issue, but given the issues people have been having with the 8.12s and 4+Gb of ram, It may just fix it.


If that fails, you could buy a molex to PCI-E adapter and try that. My first option doesnt cost a dime though, so try it first.

 

[sabot00]

I read in the System builder marathon: Mid-Range PC http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-overclock,2112-6.html
They had inexplicable crashes and the newest driver's won't work. They used the driver's from the cd (8.10) and underclocked the 4850x5 by 50 MHz to solve the crashes.

 

[zacharus]

I think your right about the 8gb ram. I will try and stabalize things with 8.11 if that doesnt work, I'll even try 8.12 with 4gb ram in the system and we'll see if it works.

 

[50bmg]

the above suggestions sound reasonable, i would do those first.

What psu do you have? how many watts and combined amps on the 12v rails? This could be a power issue.

 

[sabot00]

I don't think it's a PSU issue, the toughpower is a good one and 700 watts is a lot. The only power-hogger in your system is the 4850x2. I would try underclocking it by 100MHz then if it works you know it's a problem with your 4850x2.