Computer freezes up constantly

[dodonga]

Hey everyone,

So im currently planning on getting a new computer probably gonna buy it mid September, meanwhile im stuck with my ancient pc, built it back in 2003,

-Athlon 64 3200+
-WD raptor 74gb
-1gig of kingston 400 mhz ddr ram
-SB audigy
-Abit AV8 mobo

Here's the deal, i originally had a AIW 9800 pro 128mb worked well for a couple of years, until recently my computer stopped booting up, all of a sudden it gave me a red screen when booting saying something about a power problem with my video. I opened up the computer and it turn out the Video card's power connection to the mobo had melted in and was all burnt up. I asked a friend to lend me his old video card, he told me he wasn't sure how well it was working. A radeon 9600 128 mb, i dropped it in, and the computer booted no problem it's what I'm currently running with, however my computer freezes up all the time since i use this card, sometimes the screen blinks on and off a couple of times then the computer freezes up so i have to restart, other times all the colors get messed and the screen turns completely green with some purple stuff and everything freezes, i also have to restart to continue, some other times the mouse stops moving normally and i can only move it horizontally for a couple of seconds then everything freezes up as usual.

This usually occurs while I'm surfing the net, once in a while i open up a website and it happens, if i open up the exact same website again the same thing occurs.

I'm wondering if this also a problem of this video card being damaged, or is it the motherboard that is actually damaging my video cards meaning i have to change the motherboard before buying a new video card.

Help!

Thanks

 

[hunter315]

Is there physical damage to the mother board or video card slot? You may be having an issue with your power supply, something in it may have given out. Also check for any blown or bulging capacitors on your motherboard, if the little cans dont have flat tops they are damaged.

 

[dodonga]

No caps are blown or bulging on the motherboard, everything looks fine there, as well as the AGP slot, the only physical evidence is the burnt up cable from the power supply that was plugged into the video card, however the card im currently using does not require to be plugged into the power supply.

 

[wathman]

Try completely uninstalling the ATI drivers, and reinstalling the recommended ones for a regular RADEON. you may be running into some issues since the 9600 is close enough to the 9800 to recognize it, and since it still thinks it is a 9800 and not a 9600, it may not be communicating with it properly.

 

[dodonga]

I did that as soon as i plugged in the card, eliminated all traces of the old 9800 and installed the latest 9600 drivers.

 

[wathman]

ok, since you've described problems that go beyond just video artifacts, I'm thinking there may be an underlying problem with your PSU. Do you have access to another one you can hook up and see if you still get the odd behavior?

 

[dodonga]

The PSU is a Purepower 480w thermaltake ill try find another one, how many watts do you think i need for my system as minimum (itll make it easier to find a cheaper one)

 

[wathman]

a rough estimate would be 450, a 300 might work but I'm not sure what your components will draw in total. I think Antec has a good calculator for PSU estimation on their website.

 

[dodonga]

Alright i got my hands on a 500w thermaltake PSU, ill try it out as soon as i get it should be in a couple of hours, however i was thinking the problem is more graphics oriented due to the fact that certain websites cause the behavior, if i go 10 times to a website that makes the comp crash it will crash all 10 times.

 

[dodonga]

I tried out the other power supply and it crashed as soon as i opened one of the deadly sites.

 

[wathman]

Does it ever blue screen, or does it just crash like you described in your original post? You could try checking out your event logs in administrator tools to see if there's any clues to what's causing the crashes, but as you said in your original post, it's either a bad board, or a bad card. If you have access to another system with an AGP slot you can test the card, or if you have yet another AGP card, test out the motherboard.

Either way, you're right not to sink any more money into this system. If you come up with any clues or ideas, keep posting them. It'll at least give you something to do until the time for your new build comes around.

 

[dodonga]

Never gives me blue screens its just the crashes i mentioned above, i do want to keep the computer around maybe give it a 200$ upgrade for the rest of the family to have another computer around, theyll just use it for email facebook and printing stuff so i wouldnt wanna let it go to waste. From the looks of it im gonna have to replace the mobo and get a cheap pcie card and some ddr2 ram for it i doubt ill have any problems with it then.

 

[wathman]

that's true, it wouldn't be too expensive to recycle the functioning components into a basic needs computer. I'd actually just advise skipping a graphics card all together and just buying a motherboard with an integrated graphics chipset. It's not going to be used for gaming, so an integrated chipset will save you quite a bit. I would recommend staying away from motherboards with nForce chipsets, stick to the ones built by AMD. The few times I've worked with nForce boards, I always ended up wasting time with unexpected configuration problems.

 

[dodonga]

Oh thanks wathman thats a great idea ill just get an integrated board for it, that should solve the problem.