PSU too weak for 250GTS???

[Shadowking]

Finished a rebuild of my comp with Win 7 64bit. Custom (clean) install without any old drivers. I was using a BFG 9800GT 1gb on Vista Ultimate 32bit without problems. EPoX mother board with AMD 939 4200 cpu, 1gb ram. Played COD MW, Fear, Half Life 2, Combat Arms, Guild Wars, Assassins Creed, and lower level games without issues all at high rez.

New build has Quad processor, 4 GB ram, Gigabyte EP45-UD3R mobo, Antec 650W PSU. I have four hard drives (C;\, game drive, backup drive, and photo/music drive). Creative X-Fi Fata1ity sound card.

Since new build, I can't play a game, even lowly Lego Batman without artifacts, black screens, game freezes, etc. Did clean load of 64 bit drivers with appropriate reboots. Problem remains. Tried archived drivers from Nvidia, no change. Played Combat Arms without drivers loaded for a bit and eventually same symptoms. Updated to Beta driver (195.81) but haven't tried anything yet. GPU-Z shows proper install with temp 45C, 2%GPU load and 35% fan speed at idle. No problems playing media (music or high def video). COD MW2 pixelates, freezes and crashes with "...unrecoverable DirectX error.." DxDiag run with no issues noted.

Any suggestions? More powerful PSU? Motherboard issue at PCI-e? Windows 7 issues?

Sad gamer waiting for answers...

 

[megamanx00]

To rule out the motherboard try using your 9800GT in that system. If the 9800GT plays games fine, then the problem is likely your GTS 250. If not, then it hints at another problem. While the Antec 650W PSU should be more than enough, it is possible that it is defective and not supplying proper power to your card. If it seems like your video card you may want to also try and rule out the PSU as a culprit. Using whatever monitoring utility you prefer, you should check to see if there are any wide fluctuations in voltage. If you have a spare PSU that you can try, or one that you can borrow to try, to see if your video card will work properly that should help you rule out one or the other.

 

[JackNaylorPE]

250 is 69 watts .... 9800 GT is 94 watts, so CPU not it.

Did you plug in the 6 pin PCI-E power cord to the card ?

 

[Shadowking]

To rule out the motherboard try using your 9800GT in that system. If the 9800GT plays games fine, then the problem is likely your GTS 250. If not, then it hints at another problem. While the Antec 650W PSU should be more than enough, it is possible that it is defective and not supplying proper power to your card. If it seems like your video card you may want to also try and rule out the PSU as a culprit. Using whatever monitoring utility you prefer, you should check to see if there are any wide fluctuations in voltage. If you have a spare PSU that you can try, or one that you can borrow to try, to see if your video card will work properly that should help you rule out one or the other.

The 9800 ran fine with the same PSU, upgrade was only motherboard, processor and ram. I bought the new vid card because I thought the 9800 had *** the bed.

 

[Shadowking]

first off, If you use 9800GT your PSU will run a GTS 250 without a doubt. Second, why bother upgrading to a GTS 250? Its better than the 9800GT but not much and its old. Go for a HD 4870/4890. Your PSU should run those too.

Upgraded to 250GTS because I thought the 9800 had kicked. Haven't used ATI cards in awhile....next time.

 

[Shadowking]

250 is 69 watts .... 9800 GT is 94 watts, so CPU not it.

Did you plug in the 6 pin PCI-E power cord to the card ?

Yes 6 pin plug is in. If I don't connect 6-pin, I wouldn't get any display at all. Is it possible the pci-e connection needs to be cleaned? Maybe reseat the video card?

Is this simply a problem with using 64bit Win 7 until the Nvidia drivers are updated to address gaming issues?

 

[geofelt]

GTS250 requires 450w psu with 24a on the 12v rails. Your PSU is fine.

Try your old 9800GT if you can.

Have you plugged in the 8-pin auxiliary power connector to the motherboard? It is required to give added power to the pci-e slot. 3D gaming will increase the vga card power draw. Just a 4 pin may not be enough for a quad.

Run some tests to rule out other possibilities.

Memtest86+ should show NO errors on a full pass.

Run Prime95 with rounding error checking long enough to reach full hot temperature. Rou should see NO errors.

 

[Shadowking]

There is nothing wrong with Windows 7 and Nvidia drivers. The problem is on your end, the video card is faulty or its another issue. I would format the HD and resintall windows.

Hoping not to get to that point..again! Lol. Keep it in mind after I try a few more things though.

 

[Shadowking]

GTS250 requires 450w psu with 24a on the 12v rails. Your PSU is fine.

Try your old 9800GT if you can.

Have you plugged in the 8-pin auxiliary power connector to the motherboard? It is required to give added power to the pci-e slot. 3D gaming will increase the vga card power draw. Just a 4 pin may not be enough for a quad.

Run some tests to rule out other possibilities.

Memtest86+ should show NO errors on a full pass.

Run Prime95 with rounding error checking long enough to reach full hot temperature. Rou should see NO errors.

I'll check all my connections and settings again. I have Memtest and Prime so I'll give them a run also. Beta drivers didn't make a difference. I have another comp build with an 8600 in it. I'll swap the videocards to see if the 250GTS runs at all and the 8600 should'nt have any power, driver issues in the new build. Hope it's not the mobo.

Thanks to you guys for the tips.

 

[Shadowking]

Swapped 250GTS into other comp with Beta drivers and it ran all games fine.

Other comp settings:

AMD Athlon 64 X2 6400+ CPU (AM2) stock settings and fan

ASUS M2A-VM AM2 socket motherboard

4GB Corsair DDR2 RAM (400Mhz)

Onboard Realtek audio

Cooler Master 600W PSU

250GB Western Digital SATA II HDD

Samsung WriteMaster DVD R/W

Small Form CoolerMaster case with two 120mm case fans

 

[jyjjy]

Try the 8600 in the new build and see if you get the same issues. If so install a new version of windows(you don't need to replace the old one, just install it on one of the other drives.) If it still gives problems I guess it's gotta be a problem with the motherboard.

 

[geofelt]

One last thing to try is to remove the add-in sound card. In the past, some sound cards have generated driver conflicts.

 

[Shadowking]

Try the 8600 in the new build and see if you get the same issues. If so install a new version of windows(you don't need to replace the old one, just install it on one of the other drives.) If it still gives problems I guess it's gotta be a problem with the motherboard.

Thanks for tip. Getting around to running the 8600. Someone else with a similar problem fixed all of his issues with a stronger PSU. I have an Antec 850 I haven't used yet so I'll try that before I do a new install.

 

[Shadowking]

One last thing to try is to remove the add-in sound card. In the past, some sound cards have generated driver conflicts.

Thanks, I'll give it a try.

 

[Shadowking]

8600 ran online game (Combat Arms) for about five minutes with no issues. Then, black screen (ctl-alt-del to task screen then alt-tab to game returns display), wavyness, pixelation, etc. I know there is no issue with the cards. The PSU is more than enough for an 8600. No issues when I had Vista 32 running games. PCI-e slot works. No indication from Windows Error Reporting of driver display error. May go nuclear and re-install all from beginning.

 

[Shadowking]

Usually black screens and pixelations are signs of high temperatures or damage due to agressive overclocks, in essence its a sign that the card is dying. I think it might be easier to replace the card to avoid any further headache.

Thanks, I understand whta you're saying, but as I noted in prior posts, I have used my 9800GT, 250GTS, and 8600GT in the same comp with the same issues (driver related errors appears sometimes). Case has two side 80mm fans, 1 80mm intake front and one 120mm exhaust in back. Zalman cpu fan and the room environment is not an issue temp wise. Speedfan shows no crazy temp spikes. BTW, the cards work fine in another comp so they are not the issue.