Does my graphics card need replacing?

[cosmiconion]

Hey Guys,

I've got a Sapphire HD 5670 512mb card. When I play Borderlands or Battlefield: Bad Company 2 I get horizontal lines strobing up the screen whenever I approach a building / wall / physical object.

It looks like things are being rendered poorly whenever I strafe or look with my mouse...that's the only way I can describe it.

It's not like chunks of scenary are moving around or that the buildings are breaking up, it's just not crisp when I move around. (Trying to give as clear indication to my problem as possible!).

It does this regardless of the settings that I use the games on. I usually only play on 1024 x 768 with the settings on high (not max), which on this card should be more than possible.

I noticed it on Borderlands last night on my old LCD screen and thought I would try it on my 42" TV to see if it was issues with the monitor. Unfortunately it wouldn't show up on the TV (but the program had loaded) so I tried Battlefield: BC2 and the "strobing effect" was seen on that game aswell.

The card is brand new, inserted correctly with the latest drivers. I've never seen it hotter than 45oC and it doesn't seem to artifact or have an issues on older games.

My PC is brand new, with 4GB DDR3 RAM, Athlon ii x3 435 O.C to 3.2 and with an ASUS m4a785td-v evo mobo.

My Hard drive is only 20% full, defragged and virus free.

Does this sounds like a classic symptom of a faulty card or is there anything I can do to salvage it? I know it's not the best gaming card but as stated above, it should be able to cope with what im throwing at it.

Thanks all

 

[cosmiconion]

I turned on V-Sync in Battlefield: BC2 and that appeared to solve the problem. I shall try it on Borderlands and see if it works.


Why would I require V-Sync to be turned on?

 

[borisof007]

What you're experiencing is something called "Tearing". It's when your computer is pushing out framerates faster than your monitor can handle it. Turning on "V-Sync" (Vertical Synchronization) forces the framerate coming from the computer to match that of the monitor, which for most modern monitors is 60 FPS. This eliminates the tearing that you see in game, as both framerates are "Synchronized".

 

[borisof007]

To put it in an easier visual to understand, picture two treadmills side by side with a white line painted horizontally across each treadmill. Then, turn each treadmill on at different speeds, say one at 100% and one at 70%. The white lines would represent the refreshing of the monitor on the 70% and the game on the 100% treadmills respectively.

At a birds eye view, you would see both aren't lining up right as the treadmill spins around, and if you were able to overlap the treadmills on top of each other (while being able to see both lines), you would be able to re-create that "tearing" effect that you see on your monitor.