Could this be a bad PSU?

Jamrock

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Nov 16, 2009
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Hi,

I have been getting some strange reading in MSI Afterburner for my 5970. At first, I thought it was a GPU problem but now I am getting the same issue with my 9800GT. The GPU Usage ratings will be extremely erratic and jump from 1-99 during gameplay causing the game to run really slow and get about half the FPS as usual.

Here is a screenshot:



Uploaded with ImageShack.us

Could this be a possible PSU problem? The card is not getting enough power? It doesn't seem to be the video card. I would hate to have to rewire the whole damn computer with a new PSU. It's a Corsair 850TX. Does anyone know if there is a warranty on Corsair PSU's?
 

Jamrock

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I just ran FurMark and it made my system completely unstable afterwards. As I write this the system will keep freezing for 5-10 seconds at a time. Generally the performance has halfed in every way since I built the computer about 2 years ago.

System Specs:

Asus P6T Deluxe V2
i7-920 @ 3.4ghz
Radeon 5970 (9800GT)
6GB OCZ RAM
850W Corsair PSU

I think something must be going bad but I can't figure out what it could be. It's not the graphics card apparently.

What do you mean I am hitting a bottleneck? I used a PSU tester and the PSU seems to be fine. Could it be the motherboard?
 

Jamrock

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Capacitors look pretty good.

I have updated all of that. Thing is, it used to run just fine.

For example, when the desktop loads all the icons go white now for like 30 seconds and it takes twice as long to load. I'll get random freezes every 5-10 seconds. My mom's 10 year old computer is running faster for web browsing and such now.

Motherboard issue? Should I try the Hot CPU Tester at : http://www.7byte.com/ to test the CPU and Motherboard?

P.S. - resized image HexiT
 

totalknowledge

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Have you run a speed/health report on your hard drive(s)?

I had a hard drive fail with very slow write speeds even though the reads were fine, and it exhibited odd behavior not unlike what you are describing.

Could also be the motherboard. I would rule out the hard drive first. If it can't write to the HD well, then it can't perform memory swaps.

A bottleneck is when a part of the system is keeping the other parts of the system from operating correctly, usually after a certain load is reached, like would happen when you are running a benchmark.
 

Jamrock

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Well, I ran the CPU Tester from the link and it failed to initialize the test for the HD.

You think that could also cause problems with the GPU speeds being so erratic like that? (screenshot)