Graphics card Crash Help

[cpatel1987]

Good evening Tom's,

So I have the following: i5 2400, PNY Optima 8 GB DDR3-1033 CL9 RAM (2x4 GB), Palit NE5TX460FHD79 GeForce GTX 460 768MB, ECS P67H2-A3 motherboard, and a Thermaltake TR2 W0388RU 600W PSU, and a Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE PCI Card.

The graphics card just basically goes out at times when I'm playing a game, although I've seen it also go out once when I was playing music and browsing the web at the same time while a TV was also plugged in in dual monitor mode. The reason why I know its the graphics card going out is because:

1) The motherboard beep codes that happen (1 long, 6 short) afterwards point to a "vga adapter not found". Interestingly enough, the computer reboots (or at least I think it does since the fan speeds increase as if its rebooting) and during reboot it produces those beeps and has no video. However, when turning the computer back off and on, it boots normally and the beeps disappear. I suspect maybe there's some sort of protection built into the power supply cutting off power to the graphics card? Not sure.

2) The BSOD codes that show up in the improper shutdown message from windows once I boot into it indicates a graphics card issue.

Now I don't know if this is related or coincidence, but its also been happening after I installed a cpu cooler with a screw on bracket instead of the push pins.

Consistently, it happens during roughly 15 minutes of playing Sonic Generations. I wonder if its a bad card, bad drivers, who knows. I was also reading up articles on +12V rails, and I do know this PSU has a +12V1 32 amp rail and then a +12V2 24 amp rail. What I don't know is, could it be possibly be a rail issue if say the rails are getting overloaded? This actually didn't happen with Gears of War or Starcraft II, although I haven't tested those games since October.

If anyone has insight let me know. I'm thinking of RMA'ing the card, but I also want to make sure it isn't a different issue before I do that (aka, I wonder if its the rail requirement). Theres only a handful of Newegg reviews, some people complaining of same issue.

EDIT: If anyone's wondering if it has to do with the fan speed of the GPU, I tried it once with a 100% fan speed and still crashed on Sonic Generations.

 

[Outlander_04]

Neither of those rail amperages could be overloaded by your computer .
But they are probably also incorrect since V x A =W and you have a total of 54 amps at 12 volts which is 648 watts and doesn't include the 5 volt and 3 .3 volt rails
Anyway its cheap junk that does not have digital control of output voltage

If you can send it back you should . Only ever buy a power supply with Active PCF .
If it has a small red switch to change the voltage then you do not want it .

But hey if the fault says your graphics card is the problem ....why dont you try another one?

 

[cpatel1987]

I would try another, but I don't have anything with that equivalent power to test just yet. I noticed one thing which leads me to believe the PSU is fine and its the graphics card. The fans stop working after a while, which is whats the causing it to overheat to 100c according to one reading I saw, and the BSOD's eventually happen. I figured it might an issue with the game or something, but I actually tried exiting the game at 100c, and when I exited the temps were still floating at 100c and the thing BSOD'ed at idle (I guess it was too long in the 95-100c range).

Time to RMA this POS. Probably shouldn't have trusted Palit GTX 460 card. Since I have a choice, I may go with an ATI Radeon 6850 instead. Thinking of one of the two:

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0377034 XFX Radeon 6850 1 GB DDR5 RAM for $169.99

OR

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0354216 Gigabyte Radeon 6850 1 GB GDDR5 RAM for $169.99

Rebates are not something to factor in this choice. So on the one hand, the Gigabyte card has a higher core clock, GDDR5 memory, and requires less watts to operate. On the other hand, the XFX card has a lifetime warranty over the 6850's 3 year (but will I have this card longer than 3 years anyway?)

Let me know which one you all think I should go with. Also question regarding the +12V rail requirements, I noticed there aren't any for these cards, nor even on cards newer than the gtx 460 in general. Is it irrelevant now?