Screen disctortion and hard lock-up: Bye bye GPU?

Hi all,

So: The one thing we all dread and secretly hope never happens to us, seems to have befallen me.. *drumroll*

I think my GPU is starting to give up the ghost... There I said it. I still need some help nailing down the exact problem, so I will briefly walk through the sequence of events and the symptoms. If you need additional info, please ask. System specs are in my signature. There is a quick summary at the end of the post if you want to skip the long version.

The problem started after a two-hour session of Star Wars: Empire at War. It's a few years old by now so the GPU was never under serious strain. I experienced a sudden and total system freeze, accompanied by some jagged distortion on the screen.

After a reboot, Windows came up in the default 800x600 resolution, and could not detect the GPU. I rebooted again, and everything seemed fine. Tried the game again, and after about two minutes, the freeze happened again, once again with a distorted image.

I suspected some kind of driver issue, so I uninstalled the driver, rebooted into safe mode, cleaned it out with Driver Sweeper, and installed the latest Nvidia drivers. After a reboot the system came up fine, but any form of load on the GPU seems to trigger the crash again.

Last night I pulled the GPU, cleaned it, inspected the mobo and card for visual signs of damage, and found none. During this time, I ran the system from the on-board display, did a virus scan to load up the CPU a bit, and it seemed perfectly stable. I replaced the card, fired up StarCraft 2, and after about two minutes in the main menu, it froze again. Same visual distortion as before.

So, quick recap:
1) Putting the GPU under load causes a hard lock-up with screen distortion. 2D desktop mode appears stable.
2) System is stable with onboard GPU, and putting the CPU under load does not trigger the crash.
3) No evidence of sudden overheating or voltage drops, although its difficult to confirm since the system locks up.

Other suspects could of course be PSU going faulty or the mobo itself. Next thing I want to try is borrow a working GPU from somewhere and see if this fixes the problem, or maybe try my GPU in another system.

In the meantime, any opinions or advice would be welcome. Thanks in advance.

Update: Problem is getting worse, the system now sporadically locks up just after booting into Windows, or during normal use. I've removed the GPU and the system runs stable using onboard graphics, but this hasn't helped me narrow down the source of the problem. Could still be GPU, power supply, or PCI-e interface. I need some advice urgently.

BTW I love your avatar quote- good choice of proverbs

One to live by, that's for sure.

it is 2:25 am where I am at (northeast USA)
so I am going to sleep
I will check in the morning
I hope it works

9h32am here. Thanks, have a nice nap. Will check back later.

How are doing Herr Koos?

Not looking good I'm afraid; Still seeing distortion and crashes. The distortion sometimes even occurs during boot-up.

also possible PSU problem but not as likely

did you monitor voltages
especially on 12V+ rail?

I kept an eye using HWMonitor; I'm not sure how accurate it is though. 12V normally varies between 11.4 and 11.6. BIOS says 11.9. I didn't notice any major fluctuations.

If I were you I would ask a friend for a favour and borrow his/her GPU.

I have such a problem (Not nearly as bad) and I planning on doing that. Problem is who will lend me a GPU

Did you test the card in another PC?

OK, managed to source an 8600GT from a friend. Not an ideal comparison to the 9800GTX, but it runs perfectly and came through a 3DMark test just fine. This is sufficient evidence to me that at least the PCIe slot still works fine.

I think I'll be pulling the trigger on a new GPU then. This brings me to the question of running new GPU's in older motherboards, but I'll make a new post for that.

No problem
Well alot of sales this time of year (in USA not sure of SA)
so a good time to upgrade usually
if you want a performance boost
then you would have to look at least at 560 or HD 6870
and really more like a 560Ti or HD 6950 according to Toms Hierarchy Chart
http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 067-7.html
the new 560Ti 384bit(?) might be a good choice
also depends on budget of course
the problem is that thought the 9800GTX+ was older it was an awesome
card at the time and still ranks in the higher levels of cards

if you can get 20 percent more with the HD 6850 then it is decent upgrade
just on the HD 7xxx rumor thread and really the improvement from one generation to another isnt that dramatic anymore
one bonus would be getting new feature set like DX11,UVD 3.0 etc

then a HD 6850 is a good choice
or maybe a 550Ti or 560 non Ti if you want to stay Nvidia

While I do lean towards ATI
I do also appreciate Nvidia
Maybe a GTX 460 1GB
a great card at a good price right now
though I am not sure of your area

I am only a Logitech Fanboy LOL

but at about the $150 price mark
the HD 6850 is a great choice

Great
HD 6850 it is
good choice
Well this thread is about closed
PM me when you get your card
I would be curious about benches and performance and such
and what brand you picked
Too bad Logitech doesnt make video cards

I own an MSI myself
I like the fact they advertise military grade components
plus the cooling is awesome

BTW the Logitech thing is my way of poking fun at fanboys

I do prefer certain brands just because of good experiences
but really whatever has good reviews at a good price

though I must say one day I will own a Logitech G15 keyboard
just a cool looking board
(just turned out all my mice and kbds are Logitech-all decent at a good price-not intentional though LOL)

HD6850 installed and purring like a kitten... Yeah! I haven't put it through its paces properly, but so far I haven't been able to push the card beyond 62C. The Cyclone cooler is amazing...

Once again thanks to everyone for the assistance.