AMD Radeon HD 6850 problem

[bartrand96]

Just recently I figured it would be a good idea to update my drivers for my graphics card's drivers. During the installation, the resolution went smaller than the normal size. I figured it would fix itself with a reboot so I restarted the computer. When I restarted the computer, it said the resolution was 1920 x 1080 when it was actually 1700 x 1000 or something. I went to look up something on the Internet and I got these blue vertical lines all across the screen and the computer froze, so I restarted it. When i restarted it, the resolution then went to 640 x 480. I did a few other things and I thought my only option was a system restore. I restored my computer to a date before I touched the drivers and everything was fine for a night. Then I started the computer the next day and went on the Internet for maybe 15 minutes. Then, out of nowhere, I got those vertical lines across the whole screen, but they were green this time. When I restarted the computer, the graphics were messed up. Most of the screen was normal in startup, but certain sections were discolored and very pixelated. For example, half of the HP logo was messed up and half of the Microsoft logo was messed up. It looked like the graphics were messed up right up and down the screen. When I say that, I mean right down the middle of the screen, the left side was fine, but pieces on the right side was messed up. I can't get into windows normally, because it crashes and restarts itself. When I go in safe mode, all the color is messed up, and the resolution is like 640 x 480. Sorry for blabbering so much, but I really could use some help. Thank you in advance.

 

[mark4685]

Is the computer able to stay on long enough to reinstall the driver? Are you 100% certain you downloaded the correct driver for your card?

 

[mark4685]

Make sure that you uninstall the old driver then run a driver sweeper program like this http://phyxion.net/item/driver-sweeper.html then install the new driver and see if that works.

 

[bartrand96]

Well, I was on the phone with an HP Technician and went we through all these troubleshooting steps. He said he thinks it might be the software or something, but he had me disable the amd drivers, and that let me load windows normally. Windows loads now, but it is just as bad as safe mode. At the moment, they are shipping me a new amd card because they think it might be the card. If that doesn't work, I have to buy a recovery disk from them because my computer's resolution is so low at the moment, I can't even access the recovery panel in my computer to restore it to factory defaults. I'll upload pictures as soon as I can.

 

[mark4685]

Does the mobo have onboard video that you can at least use atm?

 

[bartrand96]

Here are some pictures I took:

http://imgur.com/a/Fymc5

 

[bartrand96]

Does the mobo have onboard video that you can at least use atm?

Well, I can see picture, but it's very pixelated and the resolution is 640 x 480.

 

[mark4685]

If all you did is update a driver, I highly doubt your hardware went bad because of it. It sounds like it was just a bad install. Might be best just to format/reinstall windows if the driver is giving you that many problems. I'm surprised they're having you send your card in tbh.

 

[bartrand96]

Well, updating the driver was the thing that first gave me the problem. But since I did a system restore to a time before I updated the driver, wouldn't that fix the problem?

 

[mark4685]

I guess it could be hardware related just seems unlikely since you were updating the driver when it happened. Sometimes doing a system restore doesn't always fix registry errors. I bet doing a full reinstall will fix the problem, but since you don't have the disk, then I guess you'll have to wait for them to send you one.

 

[bartrand96]

Oh okay. I just wish I was able to do a full install myself without paying 15 dollars. Thank you for your help.

 

[Sakkura]

The weird colors in safe mode is not (necessarily) a problem. In safe mode, the number of colors is reduced, so stuff can end up looking very weird. The low resolution is also normal. It's just turning off all the non-essential graphics stuff.

 

[bartrand96]

The weird colors in safe mode is not (necessarily) a problem. In safe mode, the number of colors is reduced, so stuff can end up looking very weird. The low resolution is also normal. It's just turning off all the non-essential graphics stuff.

Sorry if I wasn't clear. The weird colors are in safe mode, when the computer is booting (hp logo, microsoft logo) and when the computer boots normally. The resolution is about 640 x 480 in normal mode as well when it should be 1920 x 1080. The resolution is so low, I can't even see the whole recovery manager installed on my computer to reset it to factory defaults.

 

[bartrand96]

I just wanted to say this as I forgot to before. The graphics are messed up in everything (safe mode, regular mode, loading screens) but when I go to BIOS, the graphics are perfectly fine. Anyone know what that means?

 

[Sakkura]

It's just another thing suggesting this is a software error; the BIOS is stored in a EEPROM that isn't normally written to, so it stays exactly the same even if Windows is mangled.