Motherboard or GFX card problem?

[tburger]

Hello,

I was gaming the other night, when in the middle of it my computer started showing a bunch of colorful (R/G/B) artifacts, then froze. After a restart I get a message "windows was not able to start" and the screen has a bunch of horizontal white lines going across it. Obvious guess would be the gfx card is dying, but I'm experiencing some other odd behavior with the Mobo depending on which PCI 3.0 port/slot I put the card into.

Both my mobo and card are about 3 years old.

Here is what I'm experiencing from trying to narrow down the issue. Note, I unfortunately do not have a second pc or card to test with. I know that would be the simplest solution.

1. Plugging the monitor directly into my motherboard (integrated cpu gfx) without the gfx card plugged in at all works fine. PC starts, no issues.

2. Plugging the monitor directly into the motherboard (integrated gfx), with the graphics card in pci slot 1 "works", meaning the pc turns on but it does not recognize the card is even there. I'm not sure if thats normal since the monitor isn't plugged into the card.

3. Plugging the monitor directly into the motherboard, with the graphics card in pci slot 2, I get "no signal"/black monitor, and nothing indicating windows is able to start.

4. Plugging the monitor into the gfx card while in slot 1. I get "no signal"/black screen, however, I hear the window startup music as if windows started fine, but just isn't able to display anything. I'm also able to press the power button on my case, and hear the normal shutdown music, the same as if i went to the start menu and shut down.

5. Plugging the monitor into the gfx card while in slot 2. I think I get past the BIOS, I see the "windows is starting" progress bar, but then the screen goes black, and I see the "unable to start windows" message along with a bunch of white horizontal lines going across the screen.

Does any of this lead you guys toward it being the PCI slots dying or the card itself? If all else fails I'm just going to get a cheap motherboard and see if that works, if it doesn't then I'll just return it.

Mobo - ASUS P8Z68-V LE LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard with UEFI BIOS
Card - EVGA 01G-P3-1373-AR GeForce GTX 460

Thanks

 

[real ace]

I think the graphics card is at fault here,the mobo works fine with integrated graphics so it may be all right.It would be wise to get it checked by a pc builder before making any purchase.This one is a long shot but try reinstalling the graphics drivers and the windows also if possible to see if it works or not.

 

[tburger]

Well after more research, and finding some images of the exact same thing I'm seeing, I'm leaning towards a dying card as well. Was hoping it would last me a couple more years, and naturally it dies right after the warranty runs out.

 

[real ace]

Well that's really hard luck ,it would be better to confirm it though .

 

[carlo_bigtunes]

horisontal line at display, there's a first vram error...the only to do is reballing vram.