8800 gt crashing big time, help!

[DEFEATEST]

Hey guys, well I finally got my x2 6400 and 8800gt running. What a fiasco with that BIOS!
Anyhoo, the next set of probs is this. I can get in most games, and then they dont last long. Freeze 10 seconds later a quick blue screen pops up and reboot! I can even get past Crysis's EA logo! I get like a green mesh across the screen, sometimes worse than others. Games that do crash, which is a few I have tried, ususally do the green dot/mesh thing across the screen. I did a clean install of the beta 169.09 drivers, and COD4 has lasted the longest on them, but nothing else. I can play BF2 for a bit,then it crashes. My temp seems to be fine on the vid card (31 degrees) Stalker gives me hard time as well. Any suggestions. AA turned on seems to make it crash more often,
specs are:
ocz stealthxsteam 600w psu
x2 6400 cpu with artic freezer
Asus m2a-vm mobo with 1509 bios
2 gig corsair, xms twin ddr2 800mhz
Nvidia 8800 gt
DVD burner
250gig sata HD
win xp sp 2

thanks in advance.

[hat]

It sounds like you simply got a borked 8800gt, rma it

[DEFEATEST]

Oh for the love of god dont tell me that! I just got it today and waited a week for the bloody thing, what is RMA ? Oh, return to manufacturer?

[hat]

I think it means Return Manufacturer Assistance or something. If you got it from Newegg, try calling thier customer service.

[DEFEATEST]

Ya, I got it from tiger direct here in Canada. I believe their policy is "call the manufacturer"
Dam , I dont know, think I'll screw with it for a few days, then go from there. Just to let you know, I was having a hell of a time after flashing the BIOS. So I'm not sure if thats part of it or not. I was getting lots of crashes after flashing, even with my x1950xt. But no green stuff.

[hat]

Which BIOS? The motherboard? Oh man, you need to try flashing that again..

[DEFEATEST]

Man that scares the crap outta me, It was screwed for 3 days, and then I just said screw it, I installed my new CPU and PSU and this card and everything kinda worked, kinda. so that's where I am. Maybe I should eh? Is it ok to use the asus updater in windows? Cause thats what caused all my grief the first time around.

[DEFEATEST]

Its an asus mobo, so should I follow that guide you just put the link up for?

[EastCoasthandle]

what is the make of the 8800gt?

[Woah Mama!]

Yeah, sounds like a bodgey card man. Call them up and ask them how long it'll take. Correct me if I am wrong but if it were your motherboard BIOS then you would be experiencing a whole other level of crashes/glitches/crapness?

[Mussels]

sounds like a bad card. i can confirm the OCZ PSU is good enough for the GT (i have a similar system with the same PSU) so its either drivers or a bad card.

Try running ATI tool, if it crashes/screws up doing the artifact scan, the card is bad.

Obviously, the CPU coudl be overheating as well. you should check its temps.


edit: and of course, if its a new system (or one thats always been finicky) the ram could be bad or set bad. Try running one stick at a time and see if it gets better. (bad system memory feeding bad data to the video card, can often appear as graphical issues right as it crashes)

[OrbitzXT]

Can you tell us the BSOD error? I was getting BSOD's constantly with my 8800GT in one specific game and realized it was actually my sound card's driver, nothing to do with the GT.

[Live OR Die]

You got a dying 8800GT take it back get a new one

[OnBoard]

Just to be sure, lock the PCI-e bus to 100. Some boards had troubles with auto setting + 8800GT. It does sound like there is one memory chip bad, turning on AA would mean more memory usage.

One simple test would be to run some game with 640x480 all low settings, if the lower range of memory is good. Under clocking core/memory would be another, but do try that pcie frequency first.

And I feel you on not wanting to return it unless it's must. Not like these things grow on trees, so no telling when you'd get a replacement.

[rhythmeister]

Oh for the love of god dont tell me that! I just got it today and waited a week for the bloody thing, what is RMA ? Oh, return to manufacturer?

Only a week? I've been waiting ALL MONTH for mine :cry:

[Mussels]

Only a week? I've been waiting ALL MONTH for mine :cry:

lol i ordered two at the same time, one (inno3d Overclocked) arrived in 24 hours, the other is at a week now.

[DEFEATEST]

It is a Nvidia card, real one, thats why I paid 365 for it! I know its alot. I did have a really shaky flashing of the BIOS though. Tell me how this works..... My setup used to have a x2 4600 and a x1950xt with a 480w psu, nothing else is different in my setup from then until now. So those are the 3 things I have replaced. (rest of specs on side or up top of post) Now upon hearing that the bios of the mobo, which was dated last spring, would prolly not support the x2 6400, I updated the BIOS to the most current- 1501. I used the "easy updater" or whatever its called. Upon reboot it would not stay stable for more than 10 seconds, and that was like that for about 3 days! so long story short, after screwing with it for ever, I decided I would just install my new components-PSU,CPU, VID CARD- and go from there. Well what do you know the machine was stable after installing the new components. Weird or what? But of course the card has not been. I cranked cod4 and it ran for quite a while at a blistering 140 fps, but then crash! Oblivion ran forever without crashing. BF2 lasted only 5-10 mins, and Crysis I can barely get to the main menu without major green meshy screen and lockup-reboot. My system ram totally fine till that Bios flash. I know my ram is good. I'm thinking I need to at least try flashing the BIOS one more time.

ps, sorry for the long read!

[Mussels]

it could be bios, but dont rule out scrweing up the CPU install or something too. you could have messed up the grease job or something small like that, and overlooking those can be a problem.

[DEFEATEST]

Ok heres the lates update, reinstalled the bios, no difference. Messed with voltages in bios, no difference. It seems that it doesnt happen - the green meshy, freeze , hard lock up reboot - when I'm playing source based games, ie hl2 , cs, dod,etc. It doesnt happen in oblivion. GOW does it, COD i can play for a few minutes and crysis still cant get past main menu. It really makes me think its drivers. My cpu is at a cool 30 degrees, so I dont think its working hard. But why can I play some games and not others? Red orchestra gave me the green meshy screen/ lockup too. Maybey this cheap mobo hates this all! BF2 will crash to desktop or just reboot whole machine, but I never get the green stuff. PSU maybe?
anymore ideas would help guys , thanks!

[hat]

always flash in dos. windows flashing is nutoriously risky/

[DEFEATEST]

Ok I think I have flashed in the EZ flash from within the BIOS, is that ok, because there is no DOS in xp right?

[sneekypeet]

As long as the flash worked its OK...and NO DOS is not in XP....DOS is when you boot from a floppy/CD drive prior to loading the OS.

[DEFEATEST]

"I recently built a new system, which seemed to run fine till I tried a graphics intensive game like Hellgate London, which seemed to only work on medium/low graphics settings on DirectX9 since DX10 was just horribly laggy. It would crash from 5-30minutes, I then tried Crysis which once in the game crashed after 2 seconds. By crash I mean either screen freeze, or screen freeze with artifacts, both causing my computer to completely freeze and force me to power off then back on, no alt+tab, or ctrl+alt+del."

My system specs are:
CPU: Intel Core2Duo E6850 3.00GHz
RAM: A-Data 2x Paired 2x1GB PC6400 800MHz (4GB total)
Motherboard: Gigabyte P35-DS3P
Video: Gigabyte 8800GT 512MB
O/S: Vista Home Premium 32bit
PSU: ThermalTake Tough Power 600W
HDD: Western Digital 750GB SATAII
Monitor: Chimei 946D 19" Widescreen 1440x900"


THATS A QUOTE FROM NVIDIA FORUMS, HIS DESCRIPTION OF CRYSIS IS EXACTLY MINE,
HE IS USING LATEST DRIVERS. I'M GOING TO UNINSTALL DRIVERS, PUT ON OLDER ONES, LET YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENS......

[DEFEATEST]

well, just installed 1.67's and cod4 seems to be ok, but crysis is same. STALKER went for a bit, then boom , green junk and hard lock.
I'm thinking I might re-install windows and start fresh.

[tkpenalty]

well, just installed 1.67's and cod4 seems to be ok, but crysis is same. STALKER went for a bit, then boom , green junk and hard lock.
I'm thinking I might re-install windows and start fresh.

Dont be lazy. Send the card back asap, the longer you muck with it the less likely you will get the card replaced, I've seen it happen before. As far as I know, you MIGHT be suffering from heat, 31 Degrees doesnt tell a lot, as thats the idle temperature. You may have a load temp of around 100*C. If the card still mucks up, after you get it replaced it could be the following:

-Direct X Installation
-Cooling.

[DEFEATEST]

Well TK you called it, and some others too! The card was fubared, picked up a bfg version today and brought it home plucged it in a whammo! works fine. BTW it has nothing to do with laziness :) I'v found in the world of computers that most times when you think it's something , its not! LOL! So I didnt want to send the card back , pay shipping , have them tell me nothings wrong with it, waiting for it to come back, blah , blah ,blah. You know what I mean? Anyways thanks for all the help boys! Now if you'll excuse me I've got some insanely fast gaming to do!!

[erocker]

Enjoy man!:D

[rhythmeister]

always flash in dos. windows flashing is nutoriously risky/

I've found flashing in XP to be VERY reliable if you turn off ALL unnecessary crap running in the background and obviously anti-virus software. I've flashed many Biostar and gigabyte boards/ gfx cards from within windows without fail. Just make sure your system is stable before doing so; a spare CMOS chip with BIOS on it comes in handy too in case you don't have a way of hotflashing in your immediate vicinity! :laugh:

To get back on topic I hope you get that dodgy card replaced soon, nothing like waiting on a new part which turns out to be buggered :mad:

I've changed to a Club3D 3870 for £132 inc postage as well as CBC didn't have any 8800s after a month's wait but DID have a pair of these :rockout: