Isolating the Problem: Artifacting

N

Niksa

Limp Gawd
Joined
Feb 8, 2005
Messages
228
I've had this system for about 1.5 years and I just started to have weird graphic problems. Using a GeForce 6800 GT. I play City of Heroes currently and about a week ago some severe artifacting occured. The entire screen became made up of multi-colored blocks arranged in horizontal columns. I could move the mouse but not interact with anything and ultimately had to reboot. At first it seemed random when it would occur, and now it seems to happen within 10 minutes. I can watch movies but not play games.

* Temp is running at 92*C outside of games. Up to 120* in games. (using Nvidia's temp monitoring) <-- I don't know why this is so high!
* I have 3 fans plus the fan on the card, all are working.
* Cleaned out all the dust.
* Tried a new video card (no problems, but only could keep it in for 10 minutes... room mate is an addict.)
* Uninstalled drivers with DriverCleaner, reinstalled regular Nvidia drivers.
* I'm using Antec Dual Fan 480W ATX Power Supply.

Here's one of the mildest pictures I could take of the problem. You see when it seriously locks up, it's impossible to take a good screen shot. In this picture, which is very dark, there are very jagged spikes diagonally through the screen. This occured immediately before the entire system locked.
screenshot_2006-11-13-14-15-32_1.jpg


The only person I know who would let me borrow their card would only do it for 10 minutes. :rolleyes: So it's hard to tell if the card is toast because the problems can take a while to show.

How do I check to see if it's the memory, motherboard or power supply? I don't have much cash until January so I need to isolate the problem before replacing blindly, but I can replace one part now. I strongly suspect the video card but I'm trying to rule everything else out. Any ideas?
 
You're artifacting cuz of the insane GPU temps you've got, what you'll have to do is remove the heatsink and and carefully remove the old thermal paste off of the GPU and the RAM chips -use mild alcohol-, then re-apply thermal paste as thinly and evenly as possible then reattach the the heatsink...that should do it.
 
Check for dust in the gpu, CHECK THE FAN,Reapply thermal paste.
 
Get a box fan, open your case, point the box fan at the video card, fixed my problems way back when :p
 
1st) as Ladicius said:
Ladicius said:
Get a box fan, open your case, point the box fan at the video card, fixed my problems way back when :p
Click to expand...

2nd)
Take note of the new temperatures and post it here :)

If they return to normal levels, the problem is your card fan. You can try to change it (not too difficult, but maybe not too easy), or simply fix the second fan over the heatsink (if you have room under your card, it is the cheapest, easiest and safest solution).

If the temperatures remain too high: :(

3rd)
As the other said, your thermal paste is dry, and need to be replaced. But it is not easy to do it right, and you can damage the card or the chip (if it has no IHS)... If you have not experience mounting heatsinks, better get some help. And NEVER mount it without thermal paste; it could kill your card.

Does someone know for sure if 6800 GT has IHS?
 
wera said:
Check for dust in the gpu, CHECK THE FAN,Reapply thermal paste.
Click to expand...

^This is most likely the issue. Grab a can of duster, some q-tips or other sterile cleaning apparatus and clean your entire card (which you said you did).

Your card may already be FUBAR'ed though due to heat damage if you are getting extreme high idle temps like that.
 
Hey guys, I wanted to thank you for the advice. I checked the fans and they're all working properly. I cleaned out all the dust, and I mean ALL the dust (and embarrassingly enough, I had no idea how much dust had accumulated inside the video card's fan itself). The temperatures are now within 59*-87* or so and I've not seen a temp higher since my last post.

Now I still get the artifacting at times and also hard freezes during games (especially NWN2) so since I had major papers and exams all week, I decided to just take it to a comp technician to get a full hardware diagnostic.

They said they tested the video card and it looks fine, even with the high temp problems. Thankfully!

They determined harddisk failure and said the rest of the hardware seems fine. Any second opinions on the harddrive failure possibility?
 
HDD failure is NOT going to cause artifacting like that.

You're looking at one of three scenerios:

1. Your card is still overheating. The type of artifacting points heavily to the memory or core on your card overheating or malfunctioning. The type of thermal paste used on some video cards can actually break down after a couple of years and take on thermally INSULATING properties instead of thermally conductive properties. My suggestion would be to carefully remove the cooler, clean the contact surfaces of the GPU and the cooler, and re-apply a decent quality thermal interface like Arctic Silver 5, Arctic Silver Ceramique, or Shin Etsu G71.

2. Your card is damaged because of the longterm overheating - time to look at a replacement.

3. Your card is not recieving enough supplimentary power from your PSU and it is causing the artifacting.



Scenerio 1 is most likely, and 3 is least likely IMO.
 
Hard drive errors wont cause artifacting...so he's BSing you saying thats the problem. You very well may have hard drive errors, but the tech saying that it's the cause of your problem is incorrect.
 
Ok, getting some thermal paste right away. Possibly another fan but I'm not sure where I'd put one. I'll check in the cooling board for some ideas. Thanks again, I appreciate the help! :cool:
 
Niksa said:
Ok, getting some thermal paste right away. Possibly another fan but I'm not sure where I'd put one. I'll check in the cooling board for some ideas. Thanks again, I appreciate the help! :cool:
Click to expand...

Its not a second fan, necessarily...sounds like you may need to REPLACE the original fan...an aftermarket fan usually keeps cards super mega cool.
 
Niksa said:
Hey guys, I wanted to thank you for the advice. I checked the fans and they're all working properly. I cleaned out all the dust, and I mean ALL the dust (and embarrassingly enough, I had no idea how much dust had accumulated inside the video card's fan itself). The temperatures are now within 59*-87* or so and I've not seen a temp higher since my last post.

Now I still get the artifacting at times and also hard freezes during games (especially NWN2) so since I had major papers and exams all week, I decided to just take it to a comp technician to get a full hardware diagnostic.

They said they tested the video card and it looks fine, even with the high temp problems. Thankfully!

They determined harddisk failure and said the rest of the hardware seems fine. Any second opinions on the harddrive failure possibility?
Click to expand...
They were noobs, You need to re apply thermal paste really, you do, Now everybody may tell you to buy a new fan heatsink But an easy and quick fix would to be just apply a new coat of thermal paste.

It is also a possibility that the fan is failing, If that is the case you will need a new fan.
 
Yeah I'm running SpeedFan and it seems to indicate there's no problem with the fans, but I might just replace them all anyway since they're not all that terribly expensive and they're already 1.5 yrs old.
 
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