Flat Screw Driver vs TI4400 Oh %^%$

[Capt Fiero]

Well it was more than O-$hit that came out of my mouth when I did it. I gouged at least 5 traces on the board. I put the card inot a machine and tested it, I got funny colours and all sorts of things. It loaded into windows but there are definatly problems. Is there anything I can do to try and fix it or is it just plain toast. I have been told that if you run a pencil eraser along the trace in one direction gently some times you can repair a crossed trace depending on the depth of the damage.

If you want to know why I had a screw driver at the back of my video card, I was trying to pop the little plastic pins though the holes that hold the heat sink on so I could put some ASIII compound on it.

If you hear of a good deal on a TI42-4600 card drop me a line. I should proably wait till after X-Mas when everyone has upped there cards and I am sure the markey is going to be flooded with the old Ti seris cards.

[ajrettke]

If using the eraser doesn't work use the other end and actualy trace the connections. Graphite is very conductive and if you only messed up the top layer you can pencil over the breaks in the circuit and it should be good to go. Best of luck!!!!
And if it doesn't work then wait till after christmas like you said, that's what I have to do as well :(

[Grande Juan]

You can also pickup a rear window defogger repair kit, at your local autoparts store. It works very well for repairing traces.

[Cyrix_2k]

Or you could get a trace repair pen.

[Capt Fiero]

I took a much closer look at the card tonight and I really dont think it is repairable. I will probably just toss it into the pile of broken or outdated computer stuff that I am going to toss on ebay. Before anyone says anything. I ALWAYS list damaged stuff as damaged and put as much info on it as I can. I figure it is probably worth 15$ for parts, and if I toss in a few other decent working video cards, maybe a few slot one processors and other misc stuff, I might make enough cash to buy a 9600pro card without spending any out of pocket money.

[Mike360000]

Originally posted by Capt Fiero
I took a much closer look at the card tonight and I really dont think it is repairable. I will probably just toss it into the pile of broken or outdated computer stuff that I am going to toss on ebay. Before anyone says anything. I ALWAYS list damaged stuff as damaged and put as much info on it as I can. I figure it is probably worth 15$ for parts, and if I toss in a few other decent working video cards, maybe a few slot one processors and other misc stuff, I might make enough cash to buy a 9600pro card without spending any out of pocket money.

Hey Capt,
You mess up my PNY Ti 4400?
That was one heck of a video card!
Shame on you!

Cheers,
Mike

[Capt Fiero]

I loved the card, it was awesome, I got 70-90fps in UT2K3 I am so PO at my self over it, but hey $hit happens I screwed up.

So I am going to have to buy a new card. Kinda sucks but Oh well life is life.

[Noodles]

Heh. I've been there. I was taking a heatsink off my kt7a motherboard one time and the screwdriver slipped out and stabbed the board. Thank god it didn't do any real damage. I was sure I was screwed.

[Mike360000]

Originally posted by Capt Fiero
I loved the card, it was awesome, I got 70-90fps in UT2K3 I am so PO at my self over it, but hey $hit happens I screwed up.

So I am going to have to buy a new card. Kinda sucks but Oh well life is life.

snif snif

I can't believe my v card is no more............
Dang, it was so good to me...........
I don't think any cooling mods would have really helped it though.
It was oc'ing too good as it was. Anyhow...

Don't guess you wanna sell me back that adapter?
It actually came from my 5900.

Cheers,
Mike

[Capt Fiero]

Well I have a friend that wants to see if he can fix it for me. So I might be in luck. I will still probably go out and buy a new card after christmas though.

Does anyone have any recomendations on a Card that is Equall to the Ti4400 card. I dont understand all these FX cards and ATI with all there Pro this and that. Which ATI card would I want to look into. For me the Ti4400 was more than fast enough. I was looking at an ATI card for 200$ CDN about 150$ USD that the computer guy said was DX9 complient. I dont know what card it was but it was a 9xxx something.

[Jimbob7]

what clock speeds did u have on the TI4400 ?? :)

[harryinny3]

The 9600XT is on sale everywhere.

But i would have to point you to this card. Gainward Ultra 1100, As far as i see its an u5900. Its price is great.

http://www.gameve.com/gve/store/ProductDetails.aspx?sku=VC-GAIN-0019

Cant believe i Just told him to get a NV card. I think this fever is killin me. LOL.

BTW you might want to try tweezers or needle nose pliers next time. They work great.Press the tabs and push em out.

Harry

[sQUiRLy]

Capt Fiero, NewEgg has the 850MHz memory Gainward 5900 for just 25 more dollars. The 9700pro is in that price range as well.

You might get the same DirectX 8.1 performance that you had with your 4400 with the 9600xt but the DirectX 9 performance of the 9600 series is a bit lacking. I have to play NFSunderground at 800x600 with my 9600pro to keep things smooth.

[Freelancer071]

A screwdriver once met an Asus TUSL2-C :) The thing still works, but I've noticed that it takes the PC about 10 seconds to completely turn on if it has been turned off for an extended period of time (sth like 48 hours). Since it's always on it's not really a problem :). Good thing u mentioned trace repair kits, I think I'll get one of those. Too bad about your Ti4400 though :( Best of luck to you with your Ti4400 rescue mission... or with the Ti4600 acquisition mission in case you've killed the 4400 :)

[Kenshiro]

I'm not too sure about this. Can a little soldering help fix that?

[Kenshiro]

If you do have to get a new card, get the ATI 9600 XT. Don't get the 5900 non ultra even though they are the same price. I did see how the 9600SE perform with Halo, and I am very very impress. Get an ATI and I am very sure that you will be happy with its performance with directx 9 games.

[matrixzen]

I jabbed two boards in my computer lifetime experience. I was more unskilled back then in the day and it still worked. Now if I want to remove the little plastic pins for the video card or northbridge I don't bother risking I just take wirecutters and cut off the plasic piece and get new inserts. I figure might as well spend some time making my own NB/GPU mounts than risking the same mistake I've made in the past as you have. I've burned out new hard drives and motherboards and the same thing comes out of my mouth. I tend to look back at these things as learning experiences and stories I can tell people to help them not make the same mistake. I've used super glue to mount heatsinks which some types of super glue can come off with alcohol which is safe to use on your video card. My condolences do your dead video card. I just got done replacing my dead A7N8X motherboard along with its AMD Athlon XP 2100+. Very costly mistake. Your not alone when you say Oh $hit. You can try the suggestion on the window defogger kit. Let me know how it works. I might just try this on my pile on junk.:rolleyes:

[Capt Fiero]

To be very honest, I am scared to try and put the card back into my board just in the slim chance that something is shorted out on the card and it fries my AGP Slot.

[matrixzen]

Try the card out on a old computer with AGP that you don't really care too much about. That's what I'll usually do to test old parts. If I want to test an old PCI device or something I just pop it in my Pentium 233. Good luck!

[blackjackel]

if your still selling it ill take it off you for 15 bux....

i just Fked my motherboard in almost the same way and bought a trace repair pen, might as well try and repair your vidcard too...

just one question, how deep down is it?

[Capt Fiero]

ITS ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I gave it to an electronics buddy of mine about 6 months ago.

Well I got a call from him this weekend and he asked me if I rememberd that old video card I gave him to look at. He told me he got bored and started to tinker with it.

To make a long story short, he told me that I did scrape several traces but I did not actully go deep enough to cut any of them. What I did do was knock a resistor off of the board, it was a really really tiny peice. The saving grace was I managed to wedge it under another piece on the card. He used tweasers to get it out find out where it came from and soldered it back on. He tried it in his Nforce 2 board and worked like a charm. I picked it up and put it back into my machine today. It is running wonderfully now. It wont be a big step up from my Ti4200 but it is sure nice to have it back. The Ti4200 got dumped into my web/movie server and hooked to my TV. Which makes it a bit nicer to stream movies with than clogging up my main rig.

[matrixzen]

Nice to hear some good news. I'm sure you're glad to have it back running again.

[Aphex_Tom_9]

this is why you use pliers or even tweezers to pinch those HSF pins on the backs of components...

[Capt Fiero]

Nice to hear some good news. I'm sure you're glad to have it back running again.


I am very glad to have it back. Bang for the buck the old Ti cards rock!.

[matrixzen]

this is why you use pliers or even tweezers to pinch those HSF pins on the backs of components...

I just cut them off and not worry about sending them through.

[Quailane]

I just cut them off and not worry about sending them through. Maybe some of us plan on putting them back on. :rolleyes:

[matrixzen]

Maybe some of us plan on putting them back on. :rolleyes:

I understand that but this way assures you won't damage your precious board. ;)

[Quailane]

You would have to be pretty bumbly to mess up your card while using needle-nose pliers to push those pins out.

[Mike360000]

Well Cap'n that is great news!
I'm glad too hear the old v card is alive again!
Boy, I'd completely forgotten about you and that v card.
A lot has happened to me in the last 8 months and I haven't even been on here much in a long while. (Left my wife when I found out she was gay. And the dating scene stinks after so many years being out of it.) But I'm in better shape now too!

Glad your v card is back in business!

Cheers,
Mike

[Capt Fiero]

The reason I like this card is it is tweaked at 300/650 on stock cooling runs 14,000+ on 3dmark 2001 and the fact that it does this even with how old it is, is just amazing to me. I had the option of a DX9 Geforce FX5600 with 256mb of ram and chose to use this card and gave the other card to the old lady for her machine.

[Lat]

it's nice to have electronically-savvy friends that you can count on to fix your broken stuff :p

[SK8]

do what i do to old computer hardware, TORCH IT!!!! Me and some friends allways torch stuff since the local grocery has cheap rubbing alcohol bottles. 3/$1 !!! we got 30 and torched a old mac laptop that didnt work, wow was that fun! Gl and burn!!!

[Nebulous]

do what i do to old computer hardware, TORCH IT!!!! Me and some friends allways torch stuff since the local grocery has cheap rubbing alcohol bottles. 3/$1 !!! we got 30 and torched a old mac laptop that didnt work, wow was that fun! Gl and burn!!!


SK8 my friend, you need some serious help!




LOL :D ;)

[Capt Fiero]

Na I find uses for almost all my old computer stuff. Right down to P200mmx machines. Use them for MP3 machiens. I still get requests every now and then for old 4mb PCI video cards for web browsing machins and such. It is a bit of a waste having that Ti4200 running in a web/ftp server, but I hooked the S-Video out to the TV and then ran the Sound Card output to the AUX in on the TV so that I can watch all my Movies and TV shows on the TV and be able to control the volume from the bed. It acully (sp) works pretty well.

I wonder how far this card can be pushed, especially with better cooling?