BFG 6800 GT - Oh no..what have I done??

[SGTFury]

Card seems to only run games at texture mode GL_LINEAR_MIPMAP_NEAREST, or low quality settings, and is very dark. No matter how I change the in-game settings, game config file, Nvidia Windows driver configs, etc ... refuses to run at anything but crap settings now. This is after I was overclocking and trying to get maximum performance out of the card.


I had just got Q4 and was trying to maximize performance. I was overclocking at 402/1100, with Coolbits as I have many times before, but this time I also played with the AGP clock speed and set it up as high as 89. Now, I've never messed with the AGP clock speed, but I ran the Nvidia NTune app, and it automatically adjusted it up, so I figured it was ok to try it.

Not sure exactly at what point it happened, but now whenever I put in any game and try to set for high quality, it reverts to the NEAREST setting and gets very dark. I even wiped my hd clean and reinstalled windows, and fresh Nvidia drivers. Still no dice.

What have I done to my card? Anyone else seen this? Maybe a firmware upgrade would fix it?

I paid $400 for this card, I hope I haven't fried it.

[Seven7Thirty30]

Do you mean you raised the AGP clock from 33/66 to 89?

[ziggo0]

I think thats what he is saying...you try re-installing the driver? It sounds like that might be an issue..

[SGTFury]

[Do you mean you raised the AGP clock from 33/66 to 89?]

Yes, that's what I did, and not only did I uninstall-reinstall the driver, I reinstalled Windows completely with new Nvidia drivers, and the problem was still there so that leads me to believe its a problem with the card, not the OS/drivers.

[Seven7Thirty30]

Have you tried to reset the motherboard bios settings back to default? Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but raising the AGP bus speeds definitely has the potential to fry your card. Did you change the AGP voltage?

[SGTFury]

Yes, I increased the AGP voltage too. I've tried resetting the bios settings to no avail.

[Nebulous]

Hmmm, Me thinks by running the card's agp speed so far out of specs, you may have damged it :-/

Try another video card. I'll bet with another ( spare) video card you won't have that problem, meaning you did indeed borked the new card.

[grayg]

Always do your research first, it's a very important thing you should never forget.

With a bit of luck your card will be ok and you will have just broken the AGP port.

[Seven7Thirty30]

Sounds like either your AGP port is dead or the card itself. I willing to bet that the cause was from increasing the AGP bus speed and voltage. Two things you shouldn't do.

[ShadowClock59]

What about a good ole bios flash of the card? Tryed that yet, if your feeling like its gone for good, then try to flash the card, you have nothing to lose if its truely borked, theres always that chance...

[SGTFury]

still runs 2D fine, don't wanna totally fry it, but I'm going to try a bios flash and reseating the card. sigh..

[3DFlyer]

Oh No! :( Why did you go to 89? On *some* boards you can tweak it to like 70, but not 89. However, it's best to leave that APP/PCI locked down. Very very baaaaad things can happen by raising the AGP bus speed. If you have a PCI-e, lock it at 100. AGP and PCi buses do not like to be OC'd. There is the rare board that you can tweak some, but some folks have suggested those boards were actually running under what was reported.

[-_{MoW}_-Assasi]

why would you increase the AGP bus/PCI-E bus anyway?

[SGTFury]

I ran the Nvidia NTune program, and it did an auto-tune to maximize performance, and it set the agp up much higher than default. Now I'd always heard it wasn't good to do this, but I thought, hey maybe its ok. Guess I learned the hard way :(

[fuzzba11]

BFG cards have a lifetime warranty anyway, haven't you given them a call yet?? They will replace your card for free.

[ShadowClock59]

Its all understandable bud, and its just one of thoughs mistakes we make. You shouldnt feel bad about it becuase now you learned something, just the hard way.

Give BFG a call and get you an RMA on that puppy. :)

[SGTFury]

Yes, but the warranty doesn't cover damaged caused by overclocking, user stupidity, etc .. AND, I've had the card for like six months at least.

I made an interesting discovery last night. Using Q3 as a test vehicle (because it installs and runs quickly) I found out that if I run it in a WINDOW, i.e. not full-screen, it looks ok. Its only when I run FULL SCREEN that the textures/colors, etc .. look borked.

Couple of questions come to mind ..

1)Are there different modes that the card operates in between full screen and not full screen? In other words, if the card is fried, how can it render correctly in a window but not in full-screen?

2) If the card can render ok in a window, maybe it is a software thing after all. Maybe somehow the bios on the card is corrupted and a flash will fix it. I'm going to try a flash tonight.

[ShadowClock59]

Yes, but the warranty doesn't cover damaged caused by overclocking, user stupidity, etc .. AND, I've had the card for like six months at least.

I made an interesting discovery last night. Using Q3 as a test vehicle (because it installs and runs quickly) I found out that if I run it in a WINDOW, i.e. not full-screen, it looks ok. Its only when I run FULL SCREEN that the textures/colors, etc .. look borked.

Couple of questions come to mind ..

1)Are there different modes that the card operates in between full screen and not full screen? In other words, if the card is fried, how can it render correctly in a window but not in full-screen?

2) If the card can render ok in a window, maybe it is a software thing after all. Maybe somehow the bios on the card is corrupted and a flash will fix it. I'm going to try a flash tonight.

It may not be your card afterall. How does it affect the performance of the card. If that is till good, then it could be your monitor, maybe you ran it at a high refresh rate for to long and its starting to crap out with high refresh rate at higher resolutions. You have any other monitors to test it with?

[Turtle Shell]

i thought BFG did cover overclocking in their warranty isnt that one of their biggest perks thogh i may be wrong never had a BFG

[ShadowClock59]

i thought BFG did cover overclocking in their warranty isnt that one of their biggest perks thogh i may be wrong never had a BFG

I would think taht they would, afterall, they call it the 6800GT OC. Kind of like wearing a sign that says, "Go ahead, beat the hell out of me, ill forgive you"