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possibly dead gpu?

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slynutcase

Member
Joined
Jan 5, 2012
Location
Wales, UK
while gaming on a not to hardware intensive game (mmorpg) my pc screen went completly grey for few secconds then monitor shut off, pc itself doesnt restart or anything, i have to manually restart, will work fine for half hour or so and again similar problem, the card is a few years old now i used to have it slightly overclcoked but running stock now, the card at full load sits around 75degrees c (untill the pc fails)

oh the card itself is an nvidia gtx 460 sonic from palit, not the best card and due an upgrade, jus wondering if an upgrade is needed sooner rather than later?
 
Is there possibly a sound coming from your speakers when this happens? Does it happen with other games as well? IS PUNKBUSTER RUNNING?
 
If it works for a while and then shuts off agian it could be simple fix

1) Overheating. retim and clean out the heatsink. Not just the core but tim the FETs and ram as well (creafully and use none conductive grease)

2) Cap aging. Caps will go bad and while you have the heatsink off you can look for any noticeable damage to them or around them.

For the latter baking at 130C for a few hours can restore caps to brand new performance. However I do not know what effect that would have on the PCB and ICs on board.

High heat (350C ish) short time baking is recommended for reflowing solder which could be another cause of your issues. I personally have never baked a card as you are not supposed to do it in a food grade appliance due to fumes. But grabbing a cheap oven and throwing it in your workshop (even a toaster oven) Sounds like something worth looking into for me :)
 
umm ok thats abit scary sounding, let me get this straight you are saying that it may help if a put my gpu in the oven? ok it may sort some parts out but would it not melt all the plastic parts ie, the connecters on th I/O plate?
 
get a static sound from speakers, and yes its clean, properly seated and got the right drivers.

By any chance do you have punkbuster running in the background? Apparently Punk Buster can conflict with the drivers of Realtek on-board sound cards, thus causing the crash.

If so, try this.

Create a new text document and input:

SC CONFIG PnkBstrA start= demand
SC CONFIG PnkBstrB start= demand
NET STOP PnkBstrA
NET STOP PnkBstrB
EXIT

Then hit File > Save As > Set the type to "all files" > save it as "[insert name].bat" Where you replace [insert name] with anything you want.

Run the batch file. It should override the automatic startup of Punk Buster with windows and open it only when a relevant game is played. It also stops any running Punk Buster processes.
 
umm ok thats abit scary sounding, let me get this straight you are saying that it may help if a put my gpu in the oven? ok it may sort some parts out but would it not melt all the plastic parts ie, the connecters on th I/O plate?

baking sounds scary but works like a charm! i fixes a broken 8800GTX that was not going into games. baked it and BAM works great!
 
But grabbing a cheap oven and throwing it in your workshop (even a toaster oven) Sounds like something worth looking into for me :)

Toaster? click...boink!!! ah....golden brown GPU's, right? where is the margarine????
 
not sure what punk buster is? if its something you download off the net then no i dont have it.
and so people have had results from baking? how long do you bake it for? and just clearing up, its best to remove all plastic from it beforehand, i can get it all off except for the power 6 pin connectors, hdmi port and fan connector. (without getting out the soldering iron.)
 
aah i see i bleieve i have encounterd it a couple of years back, but no dont have it on this system, going over to amd now, a friend has given me a nearly new 6870 sapphire OC edition will see how that goes for now.
 
good good, should have it in my pc in few days will see how it feels, thanks for the vote of confidance :attn:
 
a slight update, have put my gtx 460 into another system and seems to work fine, could it possibly be a power issue?
but i have a 430w power pack old "corsair cx430"
the system i have tried it in has a brand new "pc power & cooling silencer mk3" 400w
 
a slight update, have put my gtx 460 into another system and seems to work fine, could it possibly be a power issue?
but i have a 430w power pack old "corsair cx430"
the system i have tried it in has a brand new "pc power & cooling silencer mk3" 400w

If you can, borrow the PSU from the system your GPU works in to test in your system.
 
well small update, have been given an hd 6870 to try instead of the gtx 460 which is working fine in an old pc now, but im still getting the same problem but less frequently, yet scince then i have noticed my 12v is sitting really low at 10.8v could this be a hint that a new psu is in order?
 
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