My Ti4600 is really messed up

[Top Hat Theater]

Okay, my primary system in my sig is running on a crappy 3 year old vid card right now b/c I can't get my Ti4600 to work right. Here're the symptoms. I was playing UT2K3 when I started to get artifacts. Strange b/c my card isn't OC'ed aggressively. So I take it down from 660 to 650 and try again. Now I've got yellow dots and dashes all over the place.

I reboot.

POST display is all weird with symbols and blue and orange letters. Begin loading Win2K and it freezes with a totally destroyed video signal (can't make out anything on the screen).

Format the drive and clean install of OS and 41.03 Detonators. Computer freezes up again (this time, it was running for even less time).

I take the card out, try some new RAM, system boots fine. Then, the yellow dashes come back and eventually, I restart only to find that I now have a messed up POST screen again. Get into the BIOS and it too is messed up to the point where I can't read anything.

Flash BIOS to 2815, 2619, 2312. Didn't solve the problem.

Put the RAM in a different DIMM. System boots, yellow dashes return. Reboot, messed up display.

By now, I'm thinking I've got a dying card. But, I put it into another system and it runs UT2K3 without a problem. No artifacts, no distorted colors. Used the 41.03 drivers as well. Same OS.

Does anyone know what's goin' on with my card?

~THT

 

[KaHNZa]

I dunno. I'm kinda having a similar problem. Mine is a 4200 though. And I noticed that if I turn of the fan that is in the side of the case blowing right on the video card the problem goes away for the most part. And just like you I tried new drivers, that didn't seem to make a difference. I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that these cards run really hot at idle....

 

[Top Hat Theater]

What really confused me was how it worked just fine in the other system.

~THT

 

[Bon3thugz43v3r]

Maybe your agp slot is corrupted

 

[Top Hat Theater]

Well, the Voodoo 3 I have in there right now works just fine.

~THT

 

[Arctic]

you also have to consider that the voodoo card doesn't require as much power as the Geforce 4ti4600.... the other problem could be your heat sink of the card might be a little lose and it might over heat. another thing is your Geforce is longer than the voodoo card and might not be in all the way...


I hope that helps;..


Cheers

Arctic

 

[Top Hat Theater]

How often do AGP slots corrupt?

The card is properly seated (good suggestion though).

~THT

P.S. Thanks everyone for the help so far! We can beat this thing!

 

[Top Hat Theater]

Popped in a Chaintech Ti4200 and it worked fine. Noticed upon removal that the HSF on the GPU, memory chips and capacitors were REALLY warm. Put in my 4600 and it booted fine. Got to the boards and was about to post when the video died and system restarted. Garbled POST once more. Removed the card and it too was warm. Sounds like it's being overvolted or something to that effect. What line(s) should I check?

~THT

 

[mbentley]

i would say that the memory is on the card is messed up. i would run a utility that will check the video card's memory. i am not sure which one i used to use, but i will look it up and find it and post the actual program. (i'm in class right now)

 

[Top Hat Theater]

but if the card's memory was messed up, wouldn't it have distorted the video when it was in the other system?

~THT

 

[Rotary-Motion]

UUMMMM ???

Sounds like it could be power supply?

needs more juice!

thx.........

 

[CSaddict]

I had a similar problem when I installed my 4600. The machine would turn on and then right back off. It worked fine in my backuo machine so I swapped the psu and it didn't help. I posted about it from my laptop and Pinky told me to clear the CMOS. I moved the jumper and presto problem solved.

 

[Top Hat Theater]

CMOS has been cleared multiple times but no go. PSU is more than enough for the system. 550W Antec TruPower for two hdds, two optical drives and 1.85Vcore. All my lines are within tolerance.

~THT

 

[mbentley]

i had 2 pny geforce 4 ti 4400's that did the exact same thing. they would act fine for a while then they would show artifacts... they were never oc'd. both had memory the failed.

 

[Top Hat Theater]

I'll give it a whirl in my A7N8X when it gets here on Thursday. Tomorrow, I have a 9700 showing up and I'll pop that in. If it works fine, then I guess it's a vid card issue. If the 4600 doesn't work in my A7N8X, it's a card issue.

~THT

 

[MDA]

POST display is all weird with symbols and blue and orange letters. Begin loading Win2K and it freezes with a totally destroyed video signal (can't make out anything on the screen).

I take the card out, try some new RAM, system boots fine. Then, the yellow dashes come back and eventually, I restart only to find that I now have a messed up POST screen again. Get into the BIOS and it too is messed up to the point where I can't read anything.

These sound like the exact same problems i get when i raise my fsb above 190, dont know what your fsb overclock is, if you have one i would suggest you try running it back at stock and see if that helps.

Seems that on my system fsb's above 190 start corrupting the agp bandwidth and my card just craps out!

MDA.

 

[deez]

good point MDA

Top Hat Theater...does your vid card do this with system FSB at stock settings?

 

[Top Hat Theater]

I'll check but it shouldn't matter. My board has the 1/5 divider so the AGP bus should be running at 66. Will give it a whirl though.

~THT

 

[Top Hat Theater]

Yep, it does it at stock too.

~THT

 

[Top Hat Theater]

Just took off the HSF, cleaned the generic crap off and applied AS3. Good contact b/w HSF and GPU. Distorted output and crash as the login screen for win2k came up.

~THT