Is my 290x tri-x dying?

Long time lurker. Don't post too much. BUT! I think there is something wrong with my card and I would like to see what you guys think.

First my system.

CPU: Core i7 930 - Running stock right now. I had one of the fans on the heat sink go bad so I'm trying to not cook my cpu.
MoBo: Asus P6X58D Premium
Ram: G.Skill 6GB ddr3 1600
HDD1 (os): OCZ Agility 3 120GB
HDD2: Samsung Spinpoint F2 t1b
3 Dell Ultrasharp 23in monitors.

Now I was running a Radeon 5970 since 2010 but in January I decided to update my card as a birthday present for myself. I checked out a number of reviews and decided that at the time the best option was a Sapphire R9 290x tri-x. My Sapphire 5970 has ran great for years without any problems.

Fast forward to about a month ago and I suddenly lost about 10-15 fps in most games that would push the card. I was able to play BF4 with everything on high. No aa/ac or post effects and was getting 70 or so fps when running all 3 monitors. Looked great and vsync was on to keep tearing at bay.

Now I get about 57-60. No change made to the system. So I use DDU and re installed the drivers. I've tried 14.4 to 14.7 and they all preform the same.

About the same time as the drop in fps I start getting random BSoD's that are from the driver.

So due to the combination of everything I wiped my ssd and re installed Win7. Still get the same problems.

Other than the drop in fps and the random BSoD about once a week, everything seems to be working fine. Under load I'm hitting about 70-75 degrees in bf4. A little higher if its a hot day but nothing crazy.

So yesterday I try to OC my card just a smidgen to see if I can get a steady 65-70 frames in bf4 so I can run v-sync again (tearing sucks on 3 screens).
When I OC any at all, it will run for a min or two and then all the screens go black. I have to restart and try to reset the card before they go black again.

So. Do you think my card is bad or am I running into something else?

Sounds like the card to me, if the drop in fps was sudden, and all these errors are cropping up ... but since you said you lost a fan on the CPU cooler, the CPU could be throttling.
However -- you aren't able to OC the card either. resulting in the black screen driver crash.
I'd also test your power supply, and i just noticed you onl,y have 4 gb ram, and usually the i7-930 used 6 minimum (triple channel -- 3x2gb sticks)

What PSU are you using? how old its?..

eviltone said:

Sounds like the card to me, if the drop in fps was sudden, and all these errors are cropping up ... but since you said you lost a fan on the CPU cooler, the CPU could be throttling.
However -- you aren't able to OC the card either. resulting in the black screen driver crash.
I'd also test your power supply, and i just noticed you onl,y have 4 gb ram, and usually the i7-930 used 6 minimum (triple channel -- 3x2gb sticks)

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Oops sorry, that was a mistype. I have 6 gigs of ram not 4.

I doubt my cpu is getting too hot, it has a Megahalems on it with one fan. I will run some Prime95 on it tonight to see how hot it will get.

Araxie said:

What PSU are you using? how old its?..

Click to expand...

I have a Corsair TX750 in it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006

It's 4 years old.

Those 290 cards have been know to have some issues with x58 motherboards. Is there any way to test the card out on another machine?

chibe said:

Those 290 cards have been know to have some issues with x58 motherboards. Is there any way to test the card out on another machine?

Click to expand...

Not really. I just moved to the middle of nowhere Nebraska and don't know anyone in the area that has the same level of obsession as I do. There is a computer store about 20 min away through. I'll see if they have a test rig I can use. The only other option would be to get a new mobo/cpu/ram and I was trying to hold off until next year.