Graphics corruption - cause?

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drdeutsch

2[H]4U
Joined
Sep 17, 2004
Messages
3,775
Not sure where to post this, since I'm not sure of the cause.

Long story short, I'm getting a lot of graphics corruption in every game I play. Even older games, like Jedi Academy or Metal Gear Sold 2, that aren't that demanding, have artifacts or corruption so I can't see the screen (MGS2 shows up almost all black, as if it's all shadows). No amount of playing with the options seems to fix this.

My components are:
Asus A8N-SLI Premium
X2 4400+ (not overclocked, but running 2 instances of FAH)
eVGA 7800GT (not overclocked, running around 40 C)
2 GB Corsair RAM
Antec TruePower II 500w psu.
1 150 GB Rapter and 1 400 GB WD ks.

Now, I recently had to replace the PSU. I was using an Antec Neo480, but for some reason that suddenly became incompatible with the motherboard, so I bought the 500. Should this be able to provide enough power to all the components?

I've updated the latest video drivers. I'm at a loss at to what's causing this... faulty video card? Not enough power? Too much heat? I'm using an Antec P180b, so there's plenty of airflow and temps are pretty good.

Also, I just noticed this recently. I haven't gamed on this rig for a solid 6 months or so - I've been so busy with school and thesis work that I simply haven't had time. So now I fire up some classics and find out they don't work.... any help is appreciated.
 
Two things I'm sure you have thought of, but when you updated your video drivers, did you run DriverCleaner?
Second, is your video card sharing power with anything? I had a similar problem when I had my video card and a couple fans sharing the same power line.
 
I just ran drivercleaner and am re-installing to see if that clears it up.

Also, I'll check the power settings. I'm pretty sure the card is on it's own line, but I'll double check.
 
Okay, I ran driver cleaner and cleaned out all the old NVidia drivers and did the drivers.cab just for good measure.

Then I retried a few games - didn't work.

Also, I double checked and the card is on it's own power line - it's a PCI-E power connector running directly from one of the modular ports on the psu to the video card.

Any other suggestions? I was thinking of upgrading to an ATI card anyway, but I'd like to know if this card is borked before I try to sell it.

drdeutsch
 
Does your comp take a while to recover when you exit out of said games? If it does then I've had the exact same issue and it turned out to be bad memory. If not then it sounds like a bad vid card. I've had that happen as well--
 
No, it usually exits out right away. I haven't noticed any unusual delays.

I'm leaning towards bad vid card as well. I'm running 3dMark06 to get some comparison benchmarks and I'm also running Artifact Scanning from AtiTool to see how long it stays stable.

eVGA has a great warranty/return policy, so I may just ship it in and get a new one.
Thanks,
drdeutsch
 
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