ATI Radeon 9800 Pro _dying_?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Cyde Weys
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Cyde Weys

It seems like my 9800 Pro is dying. The problems first started roughly
when I updated to Catalyst 5.8 drivers. Textures would simply start
disappearing or warping to really strange colors starting at around 10
minutes of gameplay. Quitting the game and reloading seemed to fix
that, but who only plays games for ten minutes at a time? So I
reverted to the 5.7 drivers. It's not quite so bad anymore, but I
still get the problem.

What is going on? My 9800 Pro worked for over a year before these
problems started showing up. Do you think I'm having an overheating
problem? I did replace the stock fan it came with with a large
fan-type dealie that takes up a whole PCI slot, and I was overclocking
for awhile. I got these problems and stopped overclocking, but it's
not seeming to help.

How do I tell if my GPU is overheating, anyway? Is there a temperature
probe like there is with CPUs?

Thanks for the help!
 
Cyde Weys said:
It seems like my 9800 Pro is dying. The problems first started roughly
when I updated to Catalyst 5.8 drivers. Textures would simply start
disappearing or warping to really strange colors starting at around 10
minutes of gameplay. Quitting the game and reloading seemed to fix
that, but who only plays games for ten minutes at a time? So I
reverted to the 5.7 drivers. It's not quite so bad anymore, but I
still get the problem.

What is going on? My 9800 Pro worked for over a year before these
problems started showing up. Do you think I'm having an overheating
problem? I did replace the stock fan it came with with a large
fan-type dealie that takes up a whole PCI slot, and I was overclocking
for awhile. I got these problems and stopped overclocking, but it's
not seeming to help.

How do I tell if my GPU is overheating, anyway? Is there a temperature
probe like there is with CPUs?

Thanks for the help!
Click to expand...

Ive had texture problems like you describe with most of the 5 series
Catalysts and several ppl on the Rage3D forums have posted that the newer
Cats from 5.6 onwards make your card run hotter. Go back to the good old
4.12s and see if your card runs better. Run it stock speeds of course and if
it seems clear then try ocing. Also a regular check and clean up of your
machine may help - the heatsinks do tend to clogged up with dust.
 
It seems like my 9800 Pro is dying. The problems first started roughly
when I updated to Catalyst 5.8 drivers. Textures would simply start
disappearing or warping to really strange colors starting at around 10
minutes of gameplay. Quitting the game and reloading seemed to fix
that, but who only plays games for ten minutes at a time? So I
reverted to the 5.7 drivers. It's not quite so bad anymore, but I
still get the problem.

What is going on? My 9800 Pro worked for over a year before these
problems started showing up. Do you think I'm having an overheating
problem? I did replace the stock fan it came with with a large
fan-type dealie that takes up a whole PCI slot, and I was overclocking
for awhile. I got these problems and stopped overclocking, but it's
not seeming to help.

How do I tell if my GPU is overheating, anyway? Is there a temperature
probe like there is with CPUs?

Thanks for the help!
Click to expand...

[rant]

What a good laugh? Read this,

http://www.tomshardware.com/hardnews/20050922_094501.html


Excerpt:

"Graphics drivers developed for Vista, Microsoft's next
generation operating system, will be far more stable than
their Windows XP-based counterparts, and not crash the
operating system anymore, an executive of graphics chip
developer ATI told Tom's Hardware Guide."

Translation:

ATI is doing same thing they have in past years. They chose
to not get the bugs worked out of their drivers and just
leave them broken, instead "implying" that if only you buy
their NEXT product generations, then suddenly things will be
right. Problem is, this is nothing new, just a bit of deja
vu. You've already PAID for a product they decide they're
only going to put a minor effort into supporting. Today
there are servers out there where you can't even remove
properly installed ATI drivers because ATI couldn't even be
bothered to fix something as basic as uninstall routine in
Add/Remove programs. They are essentially saying "screw
you, now buy more stuff from us!".

[/rant]

As for your aftermarket fan (is it the heatsink too)?
I presume you've checked to make sure fan is still spinning
at proper speed. If it's using a cheap sleeve-bearing fan
it would be good to lube that fan _before_ it starts making
noise due to chewing up the bearing, with a high quality
moderately thick oil (almost grease consistency).

If the 'sink (metal portion) was also replaced (or for that
matter, even if it wasn't) you might also see if it's still
making good contact. Maybe it's fine or maybe it needs
removed, the contact area on both parts cleaned off, and a
fresh application of high-quality, synthetic based thermal
compound (like arctic alumina or take-your-pick). If there
is a 3rd party metal heatsink body installed and it doesn't
make quite perfect contact (or is relatively rough on the
bottom and you don't want to lap it till it's flatter), it
can be necessary to put on more thermal compound to
compensate. In that case it might be best to avoid those
compounds that aren't electrically inert, like Arctic
Silver. It's relatively non-conductive but still
capacitive, IIRC.
 
I've got the 9700Pro with a nice aftermarket wrap-around heatsink and fan. I
used to be able to run it at 9800Pro speeds but now even at stock speeds
it'll sometimes (1 out of 25 starts) boot up with black vertical bands. I
just quickly turn it off (just rebooting doesn't fix) and back on and it
usually runs fine. If I don't see the bands on the initial boot it'll run
perfect (at 9700Pro speeds). I'm guessing one of these boots I'll see black
bands and not be able to correct them by turning it off and back on, but
this card has served me better than any I've ever had so I can't really
complain.
....anyway, yes, you may have damaged your card slightly by OC'ing. But I'd
try some of the older Cat's and give your case and fans a good cleaning
before sending it out to pasture.
 
kony said:
As for your aftermarket fan (is it the heatsink too)?
Click to expand...

Yeah, I have the RAM heatsinks too.
I presume you've checked to make sure fan is still spinning
at proper speed. If it's using a cheap sleeve-bearing fan
it would be good to lube that fan _before_ it starts making
noise due to chewing up the bearing, with a high quality
moderately thick oil (almost grease consistency).
Click to expand...

Yeah, funny thing ... errmm ... there's apparently a power switch for
the aftermarket videocard fan. I guess when I moved my computer around
I must've flipped it, because I just turned it back on and my problems
seem to have disappeared.

Who in the hell makes a power switch for your video card fan, anyway?!
 
Cyde said:
Yeah, I have the RAM heatsinks too.


Yeah, funny thing ... errmm ... there's apparently a power switch for
the aftermarket videocard fan. I guess when I moved my computer around
I must've flipped it, because I just turned it back on and my problems
seem to have disappeared.
Click to expand...

Dammit, nevermind. Now it's on the fritz again. And the fan is most
assuredly on, and the air coming out of it isn't really all THAT hot.
What in the hell :-(
 
Dammit, nevermind. Now it's on the fritz again. And the fan is most
assuredly on, and the air coming out of it isn't really all THAT hot.
What in the hell :-(
Click to expand...

I hate to suggest it but if it's been overheating awhile
without the fan on, it may be heat-damaged.
 
kony said:
I hate to suggest it but if it's been overheating awhile
without the fan on, it may be heat-damaged.
Click to expand...

I know, that's what I was thinking :-(

Sooo ... any suggestions on a new videocard? I don't want to spend
tooooo much.
 
I know, that's what I was thinking :-(

Sooo ... any suggestions on a new videocard? I don't want to spend
tooooo much.
Click to expand...

I'd get a 6800 (non-LE, non-GT) and try to unlock it and o'c
it till the wheels fell off. Seems hard to justify an
expensive AGP based card these days though.
 
kony said:
I'd get a 6800 (non-LE, non-GT) and try to unlock it and o'c
it till the wheels fell off. Seems hard to justify an
expensive AGP based card these days though.
Click to expand...

Just browsing on NewEgg I see that the cheapest cards based on the 6800
chipset are AGP and the more expensive ones are PCI Express. I don't
have PCI Express on my mobo so ... would that really be worth it?
Also, is there any big difference between the 6800 cards from the
variety of manufacturers, and if so, which should I get?
 
Just browsing on NewEgg I see that the cheapest cards based on the 6800
chipset are AGP and the more expensive ones are PCI Express. I don't
have PCI Express on my mobo so ... would that really be worth it?
Also, is there any big difference between the 6800 cards from the
variety of manufacturers, and if so, which should I get?
Click to expand...


No, not worth it "now", but given the pattern you've alreay
shown, that you will use a card like 9800 long enough to get
some value out of it, the same might hold true for another
card, with any AGP based card being a stop-gap until your
next motherboard and CPU purchase.

I haven't surveyed all the 6800 recently, you might seek
benchmarks of the current models as they tend to change a
little over time and as nVidia drops price of the GPUs,
more vendors start making budgetized versions of them.
Generally speaking it's the same old thing, compare memory
speed & type, bus width, pipes, GPU speed. Fans I can't
tell you about as I always throw my own 'sink on cards if
I'm keeping it for myself.... except that none seem to have
a reasonable lifespan.
 
Just browsing on NewEgg I see that the cheapest cards based on the 6800
chipset are AGP and the more expensive ones are PCI Express. I don't
have PCI Express on my mobo so ... would that really be worth it?
Also, is there any big difference between the 6800 cards from the
variety of manufacturers, and if so, which should I get?
Click to expand...

The PCI express cards dont have any more performance than the AGP
versions. In fact - I didnt know this since I got the 6800 AGP last
year , sites say the plain PCI express 6800 CANT be unlocked.

Sites have claimed that Nvidia wanted to reduce the cost of the 6800s
which cost too much to make and the yields were good enough on the
chips so they didnt have to disable all those pipes on as many chips
as they though they would. So they came out with the NV41 chip which
has 12 pipes vs the NV40 16 pipe version.

They supposedly use these NV41s on PCI express for a while now so the
new cards cant be unlocked , the PCI express versions cause they have
no extra pipes.

See heres a post:

the NV41 is the 12 pipe and i think 5 vertex, NV40. unless the 6800
you got has only 8 pipes enabled, 12 is all you're going to get.

orginally when the 6800nu came out they were using full fledged NV40's
with 12 of the 16 pipes enabled. so people were able to mod their card
to use all 16. that's probably what you're reading. check the dates. i
wouldn't think you'll see much past nov-dec 2004.


The inquirer:
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=19271

The evga I mentioned in another post is a pretty good price 153 bucks
or so with rebate at newegg 6800 agp I think. Depends on the outputs
you need some of the higher costing ones have fancier outputs Dual DVI
or whatever.

The mainthing is when you plan on upgrading as Kony says. If you are
going to upgrade to pci express anytime soon might as well wait. You
can sell your card though but thats a hassle.
 
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