How to determine if problem is video card or monitor?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Steven Wandy
  • Start date Start date
S

Steven Wandy

I have an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro and a Mitsubishi Diamond Plus 91 monitor.
At certain combinations of resolution and refresh rates I get these wavy
lines (horizontal lines that sort of move from the bottom to the top of the
monitor).
They are the worst in MS Links Golf where you can set the screen resolution
and color depth but not refresh rates.
I plugged the monitor into my laptop and the problem did not appear, but
it's not really a fair comparison as I could not get the same
resolution/refresh combinations.
Any suggestions? (aside from schlepping the monitor to someone else's house)
 
A poss cause might be a overloaded PSU or one with poor noise absorption. Try temporarily
disconnecting loading from the PSU to see what that does. also worth moving plugs around so that
the one connected to the R9700 is not connected to anything else.

Early batches of the 9500had the wavy line problem because ATI skimped on a capacitor on the rf
circuitry. I dont know whether the same problem existed on the 9700, but I fixed it on my 9500 by
using the DVI output rather than the analog monitor output. May also be worth a try.

S
 
When that happened to me it was a weak power supply. If that is it make sure
you get a GOOD brand name 400w or better.

Randy
 
are you over driving the monitor? some resolutions / refresh rates are
not supported. Is your monitor PnP, and described properly in 'display
properties'?
 
Any chance you left the actual "monitor" max rate fixed
at 60 hz ? That would sure do it.

johns
 
Would not even know how to do that? It's not in any of the setting of the
menu set into the monitor that I can access.
 
Windows XP picks up the monitor as Plug and Play. I had downloaded a monitor
driver from NEC's website that allowed me to specify the actual monitor. I
think that is when my problems started. The screen seems much more stable -
at all refresh rates - when I reset the drivers to the Plug and Play.
Strange huh???
 
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