I'm having a few problems with a PC I built recently.
I bought all the parts new about 2-3 months ago, built it and it has been working fine up until the last week or so.
I basically bought the same parts used in this review, with the intention of OCing it eventually. (however, everything is currently running stock)
Intel e2160
MSI P35 Neo2-FR
2GB Geil Black Dragon DDR2 800
PowerColor HD3850 512MB
320GB Seagate IDE
Samsung DVDRW SATA
Antec Earthwatts 500W
Antec Sonata III
Windows XP SP2
So, onto the problem...
I was playing Stalker for about 20 mins when suddenly some artefacts appeared in the sky and then the screen went black.
I could still run around and could still see the map and ammo etc on the screen. I went to save the game and reload but it just froze.
I reset my PC and clicked my name on the login screen but the monitor went black and displayed "no signal"
The PC was still running as I could plug in USB devices and hear the usual sounds, it was just as if the video cable had come out.
I reset the PC and managed to log in fine.
I checked the GPU temps and they were about 40'C which is about normal considering it idles at 35'c and I was just playing a game a few minutes earlier.
I then loaded up Stalker and on the menu screen were loads of artefacts - the PC then crashed.
Reset again but this time there was artefacts all over the screen right from POST and I don't think it would even load Windows.
Reset again and the same problem.
I thought that it's possible the GPU may have overheated (although I'm 99% sure it didn't)
Left it for a few hours, started it up and it asked for a BIOS password (I've never set up a BIOS password! wtf?)
Reset the BIOS using the switch on the mobo and the password prompt is gone, but everything is still garbled.
Contacted the seller and they said to RMA the graphics card.
I then noticed the IDE cable wasn't plugged all the way into my HDD so I unplugged it and put it back in.
This seemed to solve the problem as it booted fine with no artefacts! weird!
4 days passed with no problems. I spent quite a bit of time using the PC doing uni assignments (but no games) without any problems.
Left my PC for about 20mins and came back to a garbled Windows Flag screensaver and the resolution had been lowered.
Shutdown and restarted but it seems now there was no video output at all, the monitor just displayed "no signal" and didn't show anything, not even POST messages.
The monitor I'm using is an old Sony lcd via a DVI-> VGA adapter.
I then tried plugging my TV into the PC via a DVI-DVI cable.
It worked, well kinda....
Managed to get into Windows and load up ATI's Catalyst Control Centre which then told me the driver was not compatible and to reinstall it.
Since a corrupt driver wouldn't effect VGA output of POST and BIOS I didn't think reinstalling it would help and it didn't!
I then got a BSOD that mentioned ati2dv..... something... hmmm....
Someone mentioned to me it could be a dodgy power supply so I unplugged all the power adapters and tested them with a multimeter and found they were all pretty much spot on what they should be. Plugged everything back in and the damn thing works again!
Today I played a few hours of Stalker on highest settings and got no problems at all.
I scanned for artefacts with ATI Tools for 30mins and got nothing.
Ran a memory test and got no errors.
Any ideas what's causing this?
At first I thought it was the GPU but now I'm not sure.
Sorry for the long post and thanks for any help!
Cheers!
I bought all the parts new about 2-3 months ago, built it and it has been working fine up until the last week or so.
I basically bought the same parts used in this review, with the intention of OCing it eventually. (however, everything is currently running stock)
Intel e2160
MSI P35 Neo2-FR
2GB Geil Black Dragon DDR2 800
PowerColor HD3850 512MB
320GB Seagate IDE
Samsung DVDRW SATA
Antec Earthwatts 500W
Antec Sonata III
Windows XP SP2
So, onto the problem...
I was playing Stalker for about 20 mins when suddenly some artefacts appeared in the sky and then the screen went black.
I could still run around and could still see the map and ammo etc on the screen. I went to save the game and reload but it just froze.
I reset my PC and clicked my name on the login screen but the monitor went black and displayed "no signal"
The PC was still running as I could plug in USB devices and hear the usual sounds, it was just as if the video cable had come out.
I reset the PC and managed to log in fine.
I checked the GPU temps and they were about 40'C which is about normal considering it idles at 35'c and I was just playing a game a few minutes earlier.
I then loaded up Stalker and on the menu screen were loads of artefacts - the PC then crashed.
Reset again but this time there was artefacts all over the screen right from POST and I don't think it would even load Windows.
Reset again and the same problem.
I thought that it's possible the GPU may have overheated (although I'm 99% sure it didn't)
Left it for a few hours, started it up and it asked for a BIOS password (I've never set up a BIOS password! wtf?)
Reset the BIOS using the switch on the mobo and the password prompt is gone, but everything is still garbled.
Contacted the seller and they said to RMA the graphics card.
I then noticed the IDE cable wasn't plugged all the way into my HDD so I unplugged it and put it back in.
This seemed to solve the problem as it booted fine with no artefacts! weird!
4 days passed with no problems. I spent quite a bit of time using the PC doing uni assignments (but no games) without any problems.
Left my PC for about 20mins and came back to a garbled Windows Flag screensaver and the resolution had been lowered.
Shutdown and restarted but it seems now there was no video output at all, the monitor just displayed "no signal" and didn't show anything, not even POST messages.
The monitor I'm using is an old Sony lcd via a DVI-> VGA adapter.
I then tried plugging my TV into the PC via a DVI-DVI cable.
It worked, well kinda....
Managed to get into Windows and load up ATI's Catalyst Control Centre which then told me the driver was not compatible and to reinstall it.
Since a corrupt driver wouldn't effect VGA output of POST and BIOS I didn't think reinstalling it would help and it didn't!
I then got a BSOD that mentioned ati2dv..... something... hmmm....
Someone mentioned to me it could be a dodgy power supply so I unplugged all the power adapters and tested them with a multimeter and found they were all pretty much spot on what they should be. Plugged everything back in and the damn thing works again!
Today I played a few hours of Stalker on highest settings and got no problems at all.
I scanned for artefacts with ATI Tools for 30mins and got nothing.
Ran a memory test and got no errors.
Any ideas what's causing this?
At first I thought it was the GPU but now I'm not sure.
Sorry for the long post and thanks for any help!
Cheers!