[SOLVED] Grey Screen of Death

[JoeSchmo12346]

Hi there, I've recently started getting the dreaded grey screen with vertical lines whilst gaming. My card is a Gigabyte Windforce R9 280. I did a search on some other forums and it seems that this issue is most commonly associated with the ATI 5700 and 5800 series of cards. My card is slightly newer but it does have DDR5 memory, something which was cited as a possible cause of this issue. A couple of months back, my G25 wheel started disconnecting sporadically. It started with momentary disconnections and deteriorated to the point that it now goes limp and lifeless before the initial calibration has finished. I've checked it in a PS4 to make sure it's not the wheel itself at fault; it seems to power up and calibrate fine (although it's not compatible to use with a PS4). I mention this because I was wondering whether the grey screen issue combined with the USB disconnections might point to a motherboard failure. Can anyone shed any light on this issue? Thanks.

 

[jimmysmitty]

Its possible its the motherboard but you can Google R9 280 Grey Screen and find plenty of people with the issue. I even found some with the RX 400 series getting it. I have never see a motherboard going bad cause a GSoD, its normally going to throw a BSoD.

The solution for that it to tear down the GPU and literally, and I mean this, bake it in an oven for 10 minutes at 200F. It works most of the time.

However my suggestion would be to try the GPU in a different system or try a different GPU in your system and see if the issue persists. If it persists in a different system or a different GPU does not have the same issue in your system its the GPU.

 

[JoeSchmo12346]

Its possible its the motherboard but you can Google R9 280 Grey Screen and find plenty of people with the issue. I even found some with the RX 400 series getting it. I have never see a motherboard going bad cause a GSoD, its normally going to throw a BSoD.

The solution for that it to tear down the GPU and literally, and I mean this, bake it in an oven for 10 minutes at 200F. It works most of the time.

However my suggestion would be to try the GPU in a different system or try a different GPU in your system and see if the issue persists. If it persists in a different system or a different GPU does not have the same issue in your system its the GPU.

It's entirely possible that the motherboard is failing at the same time; I bought a cheap second hand one to replace another one that had died on me (reluctant to buy a new CPU!). Unfortunately, I don't have either a second graphics card or computer to try what you suggested. I'll have to find somebody to either borrow an old card from, or to test out mine- before resorting to the baking trick!

 

[jimmysmitty]

It's entirely possible that the motherboard is failing at the same time; I bought a cheap second hand one to replace another one that had died on me (reluctant to buy a new CPU!). Unfortunately, I don't have either a second graphics card or computer to try what you suggested. I'll have to find somebody to either borrow an old card from, or to test out mine- before resorting to the baking trick!

I would go that route for sure. If the GPU does the same thing in a different system then baking it is a chance you can take.

But you are correct, the board may be going out as well. I just have never seen it cause an issue commonly known to ATI/AMD GPUs.