Low resolution on monitor. Bad VRAM?

[NorthSouthComm]

After reporting some overheating on the graphics card, my motherboard is not supporting the minimum video display resolution in Windows Vista Ultimate. The display settings are stuck at the minimum resolution of 800 x 600 pixels, and I cannot slide the bar to increase resolution. I have an error 43 reported with the GPU. When I power up I see artifacts such as square root symbols during BIOS startup, and the display has slightly jagged horizontal blue or white lines throughout spaced 5mm apart. I believe these are artifacts consistant with VRAM problems. I did a full dusting inside the case and tried swapping out the GPU and PSU and cables and even the monitor, but I still cannot get minimum resolution on my display.

My GPU is an NVidia GeForce 8800 GT, I have a 650W power supply, and I tested the cables. My motherboard has an Intel Core 2 Quad CPU @ 2.66 GHz and I am running Vista Ultimate. The monitor cable is connected to the GPU slot not the motherboard.

Just in case it might be a power issue, I replaced the PSU with a brand new Corsair TX650 650 watt and I have the same symptoms. So I guess the only remaining suspect is either the BIOS (which has no update available since 2008) or the motherboard. Is there a way to check if part of the motherboard is not functioning? The motherboard has the following components:

Intel Intel(R) 82801 PCI Bridge - 244E
Intel Intel(R) G33/G31/P35 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1
Intel Intel(R) G33/G31/P35 Express Chipset Processor to I/O Controller - 29C0
Intel Intel(R) G33/G31/P35/P31 Express Chipset PCI Express Root Port - 29C1
Intel PCI Simple Communications Controller
Intel PCI standard PCI-to-PCI bridge
Intel Pont ISA standard PCI
Microsoft Microsoft UAA Bus Driver for High Definition Audio
Synaptics Intel(R) ICH9 Family SMBus Controller - 2930

 

[Brantyn Gerik]

Due to the overheat you probably did indeed fry one or more of the memory modules. looks like you need a new gpu