R8500 problems

[shadow_of_colors]

Hi all,
i've recently had the pleasure of seeing a nice piece of recent ATI history cross my desk. an 8500 LE w/ 128MB DDR, (Hynix 3.6ns BGA memory) rage theater chip and TV out. unfortunately it doesn't seem to be working all that well. i borrowed it from a friend to test it, and while it works fine on bootup, and 2D stuff, as soon as i start any 3d app it craps out on me. it's not my rig, as he had the exact same problems on his rig, not sure his stats but it's older than mine. any ideas what might be causing this? is the card just gone and unrecoverable? or is there something i'm missing?

FYI, sys stats are
430W enermax
ASUS A7N8X-D
2 X 512 MB 333 DDR (infinion chips)
Athalon XP 2700+ (week after i bought this the bartons came out.. arg)
current vid card 9800 pro 256MB edition. running the cat 4.2s no probs in anything COD, farcry demo, UT2K4 demo, MOH, etc.
swapped the 9800 out to test the 8500, comp boots no problem, goes into windows 2k, detects new card, reboots, runs fine. as soon as i go to start a 3d app, either hangs at start of app, or in the case of far cry, got into the game, but only displayed a black screen.
any help would be appreciated, as we're trying to get this card working just for sentiment's sake.
Thanks all,
Cheers

 

[cleeve]

I had problems with my old 8500 in 3d apps when I had a crappy generic 300w power supply.
I got a new power supply and the problems went away...

What brand and wattage is your PSU?

________________
<b>Radeon <font color=red>9500 PRO</b></font color=red> <i>(hardmodded 9500, o/c 322/322)</i>
<b>AthlonXP <font color=red>~2600+</b></font color=red> <i>(o/c 2400+ w/143Mhz fsb)</i>
<b>3dMark03: <font color=red>4,055</b></font color=red>

 

[shadow_of_colors]

as i noted above, my PSU is a 430W enermax.. it has no problems running my power hungry 9800 Pro w/ DDRII memory, so i can't see that as causing problems with the 8500. actually, after re-reading my post i just said 430W enermax, which is kind of vague, lol. sorry for not being more specific.
anyone have any more ideas?
thanks
Cheers

 

[cleeve]

Sweet Jesus, not sure how I missed that.

I need some coffee...

Well, it might be a cooling issue, if it's only happening in 3d mode. Are you sure the card's fan is working?

________________
<b>Radeon <font color=red>9500 PRO</b></font color=red> <i>(hardmodded 9500, o/c 322/322)</i>
<b>AthlonXP <font color=red>~2600+</b></font color=red> <i>(o/c 2400+ w/143Mhz fsb)</i>
<b>3dMark03: <font color=red>4,055</b></font color=red>

 

[Zoron]

What version of Cats are you running?

I can't remember what version it was, but I do remember that at one time if you had the original Radeon 7200, you couldn't run the newest drivers without lock-ups. The only solution was to install older drivers. You might have to downgrade your drivers to get your 8500 working properly.

<font color=red> If you design software that is fool-proof, only a fool will want to use it. </font color=red>

 

[shadow_of_colors]

huh, good point on the fan. i never actually thought to check it when i had the card in. i'll have to slap it back in tommorow and check it out. we've all had coffee days, i remember staring at a mobo for an hour trying to find it's make/model number, then realizing it was right between two of the PCI slots, where i kept looking right past it.

Zoron, thanks for the tip on the cat's, any idea what previous ones might work? i'm running the 4.2's now. how far back do you think i'd have to go? and where could i find older versions to try? i think this has been mentioned on this board before (where to find older ones) but i can't find it right now.
Thanks all, i'll try these two ideas tommorow if i can, then report back.
Cheers

 

[TheRod]

I have about the same setup....

Athlon XP on A7N8X board with a Radeon 8500LE 128 Megs and I run the newest Catalyst drivers without problems.

Maybe you should try to uninstall Catalyst drivers with Driver Cleaner first and reinstall them.

--
Would you buy a GPS enabled soap bar?

 

[shadow_of_colors]

hello all, bit of an update.
here's what i've done so far and i'm still having problems. disabled fastwrites in BIOS, gave me a little more stability, i can actually load and play far cry and UT2K4, but MOH and CoD still won't even load. i've tried various versions of that Cat's, 4.3, 4.2, 3.8, 3.6, 3.4,3.2,3.0. i don't want to go much further back than that. still no luck with games. UT and FC will play for a few seconds/minutes depending, then lock up. MOH and CoD still won't work at all. oh yea, i checked the fan, it's still spinning no problems there. i'm thinking of trying the omega drivers soon, just as an option. the board was made in 2002, and ATI's website says R7000's and newer have 3 year warranty, so i'm thinking maybe RMA? any other ideas out there? and thanks a lot for all the replies so far.
cheers!

 

[cleeve]

So these problems have consistantly happened on your machine as well as your friends? Then it probably is a card problem. Send it back for RMA.

________________
<b>Radeon <font color=red>9500 PRO</b></font color=red> <i>(hardmodded 9500, o/c 322/322)</i>
<b>AthlonXP <font color=red>~2600+</b></font color=red> <i>(o/c 2400+ w/143Mhz fsb)</i>
<b>3dMark03: <font color=red>4,055</b></font color=red>

 

[shadow_of_colors]

Cleeve,
yea, same problems on two different rigs. i was thinking i'd end up going the RMA route from the first, but i had to try some things first. i'm going to try the omega drives on monday, and if that doesn't result in any more positive results it'll be going back, unless anyone else can come up with a suggestion or two more in the mean time. we'd like to try and save this card if possible, but it's looking pretty faint at this point.
once again thanks all. i'll post on monday the results with omega, and then i think it'll be RMA time.
thanks again all.
Cheers

 

[Nights_L]

I think it's heat problem...try to underclock the card..

 

[Black_Cat]

Good idea. Underclock it with <A HREF="http://www.rage3d.com/index.php?node=r3dtweak" target="_new">rage3d tweak</A> and see if FC and UT play a little longer. If they do I think it would be reasonable to assume that it is a heat issue.

You've tried and failed. The lesson here is, never try again. -- Homer Simpson.

 

[shadow_of_colors]

thanks guys, i'll give that a try too. though i have my doubts, as MoH and CoD won't even load, let alone play for any length of time. still, anything is worth a try.
thanks again
Cheers

 

[shadow_of_colors]

alright,
monday morning, card still not working. i've now tried driver cleaner and re-installing the 4.3's, UT played well, everything else still didn't work. tried the omega's based on the 4.3's same thing. tried underclocking it with rage3dtweak, and the radlinker in the new omega's. dropped from 249.75 MHz core/mem, to 225 MHz core/mem, and dropped it again to something else, (don't remember off hand) even worse results, nothing loaded nothing played. reset to 249.75 MHz, back to same results as 4.3's/Omegas. UT2k4 plays well, at very low settings of course. Far Cry plays a bit, then locks. Call of Duty won't even get past the main menu to start, and MoH won't even get past the loader screen.
i'm going to recommend an RMA to my friend, unless anyone has one last suggestion?
thanks a lot for you help so far, i think the card is just gone.
Cheers