3d corruption on display and crashes on 9800 pro

[Stormcaller]

It's never a good sign when your manufacturer is clueless...

The display corruption takes two forms: A flashing, flickering, of straight lines of various colors, that seems to be text related (Meaning, if there's more text displayed on the screen, the more rapid and violent the corruption), as well as textures being displayed as long poles or spears, shooting out from their proper place.

About a month ago, this was playable, and there wasn't much of a problem with crashes, or lock ups. With special thanks to my tinkering, I'm now very good at getting the machine to die...fast. I've been using World of Warcraft as my primary test, as the display corruption seems to occur only in D3D, and requires DirectX 9.0c. The crashes and lock ups occur with both OpenGL and Direct3D, however. It takes less than 3 minutes for that to occur with WoW.

My tinkerings included uninstalling and reinstalling of the various catalyst drivers, from 4.1 up to current 5.3, and the Omega drivers. I've reinstalled Win XP Pro, along with Directx 9.0c.

All and any help is appreciated.

AMD Athlon 1400
768 MB SDRAM
AMD Keystone MB, VIA
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
SoundBlaster Live

 

[tbrunt3]

Not a bad card but a very small cpu .Try updating your motherboard chipset drivers is this a gateway computer buy any chance thats a gateway motherboard in there?

 

[olefarte]

If it is a Gateway, did you install this video card or did it come with the computer? If you added it, maybe your power supply is going bad or not big enough. I've got a Gateway, or it used to be before I did some serious upgrading, and believe me they don't hurt themselves on power supplies.

Also, as it sounds like it could be a heating issue, have you checked inside your case, and blown all the dust out of the heat sinks? Is you cpu fan turning, how about case fans. Look at air intakes, they may be clogged up with dust. Maybe you've thought of all this already, but I thought I'd through it out just in case.

 

[Stormcaller]

Everything has been cleaned up, yeah. I'm a big beleiver in PM.

Yes, it is a Gateway system. Four years old, but since i got the 9800 pro, it's been keeping up with standards. I could run Neverwinter Nights and other 3d programs at 1280x1024. It is getting a bit long in tooth now, but it's all I got, with no money to be spared for upgrades. (Most often, I get annoyed with the machines enough to go and purchase a complete new one anyways).

The power supply thing worries me. Unfortunately, I do not have them means of proving it, at all. Damn my multimeter for breaking on me. Is there anyway of testing this?

As far as other heat issues go...well, let's just say you might not like the way I rigged it up. It involves a 12 V AC/DC power adapter, and a 12 V 150 mA fan I yoinked outta someone else's garbage machine. It sounds wierd, but colling is good.