My Screen looks like a deck chair

[mickarms]

Hi,

Lets get the system out the way first, I have a:

Intel P4
1GB RAM
Abit IS7 Mobo
Thermaltake 480Watt PSU
MSI 5700 Ultra AGP Gfx card


Last week I bought a new Leadtek Winfast 6800GT AGP graphics card. For the first couple of days it worked great then I turned the PC on one night and it just showed scrambled lines and blocks. I tried reseating the card, checking the ram and all the connections but they seemed fine so I sent the card back for a replacement.....and still waiting. In the meantime I've reinstalled my MSI Nvidia 5700Ultra AGP card and everything was fine until yesterday, I was having a lovely game of Splinter Cell and the screen just froze. I rebooted the PC and the screen just shows columns of lines in the post. I had to start the PC in safemode and disable the MSI 5700 Ultra display and restart so I'm only getting 640 x 480 for my display and there are 5 colums of 4 lines running down the screen. I've tried reseating the card but that does nothing, any idea's? Could these two graphics card problems be related?

Thanks

 

[SOcRatEs]

Hello! Welcome to TechSpot

What version of driver are you using with these nVidia cards?
Try other drivers HERE from TS
G'Luck

 

[mickarms]

Thanks for replying! I've got the latest version of the Forceware driver on but this problem occurs from the POST before the drivers are even loaded. I've had to disable my MSI 5700 ultra in device settings, while in safe mode, as if I have the card enabled my screen goes blank before it hits the desktop screen, requiring me to reboot and start in safe mode again. I'm thinking this Could be either a dodgy AGP port or Graphics card.

 

[SOcRatEs]

I'm thinking this Could be either a dodgy AGP port or Graphics card.

Yeah, it's starting to look that way if two cards having the same prob!
If so do you have another agp card to test agp slot?
I have an abit vt7 with 6800 gt oc that runs great.
G'Luck

 

[mickarms]

Hi again and thanks once more for your help.

Indeed it was a dodgy graphics card, a friend brought over one of his old Rage AGP cards and this works fine, I've had my MSI 5700 Ultra for about 18 months now so it's out of warrenty I think so just waiting for my new 6800 GT to arrive. I also found out that there is a problem with quite a few Leadtek 6800 GT's in circulation thanks to this website which I brought up with the supplier and they confirmed there had been a number of these cards being returned with the same problem as I had. I've now arranged for an XFX 6800 GT card so hopefully this should put all my problems at rest.

Thanks Again for your response on this.

 

[SOcRatEs]

No problem!
Glad to hear it worked out