Screen flickers at some parts while gaming

[rmdl51]

Some days ago I asked for help when Iw as building my system, well I pretty much finished and here's what I have right now:

Asus P5Q Pro Turbo
Intel Core Quad Q6600
2x2GB DDR2 1066 Corsair
WD Raptor 150GB + 1TB WD Black for storage
XFX HD 4870 1GB
Antec 650w triple 12v rail
Windows Vista 64-bit
LG Blu ray/HD dvd drive

Well I go over my budget a little and I couldn't afford a monitor at the moment, so I plug my old 17" Hyundai L70N which has a max res of 1280x1024 75hz and 16ms response.

My question is: Every game I've installed (I've tried Crysis and Age of empires III) it runs but it flickers anywhere I place the mouse on AOE, I saw diagonal lines when playing crysis and the gun pixelates as I move, is this because of my old monitor? or Windows Vista 64- bit and DX10 are the ones causing this.

I'm guessing those because before I was running Crysis with very good performance with only 2GB of DDR2 800 an 8800GT and Windows XP and back then I had a 22" viewsonic, so, the HD 4870 and the 4GB of ram should improve on the performance, however I know DX10 is more a resourse hog, could my current system be a problem to run crysis if yes how come an old game like AOE does have the same problem, I honestly think it's my monitor, but I want to ask to be sure if this problem will be gone next week when I order my monitor or I should look to figure it out the problem right now, BTW I already lower my settings and I see no improvements on this problem, could you let me know what do you think.

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[red1776]

Hi RM,
I bet that goes away when you upgrade your monitor, 16ms is pretty slow, sounds like screen tearing, your rig is sending to many FPS to that monitor. have you tried turning on vsync?

 

[rmdl51]

Yes, I've turned vsync on and no luck, well I did on AOE 3, I did not tried on crysis, however I'm aware 16ms is very slow but I was wondering if this problem is related to those 16ms, and I dont know how to explain how the screen behave but at some parts I can see triangles or some objects are out of the shape it's supposed to be, maybe it's like you call it, tearing.

I know my rig is not top of the line, but I believe is pretty decent to have a very good performance specially after reading all the good reviews from the HD 4870 and so many recommend that video card but I was worried if my card could be defective.

Unfortunately I have no other monitor to at least test my video card, unless I can do it on my living room TV, it's a 50" 720p plasma, do you think I can try it there to see how it performs? I don't know if it's a problem being a 50" TV, I could use a DVI to HDMI cable or use the RGB blue cable to the TV PC input.. OH! BTW this monitor is Analog only, so I have to put an adapter from the video card to the RGB monitor cable, if that matters for my problem..

 

[red1776]

i think Tv's are even worse when it comes to tearing if im correct, i really think that that your rig is too fast for the monitor.

 

[hellokitty[hk]]

16ms response.

I think that would look horrid D:, but i've never even heard of 16ms heh.
I would put my bet on that first, but it is also possible (though unlikely) that your graphics card is running too fast and artifacting.

 

[rmdl51]

Ok, Today I bought a Samsung Syncmaster 2333HD which is 23" 5ms and 1920x1080, My problem still persists

I've uninstall the ATI CCC 9.4 and reinstall it and no luck, downgrade to 9.3 still no luck, change resolutions, disable AA, enable disable V sync still no luck... is my graphic card defective? or what or where can I tweak settings to solve this issue?

 

[hellokitty[hk]]

Uh oh, XFX is known for good support, I would be looking into RMA around now, I personally have no idea aside from defective graphics card...I hope the monitor was a good buy regardless of the unhelpfullness.

 

[rmdl51]

I'm downloading some beta drivers right now, I hope this helps.. I'll see and let you know

 

[ZaUcY]

i dont know about the tearing or weird triangle things, but i bought a HD 4870 not to long ago and when i was shopping around i wanted to get an XFX (mainly cause their cards looked cool) but i was reading the reviews for EVERY ONE, each card had complaints on the screen flickering in game. so as far as the flickering thats normal for the XFX ATI cards.

 

[hellokitty[hk]]

EVERY ONE, each card had complaints on the screen flickering in game. so as far as the flickering thats normal for the XFX ATI cards.

Really?
Is it possible that everyone STILL chooses the XFX 4870 over my favorite suggestion, the Saphire 4870? Great warranty when all the RMA products have the same problem .
Though that is very strange, not only that XFX somehow causes such a problem, but that people find this normal and acceptable for a more expensive card.

 

[ZaUcY]

yeah i ended up buying the sapphire hd 4870 1gb toxic because sapphire makes sweet cards and their really cheap. well i just saw it on the XFX cards. i mean people still gave them 5 out of 5 but was saying there was flickering and it was on the reviews for every single XFX card. my sapphire has no flickering or problems what so ever though. check it out, i read the reviews on www.newegg.com

 

[rmdl51]

That's too bad I rush buying XFX because of the lifetime warranty without reading those reviews, Beta drivers didn't help at all, and now I just notice I can't play any DVD's or Blu ray without getting BSOD.

I already send a message to XFX customer support, let's see if they are as good as everybody says.

 

[ZaUcY]

hopefully they help...... was it a clean install of windows when you put this card in your system? (im guessing it was cause it sounds like you built a new system)

 

[rmdl51]

I sold my system to a friend and Just keep my case, my CPU, my WD Raptor 150 gb (which I completely format before installing windows) and my LG blu-ray drive.

So brand new PSU, Mobo, Video card and memory and a new HDD for storage.

Yes, the installation was fresh over all this hardware... but I used my old monitor Hyunday L70N, which it was very old 17" 1280x1024 16ms, but I think that shouldn't be a problem right? I mean I even install a driver for my new monitor...

BTW, my error message over the BSOD it's 0x00000ae I think it's memory related right? but could be video memory? also how can I see the info over the minidumps?

 

[ZaUcY]

i dunno man.... i really wish i could help but i have pretty much no experience with fixing memory dumps. my computer science teacher does though so i can ask him tomorrow for you if it means its only ram or video ram. if the new monitor didnt fix anything then im pretty positive it wasnt the old one. it does have a wicked slow refresh rate but i imagine that would just result in tearing, but then again im not an expert. you mentioned you were running 64 bit right? well my computer runs FLAWLESSLY with 32bit but every single time i tried running x64 it would freeze up like every 2 minutes and i think i got BSOD a few times i mean you could try running x32 if you arent fixed on x64. have you done any OCing or is all running stock speeds? cause that could cause some of your problems. you made sure you had all the latest drivers? so ill ask my teacher tomorrow about the memory dumps.

 

[ZaUcY]

oh and to see the info on minidumps.... with vista if you click start, right click computer, click properties it should bring up your system info. on the left side there should be a four UAC protected links to click, click on "advanced system setting" then it will ask to continue click yes, then a window should pop up with a 5 tabs already on a tab called "advanced" on the bottom of advanced there should be a section called "start up and recovery" click on settings and then where it says "system failure" uncheck automatically restart and when you get the BSOD and it does memory dumps it will keep the memory dump up until you hard restart for you to read it. i hope that answers your question

 

[ZaUcY]

i also just noticed you said you have 3 12v rails, you could possibly double check the wire management on each rail make sure you arent pulling to many amps through a single rail.

 

[rmdl51]

Don't worry about the 12v rails they are properly managed, I've learned my lesson in the past over that subject, the 4870 is getting juice directly from the PCI-E connectors from the PSU.

I don't want to run 32 bit, I want to stay 64-bit now mainly for my 4GB of ram, I've done some OCing but nothing fancy just about minimal settings.

BTW, you could always use the edit button the add more info to your same post

 

[ZaUcY]

oh yeah.... i guess i should've done that. yeah i dont know what to tell you, i pulled this up with your error code maybe it can help you http://www.scribd.com/doc/1017106/0x0000000A . im not an expert with computers (obviously) but if i ever get an issue i try EVERY possible thing that may or may not be the source of the problem, sometimes the problem is something your for sure it wasn't. but yeah sorry i cant really help you with this.

 

[rmdl51]

Anybody have any other suggestions? I'm tired trying older drivers from ATI: 9.4, 9.3, 9.1, 8.12 nothing works.

XFX support have not help so far, they just suggest me to install codec package for the dvd problem and new driver for the gaming problem, when I already told them I tried all drivers...

Should this confirm my card is defective? I'm going to try this card on a different system, or maybe I'll install my Windows 7 RC and see if I have the same issue, any other suggestions

 

[hellokitty[hk]]

XFX support have not help so far, they just suggest me to install codec package for the dvd problem and new driver for the gaming problem, when I already told them I tried all drivers...

Well simply because so many other XFX users are supposedly getting the exact same issue with their cards, I would think the XFX card is the problem.