Specs:
HIS IceQ3 Radeon x1950 PRO (512mb of 256-bit GDDR3 memory) Video Card
ECS ATX Socket AM2 580X Crossfire AMD Motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4600+(65W) Windsor 2.4GHz Socket AM2 Processor
2x 1GB Corsair XMS2 DDR2 SDRAM (PC2 6400)
COOLER MASTER eXtreme Power 550W max PSU w/ (2x 12V @ 16A each)
I've got all the latest drivers and everything, I'm running windows XP SP2.
Video Card currently clocked at 617MHz(GPU) 736MHz(memory)
Just bought the system, built it myself, no problems with anything except Oblivion, which is the main reason why I bought the system to begin with.
The system runs fine when playing CS:S or WC3 on highest settings.
However, when playing Oblivion, every hour or so the VPU will just crash. My monitor will go blank, and the power indicator will turn yellow. I'll be able to hear the music, but won't be able to do anything else, forcing me to restart.
I've downloaded ATT(ATI Tray Tools), and tried turning up the fan. That helped a bit(but not enough). After upping the fan speed, the GPU would never go above 55C anyway, and usually stayed in the range of 45-52C.
Then I read somewhere that I should try underclocking it. However, whenever I try to use ATT to underclock it, my screen either goes blank, or sometimes green in this case, and again, I have to restart.
I also read somewhere that it could be an issue with my PSU. So, I went into the BIOS and enabled "10% extra current for GFX" and "10% extra current for GPP", as well as upping the max power wattage from 75 to 85W on each GFX slot, and from 25W to 30W on the GPP. Even after this, I'm still getting occasional VPU crashes every hour or so, and moreover, after 2-3 hours of use, some screens would start to flicker. Like, firefox would constantly oscillate between two pages, and when I go into the start menu, the current option would only be highlighted if I moved the mouse. I haven't been able to fix this either without a restart. Everything seems normal if I minimize everything and look at the desktop, but whenever I open a window, it starts jumping between a scroll up and a scroll down.
So, overall concerns:
1. Why would my VPU crash?
2. Why doesn't ATI Catalyst do a VPU recover?
3. How can I underclock the VPU without using ATT?
4. Is it safe to adjust graphics card power settings in the BIOS?
5. Any idea what this screen flicker thing is?
If you need any additional information just ask.
thanks for your help :-D