bullshit i tells ya,

[Polkovnik]

A bit over a year ago (summer 06) I purchased me some parts and built me a PC. It was a fine machine with a fine video card (i forget which one it is).

I had been able to play games perfectly fine. Then, I was playing oblivion one time and I saw graphical fuckups (called artifacting), when a few polygons of a model just get stretched extremely far, so you'd have a tree with a huge line going into the sky, et cetera. Then the card started overheating and restarting itself.

fuck that, so I got it exchanged fo free

Problem solved I thought. I played oblivion on high settings and it looked fantastic.
A few months later, here I am. I had been able to play ArmA on full settings easily. Even CoD4. Last time I tried to run ArmA on full, it restarted my comp. I have to play on lowest settings and 1024x768, which is less than my monitor resolution and looks like shit and artifacts, too.

it started overheating and resetting when I was playing cod2, which isn't very graphically demanding.


why does this keep happening? all my shit is updated.
EDIT: the card is radeon x1900 GT

[Cju]

I'm no expert, but perhaps your motherboard is malfunctioning or has settings that are trying to overwork your components? Also the overheating might be due to restricted airflow or something.

I would suggest perhaps going into your BIOS and checking the CPU temps as well, because if that overheats, it is liable to shut down instantly - that might explain why you get random resets and it would confirm that you have a heatsink/airflow/motherboard problem.

[Polkovnik]

AMD Athlon 3200+ processor
2.01 Ghz
512 mb RAM


i don't think it's 'overworking' my card, because I played these same games perfectly fine for months.

[PsiRedEye22]

Excessive heat destroys components over time. Never think it is a bad idea to monitor your heat outputs.

[Poser Park]

Dude, don't you know that the best computer parts today are literally next month's half-off sale?

[Gpod]

Poser Park.... dude this is off topic but are you serious with that avatar?

[The_Guitarist]

Get a new fan.

[Tenelen]

Alright I had the same problem with my Nvidia 7950 which is known to overheat. The first one would get to about 100 C and then shut down. I sent the first in and got it replaced, got the new one and after a week or two it started to do it again but this time worse. I opened up a game and was monitoring my temps for it and I managed to hit 120 C (No, I am not lieing) the game was completely unplayable. This one for some reason didn't shut down my PC so I was just pissed. Both of them ran a consistent 76 C idle.

So anyway, I decided to get this (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835186017) which took my idle temp to around 35 C and managed to keep my MAX temp to about 45. I got the fans that you could have gotten with it in the package.

Wait, shit. I just checked and that heatsink won't work with your graphics card, so look around and find one that's compatible with your card. It's worth it.

[TheScarecrow]

Poser Park.... dude this is off topic but are you serious with that avatar?Yes he is quite serious hes calling his extremist party "attention whoreism."

Anyway on topic now.
I think some fans would be your best bet. My case has a fan on the side of it.
Also, I have a fan that takes up a video card slot right underneath my video card that blows on it.
A little noisy though, kinda sounds like a refrigerator.

[usefulidiot316]

I've got the same problem with my 7900gt. Mine came with stuck pixels I originally thought were on the monitor, until I took a screenshot with one of those dead pixels and it was still there. When you take a screenshot, it takes a picture of everything that's in your video cards memory, and at the time, all the x1900s and 7900s used the same memory. I'm not sure how memory would effect the polygons, but apparently it does. The only remedy to the problem is to upgrade to a next generation video card or just keep returning the one you have now every time the problem comes back.

[Tenelen]

I've got the same problem with my 7900gt. Mine came with stuck pixels I originally thought were on the monitor, until I took a screenshot with one of those dead pixels and it was still there. When you take a screenshot, it takes a picture of everything that's in your video cards memory, and at the time, all the x1900s and 7900s used the same memory. I'm not sure how memory would effect the polygons, but apparently it does. The only remedy to the problem is to upgrade to a next generation video card or just keep returning the one you have now every time the problem comes back.

Stuck pixels and Artifacting are two totally different things. He said that it started to happen, not that it always happened indicating that the card has been overheating and finally started to show because of too much heat.

[h4z4rd]

Yeah if your video drivers are all up to date and you are using the latest game patches and it's still artifacting, then there's some heat issues with the card. It may be as simple as getting a new heatsink/fan, or the card might have been overheated to an extent where it has damaged on-board components like the memory modules. In that case you would have to RMA it with the card manufacturer and get it repaired or replaced.