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4890 dead?

sja360

sja360

sja360

Soldato
Joined
28 Jul 2003
Posts
4,197
Location
Dundee
well after sort of leaving the computer sitting for a good 6 months i went to switch it on after setting it up again and it seems the graphics card is dead, the bios beeps indicate reseat the graphics card which i've done and i've tried the other pci-e slots as well and no luck.

i've disconnected the extra fans, hdd, dvd-rw and even disconnected the power to the graphics card. as the card would boot but it would just complain about how it needs more power to do graphics.

i just dont see how the card could have just simply died, it hadn't been overclocked and it wasn't used that much. any ideas?
 
Dust CAN cause short circuits in any electronics, give it a good clean out and reseat, also give your PCI-E slot a clean.
If all else fails, bake it in the oven, although, i'm not sure if it affects newer cards (newer than 8800's anyway).
 
cheers for the idea's, i'll try dusting it tomorrow and i think if it still doesnt work then i may try taking it to my brothers and plug it into his computer to basically find out for sure if its dead.
 
well i've dusted it down, re-applied thermal paste and also went to the great length of baking it in the oven for 5 mins at just under 200c. it still has the same beep from the motherboard saying it needs re-seated. i think i may try ripping the motherboard out and doing a testbed setup on the computer desk.
also will take it at the weekend to my brothers if all else fails. Real shame as the 4890 is a pretty decent card and finding a replacement at the same performance costs more now.
 
i checked out some comparisons and its not that big a leap for the amount of cash, plus i dont really use the computer that much for gaming at all.
i'm finding it hard to believe the graphics card just died like that. can i ask does anyone know if the pcb card was bent slightly due to the weight while sitting in the computer would cause any problems there?
 
sja360 said:
can i ask does anyone know if the pcb card was bent slightly due to the weight while sitting in the computer would cause any problems there?
Click to expand...

Mine sits a little bit bent under it's own weight near the PCI power in. Seems normal to me, my 4870 did it as well.
It is a shame, it's not a bad card, you can still pick them up for around £70-80 on a typical auction site though.
 
yea my thought though is that buying another 4890 is a bit pointless as it ran a bit noisy and hot and power hungry i think compared to even 5xxx series and especially the newer 6xxx series.
 
My 4870 was always sagging a bit. It died on sunday and I believe it was dust that killed it, as I had it supercooled so it wasn't overheating.
 
how would dust have killed it ? that kinda makes sense as it sat for 3 months in a cupboard that wasn't really ventilated or anything
 
Did you use anti static measures when handling the card? Or walking about in socks on your carpet while touching the card? Chances are it's just been killed by static.
 
I remember seeing artifacting on screen a few weeks back, shortly after doing a massive clearout of some stuff in the room which created an awful lot of dust. I should have heeded the warning and replaced the side cover which I'd left off. Not that it needed to be off, I simply hadn't bothered to put it back on since the last time I removed it for maintenance. If dust can short out circuits as Emphacy said, then I reckon that's what happened to mine.
 
nah i touched the inside of the chassis before unplugging and stuff. also i just switched on the pc after moving it out from the cupboard so it was like that before i opened it up.
 
well i tried it in my brothers pc and still nothing, the new (used) powercolor 4890 is running fine, i thought hmm try baking the old 4890 again, cant really lose out, i did and added it into the system and well lets say i now have crossfire..
i got a score of 18000 in 3dmark 06. i think i've misjudged the problem. its either the motherboard or psu. however for now i'll be happy to keep this pc running :p
 
yea it is now, wasnt before was sitting idle at about 35c. although i did fire up metro 2033 and it shutdown the computer after loading the save :o
so im leading to believe a psu issue perhaps. currently running a ocz 600w stealth x stream. i however dont know how old it is or how much of a beating its taken as i bought it second hand on here almost a year ago.

i'll need to thoroughly test it more to check its stable.
 
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