D601 error on XFX 4890

[xolotl]

I've just built a new PC with the following specs:

i7 920
Corsair Dominator 6gb
Asus P6T
XFX 4890 1gb XXX edition
Seasonic 700W PSU
Akasa Eclipse 62

It's been running fine for two days but now everytime I start a 3d application the system black screens and freezes. Reseting the PC is the only way to fix this.

I've tried reinstalling the drivers (9.6) but that didn't help. The card itself has never been overclocked.

The LED called D601 on the 4890 is lit up and from searching around this seems to suggest an issue with the VRMs on the card. As this light doesn't go away I'm guessing it's broken and time for an RMA? Any other possible fixes?

 

[rolypolyman]

Hi, Pretty sure the D601 led indicates temperature overheating problems.

 

[xolotl]

This link here seems to suggest it's the VDDC:
http://forums.amd.com/game/messagev...d=97885&STARTPAGE=3&FTVAR_FORUMVIEWTMP=Linear

Diagnostic LED meanings for the HD4890 card ...


D601: VDDC_FAULT

D1601: critical temperature fault

D1602: AUX Hot Plug/Unplug Fault (upper connector)

D1603: AUX Hot Plug/Unplug Fault (lower connector)

What's interesting is that now that I've left it turned off overnight the LED is no longer illuminated. I'll see what happens after some long gaming sessions today.

 

[Genoma]

what's the verdict? I'm having similar issues on my new i7 build with a 4870, Win7 - crashes in crysis and COD4, black screen, sound looping, need to reset pc.

Reading on the net, I've found suggestions to more power (PSU) and drivers but nobody seems to sort this out, one guy replaced the PSU and still had problems.

Not conclusive yet but I'm finding that lowering the GPU clock makes things stable for longer.

Starting to wish I ordered a nVidia card now...

Anybody with similar problems?

 

[xolotl]

I decided to RMA the card (from a competitor) and it's still going through that process as they initially didn't find a fault.

Allthough I don't have the links at hand my conclusion from research seems to be that that 4870/4890 refrence cards have a design flaw in the voltage regulators. In normal cards under normal situations this doesn't cause any problems. However, when the all aspects of the GPU are used in super intensive applications such as the burning mode of Furmark or OCCT instability can occur. This is more likely on factory overclocked cards such as the one I own as they draw more power.

The cause of this seems to be insufficient capacity in the VRMs presumably to save money in the production process. While most games wont cause all aspects of the GPU to be used at once when something does the VRMs are forced to work over the design capacity. You can see this in GPU-Z as their temperature can hit 150c whereas they're only rated for 127c. When playing COD:WAW they only hit 90c.

If I get a refund I'm going to get a GTX 275. While this problem isn't show stopping I personally think a stock graphics card should be able to run any application without crashing, regardless of whether these applications have any use bar stability testing.

 

[WJA96]

It's funny, but I just did a search on OCCT and this came up. I have just bought a BFG GTX295 H2OC and I thought I'd burn it in a bit and see what it did in OCCT, at which point it promptly crashed with VRM temperatures of 130C showing in the GPUz log.

Can anyone confirm if this is normal for OCCT or is my heatsink not mounted properly. This is a new card, it's the one that comes water-cooled from the factory and it was VERY expensive.