Distorted graphics

[Pho]

What appears to be happening is that when I'm playing some games in full-screen the graphics are distorted, all of them are fine in windowed mode. This seems to happen no matter which resolution I use, or what quality settings I have.

I thought I'd fixed it by forcing anti-aliasing in the nVidia control panel but it seems to have come back. Occasionally a reboot fixes it too. The card is an XFX 7900GS on Vista and I have the latest nVidia drivers.



Crop:


I get random blocks appearing over the screen and sometimes see wireframe in place of models.

This doesn't happen on all games, Quake Live, Neverwinter Nights etc are fine whereas BF2, Splinter Cell, SWAT4 or Gears of War have this problem - I think this may be a DirectX issue.

Any ideas?
Thanks.

 

[mmj_uk]

It looks like a faulty/overheating card to me.

The reason it may not be happening in all games is that it depends what part of the GPU is faulty and the ones you say it is fine in are older games which probably use less of the GPU.

Have you already installed the latest DirectX to rule that out?

 

[Pho]

Quake Live is new but is based on the Quake 3 engine, which I guess could mean it's old. The temperatures seem ok, but this happens as soon as I load the games, even if I force the fan to 100%.

I installed the latest DirectX and that didn't help either.

I guess it's time for a new graphics card then. The one in my laptop died a few weeks back too .

Not sure if it's any use but the images appear fine if I print-screen from my keyboard.

 

[Sweeney]

Its artifacting, usually happens when the memory is buggered. One of the ways in which it tells you if a ram clock rate is just a bit too much for it to handle.

Try lowering the graphics clock speeds, to check if it goes away (obviously, if its at stock speeds and isn't overheating the card needs replaced/rma'd)

 

[mmj_uk]

Quake Live is new but is based on the Quake 3 engine, which I guess could mean it's old. The temperatures seem ok, but this happens as soon as I load the games, even if I force the fan to 100%.

It could just be a faulty portion of the GPU that doesn't get exposed in all games then, if you can try the card in another computer to rule everything else in your machine out.

 

[Pho]

Well I just tried de-clocking it; it was running at 600Mhz core / 800Mhz (1600Mhz effective) memory which is how it must have shipped from the factory (it was pre-overclocked and at the same price I think).

I put the memory back down to what the 7900GS should be (450Mhz core and 660Mhz memory) and it seemed to work fine, so cheers for the suggestion.

Now I guess i need to decide whether I should get a new card, this one is starting to lack a little.

edit: I put it back up to the factory values and it also seems fine, now I'm really confused .

 

[Sweeney]

If its ok at stock speeds then try overclocking back up to a speed where it doesn't artifact, sounds like its had enough of the factory OC, still plenty room in between stock and factory settings

 

[Pho]

I think that may have just been coincidence, it's now doing it again. I've even tried putting it all the way down to 400Mhz core / 500 Mhz memory and I'm still getting it.

I guess my only option is to try it in another PC though it's somewhat of a hassle.

 

[Sweeney]

To completely rule it out, yeah try on a different pc. Tried changing drivers to see if that has any effect?

 

[Pho]

I've tried the latest (178.24) and ones from a few months back before I updated and they both seemed to have the same problem.

At least I can justify a new card now .

 

[Sweeney]

Latest are 180.48 (Theres also 180.60 CUDA release though)

If its doing it on stock then yeah i'd say so

 

[Pho]

They don't support my card it seems, guess my card really is old.

 

[Sweeney]

Ah i see, didn't realise that, my bad

Don't think its the cards age i think its just because the 180's were "Big Bang 2" in regards to performance increases and PhsyX/CUDA implementation