Gpu Dying?

Borden10 · 20 Jun 2019 at 01:03

Today this issue started occurring. My screen suddenly turns black and then reappears 1-2 seconds later and i get the message "Display driver stopped responding and has recovered" in the bottom left (taskbar). My computer was very dusty so i cleaned it and the issue still persists. I'm not sure what to do, i've tried following google help guidelines but nothing is working. If someone can help me i'd greatly appreciate it.

Specs:
Gpu: EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX780 Superclocked ACX Cooler 3GB GDDR5 Graphics Card (PCI Express 3.0, HDMI, DVI-I, DVI-D, Display Port, 384-Bit, 2560x1600, Nvidia 3D Vision Ready)
cpu: i5 4670k
motherboard: asus z97a
hdd: 1tb
ram: 8gb
OS: Windows 7 ultimate 64-bit.
direct x 11.
Monitor: UH85_U32H85xUM (DP) - using 3820x2160 32bit at 60hz
PSU: EVGA 600w Bronze PC power supply
Fan: Cooler master hyper 212 EVO
Msi afterburner: https://prnt.sc/nymos3

I've had this pc for 5 years, and it's worked perfectly fine until today. I'm not sure why my GPU is acting up, if my gpu is the issue as i'm not sure but from what i've read, it seems to be the problem. Also can not having the synaptics smbus driver installed cause this issue? ran a driverchecker and it told me i was missing that and also intel 8series/c220 chipset family sata ahci controller, though i don't know if these even have anything to do with my issue as these won't installed before and i had no issues until today. I've also turned powersaving off as i read somewhere that could cause this to happen, but that hasn't made any difference. Also i've installed the latest gpu driver which i did after the issue started occurring. Nothing was changed and suddenly this problem started so i'm sure it's not because of any changes. Every PC part is as bought, nothing is overclocked or anything like that but i think my gpu comes overclocked? not sure. Any help is appreciated, thanks. Also i'd like to add that i started up a game just now (mw3) on my pc and it's unplayable after a couple of minutes, huge black screens and artifacts start appearing, the map becomes transparent, so i'm suspecting that this issue is definitely my GPU and nothing to do with the PSU or any other component? I hope i can fix the gpu and don't have to buy a new one. And also the issue isn't happening constantly now, only sometimes when i'm watching a movie or youtube video and it'll break the player after a quick black screen for a second and then i'll just have to reload and it'll work for a while again.

Borden10 · 20 Jun 2019 at 15:01

Doogles said:
If temps are all good then it's either the PSU not supplying enough power/unstable or the GPU is gone, depending on how old the PSU is I'd upgrade it anyway and see if it fixes the issue, if not then you'll know the GPU is done for, nothing you can do to fix it really if that is the case.

I haven't upgraded any parts since i first bought and put together the pc in 2014. I don't want to waste buying a PSU if it's not the issue and the GPU is dying. If you take a look at msi afterburner, it shows temp right but it's stuck at the same numbers which isn't normal and doesn't move. Any reason why my GPU suddenly dying, was it because of dust buildup and me not cleaning earlier? i think it was a year when i last cleaned it before recently. Also wouldn't the PSU having issues not bringing enough power cause other issues aswell?
Edit: i just opened up misafterburner and it was set at around 600 bottom and around 800 top, my screen went black for a second again and right after, the bottom number was 3001, not sure what this means but i hope you can tell me.
https://prnt.sc/o4f413
and now it's back to 324 top and 324 bottom, am i right in thinking the spike to 3001 is power issue or just the card resetting?

Borden10 · 20 Jun 2019 at 16:01

labcoattech said:
Create a bootable linux USB flash drive and see if the issue still occurs, if it does then it does sound like a component on the graphics card is on it's way out.

Sure i will try this but i don'tr see why booting up with linux will change anything?

Borden10 · 20 Jun 2019 at 16:02

labcoattech said:
It will confirm if the issue is hardware related then software.

I see, i'll try to find a usb now and do as you said and will post here, thanks for your help!

Borden10 · 21 Jun 2019 at 01:24

darael said:
Just to rule the PSU out, can you post a screenshot of your voltages from hardware monitoring software? If you have a multimeter, better still.

http://prntscr.com/o4mh3f
http://prntscr.com/o4mh9t
Someone told me to uninstall and clean install my gpu driver so i did that and now i've reinstalled and dloaded this app and these are my temps. I will try what labcoattech suggested tomorrow since i don't have any usb available to me today.

Borden10 · 22 Jun 2019 at 00:09

Guys it's getting really bad. Just now the entire graphics went, chrome, taskbar everything just displaying whiteness and not what should be showing there so i had to restart my pc manually and not sure what to do now.

Borden10 · 22 Jun 2019 at 13:30

labcoattech said:
If you have onboard graphics you could try removing the GPU from the PC and see if you get any issues.

Is it possible to use onboard graphics without removing the GPU? Also can onboard graphics sustain a 4k 32in monitor?

Borden10 · 23 Jun 2019 at 15:36

Zernath said:
That to me sounds like a dying GPU. Try running onboard graphics as others have suggested, and that will confirm it one way or the other.

Removing the graphics driver using DDU, would mean onboard graphics are enabled, so i should remove via ddu in safe mode, reboot into regular mode and see if it still occurs right? Because when i removed the gpu drivers using ddu just recently when someone recommended it, the screen resolution changed and i don't think there was a 4k optionso this could be a possibility instead of physically removing the graphics card.

Borden10 · 24 Jun 2019 at 22:33

azazl187 said:
If it's not display driver then it's likely to be the card. Just make sure your cables and properly connected as well

Will double check all my wires are connected properly but i don't think this is a wire issue due to how the issue occurs and the wires not being changed or moved at all, if the wires were an issue, it would constantly be happening, yet it only happens when a gpu intense task is occurring, e.g. netflix/games etc. If i sit at desktop with no apps open, it doesn't happen.

Borden10 · 24 Jun 2019 at 22:34

labcoattech said:
Removing the graphics driver does not mean your PC switches over to onboard graphics, it will still use the external graphics card but at a lower resolution because the drivers are not installed.

Only way to test is to physically remove the external graphics card, connect your monitor to the HDMI / DisplayPort on the motherboard and then test.

I see. I will have to remove the GPU then, i'm not an expert but will look at some youtube tutorials on how to remove/attach, and by doing this i can also do the instructions Wookie87 has told me to do which require me to remove the GPU/check the heatsink. A relative of mine came ovver to my house and put the PC together so i'm not that familiar with pc building etc but i can check youtube and see how it goes.

Borden10 · 24 Jun 2019 at 22:41

wookiee87 said:
when you cleaned the pc did you remove the gpu heatsink and give it a really good clean?, during this stage did you look at the thermal paste on the core, if it looks like its dried up then the core may be overheating even at idle speeds the 780's boost algorithm works diffently to newer gen cards.
check the ram thermal pads as if they have dried up that will cause the ram to overheat, (but if the pads are dry then the damage may already have been done)
causing wierd glitching even at idle speeds.

failing all of the above try rolling back your drives i know nvidia does relase drivers that work for current gen gpu's but getting them to work on older cards can be very hard and can lead to all sorts of problems, which may make you think oh crap my card is dying when its just the updated driver.

In the event that the older driver roll back doesnt work then you card may very well be on the way out so look at a replacment soon before it does die

I cleaned it using a air duster, it was very dusty so i just sprayed the contained air to remove dust all over the GPU/Motherboard and in the case. I didn't actually remove any parts, just opened the case up and air dusted it as much as i could. I am not familiar with GPU heatsink or RAM/Core Thermal paste, i'm assuming you mean the processor when you say "core"? wasn't aware the processor had thermal paste on it. I will tomorrow open up my pc and look at some videos today to see how i can disconnect/remove the GPU and see if i'm able to locate and find out if the thermal paste on the core is dried up, same for the ram thermal pads. Will be difficult as i'm not familiar with custom builds or how to remove/add them but i can learn quickly and see if the drying up is true or not. If the ram thermal pads are dried up, that's fine i suppose as i will then have located the issue and can replace it and move. Ram is much cheaper than GPU's so that's why i guess better than nothing. As for the drivers, i was having this issue while having an old stable driver version installed that i've been using for quite some time. I even installed new version and the issue continued and then uninstalling it, somehow an older version 399 was installed when i checked device manager, it must have reverted back to that i think when the installation didn't install/uninstall correctly when i rebooted as i got the black screen because i didn't uninstall in safe mode and did it manually instead of DDU. You can only go a certain amount of back for drivers, i've installed some that were released months ago and no difference. Before i make arrangements to get an ew GPU, i want to make sure it's actually the GPU and not my ram/core actually failing aswell. There may even be power issues as none of the parts have been replaced since i bought them 5 years ago. Thanks for your advice, i will open it up and try see the things you listed tomorrow after youtube videos. I have a brand new evga 1080ti that i can use but first need to confirm the issue and i'm not even sure if the 1080ti fits in my case or is compatible with my parts.

Borden10 · 24 Aug 2019 at 02:32

Yes i agree that my 780 after constant usage of 5 years has gotten to the stage of needing to be replaced. Luckily for me i have a brand new evga gtx 1080ti that i have in my closet for over a year, just sitting there. Now before i install this card, i was wondering if it will bottleneck any of my other components and if not then which would you recommend i upgrade to get the most out of the 1080ti. Not sure if i want to keep the 1080ti or sell it and get a cheaper £200 GPU since i'm not a hardcore gamer, do sometimes play games on the odd occassion but my screen is 4k 32inches and at 4k resolution the 1080ti will help a lot, not just with gaming. I don't do video processing or anything cpu/gpu intensive, just browsing/movies and the occasional gaming. Also the issue that if i sell the 1080ti, i'll be forced to upgrade sooner rather than later if i buy a cheaper gpu to replace my 780, was looking at 1060 6gb. Any thoughts? Thanks for your help!